author
James Hardy Vaux
b. 1782
A transported convict turned pioneering memoirist, he left one of the earliest firsthand accounts of crime and punishment in colonial Australia. His 1819 memoir and slang glossary remain striking records of underworld life in the English-speaking world.
1 Audiobook
Memoirs of James Hardy Vaux. Written by himself.
by James Hardy Vaux
About the author
Born in Surrey in 1782 and baptized on May 20 of that year, James Hardy Vaux became known for a life that repeatedly crossed paths with the law. He was transported from England to Australia three times, yet his literacy and clerical skill also helped him find work in colonial administration.
Vaux is best remembered for Memoirs of James Hardy Vaux, first published in 1819. The book is often noted as the first full-length autobiography written in Australia, and its Vocabulary of the Flash Language is also regarded as the first dictionary compiled there. Together, they offer a rare, vivid look at criminal slang, prison life, and the convict world of the early nineteenth century.
Details of his final years are uncertain, but records suggest he was alive after 1841. What lasts is the unusual power of his writing: part confession, part social history, and part survival story.