#william swallow

Gaolbird is a biographical picture storybook about the life and times of William Walker, known better as William Swallow convict and pirate. It tells an interconnected story of Popjoy fellow convict. The book focuses largely on the seizure of the convict transport ship the Cyprus in 1828.

The style is gorgeous. Double page spreads with plenty of detail tell the story of Swallow while small more comic style windows tell Popjoy’s tale. The copperplate writing which is becoming of the time isn’t the easiest thing to read, though it is only used for feature pieces.

This is another book using animals as a device to tell a story about humans to children is a way they may better understand. The violence is comedic. The convicts are made into animals, everyone else remains human. While all the convicts aside from Swallow and Popjoy are the same yellow birds they are individualised. All the humans are quite different, the more it is looked at the more detail will be seen. Particularly on the busy scenes.

Gaolbird is an excellent book if you are taking a child to Port Arthur Penal Colony or the Old Baily, given Sarah Island no longer exists. Particularly if going to Port Arthur Penal Colony and taking the Isle of the Dead tour, that is where William Swallow will be buried. It could allow for a reasonable introduction into the society that the locations came from.

Follow up with A–Z of Convicts in Van Diemen's Land (the second in Barnard non-series about convicts in Australia)