PLACE & DATE OF TRIAL At the Somerset Lent Assizes, held at TauntonCastle on 30th March 1786.
CRIME & SENTENCE: For feloniously breaking and entering the swellinghouse of Nathaniel Shorney at the parish of Over Stovey about 10 in theforenoon of the 24th day of September last no person being therein andstealing thereout two linen aprons and other goods value 18 shillings,the property of Jane Shorney. Sentenced to be hanged. Reprieved, to betransported for 7 years.
Mary Phillips broke into a house at Over Stowey, Somerset, and stole twolinen aprons and other goods. For which she was sentenced to death atTaunton on 20th March 1786 . On 13th April she was reprieved to sevenyears transportation. On 21st November ordered to the hulk "Dunkirk" shewas received there on the 4th, aged 32. On 11th March 1787 she wasembarked on "Charlotte". At Rio on 11th August she was one of six womentransferred to "Friendship" in an exchange, to the disgust of RalphClarke who felt they had received six of the worst from the "Charlotte"which "I don't think is right". At the Cape of Good Hope on 28th she wasmoved to "Prince of Wales" when "Friendship" was cleared to make room forthe stock brought there.
At Port Jackson in November 1788 Mary was sharing a tent with Mary Turnerand offered to allow Private James Baker to spend the night with herwhile the man she usually lived with was away up the harbour. She laterrefused a similar request from Private Thomas Bullmore, who created adisturbance leading to a fight with Baker and a lot of abuse for Mary,struck several times by Bullmore.
On 4th February 1789 Mary was ordered to 25 lashes for baking her flouron an iron spade over a fire. On 5th September that year a son by PrivateAlexander McDonald was baptized James. McDonald did not go with her toNorfolk Island when she and the child went by "Sirus" on 4th March 1790.She is not on record at Norfolk as receiving a sow, perhaps because bythen she was living with James Riley {Reiley} another marine, who hadbeen on "Sirius" for Norfolk Island in 1790 {though there is a suggestionthat the daughter Sarah she bore in November 1791 was by Thomas Spenceralso having gone to Norfolk Island by "Sirus" at that time}. At any rate,Mary is recorded with James Reiley and three children in June 1794{including John born 1793}, and may have remained with him until hisdeath in October 1801. She remained at Norfolk Island until she left forPort Dalrymple, VDL {Tasmania},