Emotions of Activism and Exile: A study on Chartist and Young Ireland political prisoners transported to the Australian colonies in the nineteenth century

This thesis examines the experiences and impacts on Australian democracy of over a hundred political prisoners linked to two radical reform movements in the United Kingdom, Chartism and Young Ireland, who were transported to the Australian colonies of New South Wales, Van Diemen’s Land and Western Australia between 1839-1854. Though traditional scholarship has held that political prisoners generally did not engage in politics or make an impact while in the Australian colonies, this thesis overturns this consensus through a transnational and conceptual focus on emotion ‘from below’ to demonstrate resistance and activism for the realisation of democratic ideals.