Many of the
soldiers being allowed to occupy houses for their families in the
vicinity of the barracks, the commanding officer was desired to appoint
his own watchmen for the military division of the town, and to order them
to report to him.
A few days previous to the arrival of the _Sylph_, the Colonial
schooner returned from Norfolk Island, and brought letters from the
_Reliance_, _Supply_, and _Britannia_, which ships left that
island on the 25th of the last month, and the day following her
arrival (the 14th) Richard Atkins, esq was directed to officiate as
judge-advocate of the colony, in the absence of the gentleman who had
filled that situation since the first establishment of the settlement,
and who had now proceeded to England in the _Britannia_.
This judicial appointment having taken place, a criminal court was held
on the 23rd, and continued sitting, by adjournment, until the 29th, when
sentence of death was passed upon eight prisoners who were capitally
convicted; one, of the wilful murder of the man whose body had been found
on the north shore the 16th of last month, and seven of robbing the
public store-houses at Sydney, and the settlement at the Hawkesbury.
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