YORK, WESTERN AUSTRALIA—Sean Winter of the University of Western Australia has investigated the Toodyay and York convict hiring depots in Western Australia, and found differences between them and the convict system in New South Wales. “It was set up 60 years after New South Wales and under a completely different penal theory,” he told Phys.org. Winter and his team used old maps, ground-penetrating radar, and a magnetometer to look for the remains of buildings erected by the convicts at the depots and to target areas for excavation. “There is no evidence of walls or any kind of restrictive structures around the outside of the depots. They weren’t locked up at night, they could come and go as they pleased, and they were even able to do things like access guns so they could go hunting. We found that there was a lot of alcohol consumption,” he added.
