Convict-Era Port Arthur
Misery of the Deepest Dye
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Convict-Era Port Arthur
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Narrated by:
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Ant Neate
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By:
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David W. Cameron
About this listen
Detailing the development of the prison and its outlying stations, including its dreaded coal mines and providing an account of the changing views to convict rehabilitation, Convict-Era Port Arthur focuses in on a number of individuals, telling the story through their eyes. Charles O'Hara Booth, a significant commandant of Port Arthur; Mark Jeffrey, a convict who became the grave digger on the Island of the Dead and William Thompson, who arrived just as the new probation system started and who was forced to work in the treacherous coal mines.
Convict-Era Port Arthur will for the first time provide a comprehensive history of Port Arthur, its horrors and its changing role over a 50-year period. In gripping detail, using the experiences and words of the convicts, soldiers and administrators who spent time there, David W. Cameron brings to life these deeply miserable days.
©2021 David W. Cameron (P)2021 Penguin Random House AustraliaListeners also enjoyed...
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 376
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 372
It started in 1845 and lasted six years. Before it was over, more than one million men, women, and children starved to death and another million fled the country. Measured in terms of mortality, the Great Irish Potato Famine was one of the worst disasters in the 19th century-it claimed twice as many lives as the American Civil War. A perfect storm of bacterial infection, political greed, and religious intolerance sparked this catastrophe.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Unforgettable, Haunting, and a Compelling Warning
- By Carole T. on 08-22-12
By: John Kelly
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The Confidence Men
- How Two Prisoners of War Engineered the Most Remarkable Escape in History
- By: Margalit Fox
- Narrated by: Richard Elfyn
- Length: 9 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 171
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 150
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Story4 out of 5 stars 150
Imprisoned in a remote Turkish POW camp during World War I, having survived a two-month forced march and a terrifying shootout in the desert, two British officers, Harry Jones and Cedric Hill, join forces to bamboozle their iron-fisted captors. To stave off despair and boredom, Jones takes a handmade Ouija board and fakes elaborate séances for his fellow prisoners. Word gets around, and one day, an Ottoman official approaches Jones with a query: Could Jones contact the spirit world to find a vast treasure rumored to be buried nearby?
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3 out of 5 stars
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Too long
- By Ross DeSautel on 07-16-22
By: Margalit Fox
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The Catalpa Rescue
- The Gripping Story of the Most Dramatic and Successful Prison Break in Australian History
- By: Peter FitzSimons
- Narrated by: Michael Carman
- Length: 16 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 112
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 98
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 98
The incredible true story of one of the most extraordinary and inspirational prison breaks in history. Boston, 1869. Members of the Clan na Gael - agitators for an Irish republic - hatch a daring plan to free six Irish political prisoners from the most remote gaol on earth, Fremantle Prison in Western Australia. Under the guise of a whale hunt, Captain Anthony sets sail on the Catalpa, risking his life to rescue the men from the prison, known among the inmates as 'a living tomb'.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Terrific yarn
- By Garrett on 05-13-19
By: Peter FitzSimons
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Forgotten Patriots
- The Untold Story of American Prisoners During the Revolutionary War
- By: Edwin G. Burrows
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 85
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 54
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Story4 out of 5 stars 53
Forgotten Patriots is the first-ever account of what took place in these hellholes. The result is a unique perspective on the Revolutionary War as well as a sobering commentary on how Americans have remembered our struggle for independence---and how much we have forgotten.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great audiobook
- By Phillip Goodson on 05-15-09
By: Edwin G. Burrows
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Panama Fever
- By: Matthew Parker
- Narrated by: Oliver Wyman, William Dufris
- Length: 17 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 130
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 49
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Story4 out of 5 stars 49
The building of the Panama Canal was one of the greatest engineering feats in human history. A tale of exploration, conquest, money, politics, and medicine, Panama Fever charts the challenges that marked the long, labyrinthine road to the building of the canal. Drawing on a wealth of new materials and sources, Matthew Parker brings to life the men who recognized the impact a canal would have on global politics and economics.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Good book, marginal narrator
- By CmH - HB, CA on 06-02-08
By: Matthew Parker
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The Knights of Bushido
- A History of Japanese War Crimes During World War II
- By: Lord Russell of Liverpool
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 370
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 327
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 326
The war crimes trials at Nuremberg and Tokyo meted out the Allies' official justice; Lord Russell of Liverpool's sensational bestselling books on the Axis' war crimes decided the public's opinion. The Knights of Bushido, Russell's shocking account of Japanese brutality in the Pacific in World War II, describes how the noble founding principles of the Empire of Japan were perverted by the military into a systematic campaign of torture, murder, starvation, rape, and destruction. Notorious incidents like the Nanking Massacre and the Bataan Death March emerge as merely part of a pattern of human rights abuses. Undoubtedly formidable soldiers, the Japanese were terrible conquerors. Their conduct in the Pacific is a harrowing example of the doctrine of mutual destruction carried to the extreme, and begs the question of what is acceptable—and unacceptable—in total war.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Not for the faint of heart
- By Amazon Customer on 07-25-13
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Andersonville Diary
- A True Account
- By: John L. Ransom
- Narrated by: Adrian Cronauer
- Length: 7 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 109
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 49
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 50
Almost 10 times as many men died in the Civil War prison camps of the North and South as were killed at the Battle of Gettysburg. One such camp was Andersonville, where Union soldiers like Brigade Quartermaster John L. Ransom of the Ninth Michigan Cavalry, were subjected to hunger, disease, cruelty, and despair. Captured in November 1863, Ransom kept his spirits and courage up enough to survive and record this compelling true account of his experiences.
