AustLit

‘Around the turn of the 19th century a young Jew, Jacob Isaacs, and his son, Benjamin, were enduring the oppressive social and economic conditions in the east London district of Whitechapel. They ranked at the low end of the social scale and lived chiefly by their wits in the alleys and lanes of Georgian London. Jacob had been trained as a hatter but, driven by pervasive poverty and an eye for quick gain, he engaged in criminal activities that resulted in his transportation, on two separate occasions, to the penal colony, of New South Wales. Benjamin avoided the orientation of his father when a charitable London institution intervened to instill Christian beliefs, and to provide an education and an apprenticeship in the printing trade. He migrated free to New South Wales where he was responsible for establishing the first newspaper at Parramatta and Bathurst. In a career spanning a lifetime dedicated to the printed word, he was also associated with the early newspaper press of Sydney, Windsor, Goulburn and New Zealand. This account investigates their lives from the adverse circumstances of Whitechapel to the opportunities presented in a new land half a world away.’ (Publisher’s blurb)