People Australia

Aaron Davis/Davies (c.1761-1814) and Thomas Crowder were found guilty on 29 March 1785 at the Bristol Quarter Sessions of the theft of watches and rings from a man. Sentenced to 7 years transportation he was sent to the Ceres hulk at the end of 1785, where he remained until he embarked for New South Wales on the Alexander in January 1787, arriving in Sydney in January 1788 as part of the First Fleet.

Davis was making bread for Sirius in 1788. He was sent to Norfolk Island on the Sirius in March 1790. By March 1791 he had cleared 24 rods on a one acre Sydney Town lot and was supporting two other people: Mary Walker and Sarah Lee who was aged 4 in 1787. Davis had at least three children with Walker. He prospered on Norfolk Island and in March 1796 leased a town lot at Sydney Town perhaps for his bakery, or for his import and export business. He had a son Francis with Elizabeth Hosier in September 1804.

Davis returned to England in 1805 leaving his property with James Mitchell, a free settler who had married Sarah Lee. Davis petitioned for permission to return to New South Wales with his two daughters in 1813 as he had suffered severe financial losses. He died in 1814 before this could happen.

* information from Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet (1989), pp 96-97