This page updated 25 November 2006

Please note: E-mail response to this website has indicated that some netsurfers do not realise that this website has a total of 71++ files. Please navigate around the website to that extent to ensure you get the best from it - Ed

[Check the Acknowledgements / Credits page here to see who helped this project to completion Acknowledgements ] [You are now on a page filed as (aboutbc.htm] [See also, Contents of this entire website-book]

Note: December 2001: An Item ("Transportation on the Net") on this website appeared in Newswrite, monthly journal of the New South Wales Writers' Centre, No. 111, Dec. 2001/Jan. 2002, p. 9. See their website at: http://www.nswwriterscentre.org.au/

The Blackheath Connection: a new view of the "founding" of European Australia as a British convict colony - a review of the history of the transportation of British convicts 1717-1810.
The Blackheath Connection... derived from discoveries made in London in 1989 by Dan Byrnes and Neil Rhind

Prepare to learn much about the sweep of events which from 1786 linked a long-lost Australia to the rest of the world...
the how and why of a global network of shipping, the world-wide web of its day...
The Blackheath Connection aims to retell the earlier stories of how Australia - the continent - was introduced to the rest of the world... Revised or new material is presented on settlers/planters on Jamaica after the 1690s Scottish Darien Company debacle; the Boston Tea Party; Britain's handling of convicts from 1776; how London aldermen reacted as the First Fleet to Australia was being mounted; how London-based merchants avoided new opportunities in the Pacific region; new material on maritime history.

Note1: Some chapters in this website book are left overlong to discourage illegal copying by netsurfers

Note2: This website is not for readers who are not serious about early Australian-European history, or matters related

Note: Research for this project was supported in 1993 by a Writer's Project Grant from the Literature Board of the Australia Council for the Arts, following which the author returned to university to complete an Honours degree in History. The orignal website on the project has been created/updated since March 2000. This is a minimally-modified mirror copy.

Comments and suggestions about this website book
can be e-mailed to The Blackheath Connection webmaster... Dan Byrnes

Dan Byrnes is a former journalist/sub-editor (with earlier experience in advertising/copywriting), and a poet and historian with wide-ranging interests.

Since 1996 he's been fascinated with the Internet as an information-delivery system, websites and associated technology including database development.

His five websites (offering 290+ pages) are designed for quick download and page print-out.

His qualifications are:
1995 - Honours Degree (History) from The University of New England.
1999 - Certificate III in Information Technology (Computing and Multimedia) (VETAB Accredited).

He is a former board member of New England Writers' Centre and has been active in literary and media circles in Armidale and the region.

He is listed in The Oxford Literary Guide To Australia (1987) (under "Tamworth") and in the 1988 edition of The International Authors and Writers Who's Who.

He lately maintains his own five websites and various other websites

He trades under the business name: Dan Byrnes Word Factory. ABN: 27 526 974 374.
Contact information: (If in doubt, just look for "dan" + "byrnes" on Google search engine)
Dan Byrnes,
Unit 4,
145 Marsh Street,
Armidale NSW 2350 Australia.
Telephone: (02) 6771 5243.

Novelist William Makepeace Thackeray.

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