An early Australian born cabinet maker: William James Packer (known as James).(Biography)

We are often given the impression that the first settlement of Sydney was a make shift camp and was often referred to as a 'penal settlement'. That was the name given by those in England who in 1787 were opposed to the settlement of New South Wales or 'Botany Bay'. The name 'penal settlement' has stuck in the minds of historians down to the present day. Sydney was never officially called a 'penal settlement.' It was a colony set up to substantiate Britain's claim to the eastern half of the continent then known as New Holland and to forestall the French. Convicts were used as the first settlers and a troop of Marines were sent to guard the colony. The other ranks of the Marines were offered the chance to stay in the colony and receive land grants. Quite a large number did remain and so became the first 'flee' settlers. They with the convicts were to be offered land grants.

One of these Marines who remained was Private William Baxter who came out in the Alexander of the First Fleet. In 1790 he was sent to Norfolk Island when the colony was in great trouble because of the shortage of food. There he had a son by Mary Watts who was given the names of John Matthew Hunter Baxter. He spent a further time on Norfolk Island but there is no further news of the son. His wife and daughter Sarah came out in 1792.

In 1790 Sgt. William Packer arrived in Sydney with the New South Wales Corps. A son was born to William Packer and Sarah Baxter in 1794. These two immigrants were married in 1801 so the son William James was born out of wedlock, a not unusual occurrence at the time. By the time of the parents marriage William Packer (no longer a sergeant) was running a general store in Pitt Row and by 1803 had one of the largest businesses in Sydney. He had been discharged from the NSW Corps by the time of his marriage He received a land grant of 100 acres at Cooks River at the time of Governor Macquarie and bought other properties. They lived in comfortable circumstances so the young boy was not one of the poor Currency Lads. We do not know what education he received but he must have ben taught the basics of reading and writing.

In 1807 the boy William James Packer (known as James) was apprenticed in Sydney to Laurence Butler an Irish political prisoner transported for life. Butler had a large furniture workshop and had four apprentices all Australian born. These Currency Lads were in addition to James Packer, James Morris, Thomas Bradley and Thomas Upton. Butler probably had also a number of Journeymen working for him.

James Packer was aged about 13 when indentured for seven years in 1807 and in the musters of the colony in 1814 was still an apprentice to Laurence Butler. His father died in 1816 by which time young James would have completed his apprenticeship and inherited his father's property according to his will. His mother had taken over and run the business during the father's long illness. The family lived in fairly wealthy circumstances, so he was not a poor Currency Lad.

The young man left the ...