Charles O'Hara Booth

Charles O'Hara Booth (31 August 1800 – 11 August 1851), was an English-born army officer who served in India, the West Indies and England for a total of 18 years before being posted to Van Diemen's Land, Australia (later to be named Tasmania). He remained there for a further 18 years, first as commandant of Port Arthur penal settlement and subsequently as the head of an orphan's school.

In 1815, aged 15, he was sent by his parents to India in the care of an uncle. The following year he joined the 53rd Regiment as an ensign. Three years later he returned to England and applied for a commission in the 21st Fusiliers. From 1820 to 1827 he served in the West Indies before returning to England. With the rank of captain, in 1833 he arrived with his regiment in Van Diemen's Land. He was soon appointed commandant of the principal convict settlement, Port Arthur, and he also controlled all convict stations on the Tasman Peninsula. His position gave him entrée to the upper levels of Van Diemen's Land's small, exclusive society, in which he quickly became well-liked and respected.

In 1840, changes in penal organisation under the probation system confined his jurisdiction to Port Arthur and the adjacent juvenile establishment at Point Puer. Under his command the township of Port Arthur was laid out, small harbours were constructed and swamps reclaimed, a government farm was set up, a convict-powered tramway was constructed, and a semaphore-signal telegraph system was established for faster communications, especially to capture escaped prisoners. in New Town, a suburb of Hobart. He died suddenly from a heart attack at his home in New Town on 11 August 1851, aged 50. His wife and two daughters returned to England in 1852.