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4 out of 5 stars
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It was an awful time
- By Randolph on 10-11-03
By: John L. Ransom
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Hong Kong
- By: Jan Morris
- Narrated by: Wanda McCaddon
- Length: 12 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 82
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 73
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 73
Hong Kong is the world’s most exciting city, at once fascinating and exasperating, a tangle of contradictions. It is a dazzling amalgam of conspicuous consumption and primitive poverty, the most architecturally incongruous yet undeniably beautiful urban panorama of all. Through firsthand reportage, world-renowned travel writer Jan Morris takes us through the crowded streets of this enigmatic city, offering the most insightful and comprehensive study of Hong Kong thus far. She reviews Hong Kong’s early days as a British opium port controlled by pirates, cutthroats, and scoundrel tycoons, and looks ahead to the city’s future.
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3 out of 5 stars
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An interesting but mild disappointment
- By Jeanette Finan on 06-11-14
By: Jan Morris
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The Scourge of the Swastika
- A History of Nazi War Crimes During World War II
- By: Lord Russell of Liverpool
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 364
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 327
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 323
When discussing the German war crimes of the Second World War, modern histories have focused on the Holocaust. While the Final Solution was a unique and unparalleled horror, German atrocities did not end there. The Nazis terrorized their own citizens, tortured and murdered POWs, and carried out countless executions throughout occupied Europe. Lord Russell of Liverpool was part of the legal team that brought Nazi war criminals to justice, and from this first-hand position, he published the best-selling The Scourge of the Swastika in 1954. Liverpool shows that the actions of the Third Reich, were illegal, not merely immoral.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Lord Russell's Warning From History
- By Kindle Customer on 05-24-16
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London in the Nineteenth Century
- By: Jerry White
- Narrated by: Neil Gardner
- Length: 21 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 54
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 46
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Story4 out of 5 stars 47
Jerry White's London in the Nineteenth Century is the richest and most absorbing account of the city's greatest century by its leading expert. London in the nineteenth century was the greatest city mankind had ever seen. Its growth was stupendous. Its wealth was dazzling. Its horrors shocked the world. This was the London of Blake, Thackeray and Mayhew, of Nash, Faraday and Disraeli. Most of all it was the London of Dickens. As William Blake put it, London was 'a Human awful wonder of God'.
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2 out of 5 stars
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SO DETAILED..SO VERY VERY DETAILED.
- By Count B on 06-16-19
By: Jerry White
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Batavia's Graveyard
- The True Story of the Mad Heretic Who Led History's Bloodiest Mutiny
- By: Mike Dash
- Narrated by: Guy Bethell
- Length: 12 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 119
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 103
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 104
It was the autumn of 1628, and the Batavia, the Dutch East India Company's flagship, was loaded with a king's ransom in gold, silver, and gems for her maiden voyage to Java. The Batavia was the pride of the company's fleet, a tangible symbol of the world's richest and most powerful commercial monopoly. She set sail with great fanfare, but the Batavia and her gold would never reach Java.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Perhaps the best book ever
- By Ray928 on 03-12-19
By: Mike Dash
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The Famine Plot
- England's Role in Ireland's Greatest Tragedy
- By: Tim Pat Coogan
- Narrated by: Roger Clark
- Length: 11 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 140
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 127
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 125
In this sweeping history, Ireland's best-known historian, Tim Pat Coogan, tackles the dark history of the Irish Famine and argues that it constituted one of the first acts of genocide. In what the Boston Globe calls "his greatest achievement", Coogan shows how the British government hid behind the smoke screen of laissez faire economics, the invocation of divine providence, and a carefully orchestrated publicity campaign, allowing more than a million people to die agonizing deaths and driving a further million into emigration.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Atrocities abound.
- By GMJ on 06-05-18
By: Tim Pat Coogan
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Love and Hate in Jamestown
- John Smith, Pocahontas, and the Start of a New Nation
- By: David A. Price
- Narrated by: Josh Innerst
- Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 64
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 56
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 56
Drawing on period letters and chronicles, and on the papers of the Virginia Company - which financed the settlement of Jamestown - David Price tells a tale of cowardice and courage, stupidity and brilliance, tragedy and costly triumph. He takes us into the day-to-day existence of the English men and women whose charge was to find gold and a route to the Orient, and who found, instead, hardship and wretched misery. Death, in fact, became the settlers' most faithful companion, and their infighting was ceaseless.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Five Star History!
- By Damian on 08-13-23
By: David A. Price
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The Pioneers
- The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West
- By: David McCullough
- Narrated by: John Bedford Lloyd
- Length: 10 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 5,040
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 4,353
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Story4 out of 5 stars 4,325
The number one New York Times best seller by Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David McCullough rediscovers an important chapter in the American story that's "as resonant today as ever" (The Wall Street Journal) - the settling of the Northwest Territory by courageous pioneers who overcame incredible hardships to build a community based on ideals that would define our country.
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5 out of 5 stars
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i would prefer david reading it
- By hooterwah on 05-07-19
By: David McCullough
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Slave Life in Georgia
- A Narrative of the Life, Sufferings, and Escape of John Brown, a Fugitive Slave, Now in England
- By: John Brown
- Narrated by: Damian Salandy
- Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 38
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 32
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 32
This account of the life, sufferings, and escape of a fugitive slave was published in London in 1855 by the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society. It is the autobiography of a simple, sturdy man who spent 30 years as a slave in Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Slave Life in Georgia
- By Deedra on 03-27-19
By: John Brown