People Australia

Thomas Dukes was a marine in the 14th (Portsmouth) Company when he arrived at Sydney aboard the Sirius in January 1788 as part of the First Fleet. He received 12 lashes for insolence and striking his sergeant on 13 August 1787 and a further 12 lashes on 12 May 1788 at Port Jackson. He was sent to Norfolk Island on the Golden Grove in October 1788. He remained on the island until he was discharged from Sirius on 12 March 1791.

Dukes decided to settle in the colony and was granted 60 acres at Arthur's Vale, Queenborough, on Norfolk Island. He may have married a female convict whose first name was Ann in the mass wedding ceremony on the island in November 1791.

Dukes left the island in March 1793 on the Chesterfield for Port Jackson and signed up for the New South Wales Corps on 6 May 1793; he was discharged in 1798. He gave up his land on Norfolk Island and received a 25 acre grant at Bulanaming on 9 December 1793. In July 1800 Dukes was a district constable at Bankstown where he rented a farm; he was living with a woman — possibly Ann.

No further records have been found for either Thomas or Ann Dukes. 

* information from Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet (1989), p 110 and HMS Sirius 1786-1790 https://hmssirius.com.au/thomas-dukes-private-marines-14th-portsmouth-company-hms-sirius-1788/ — accessed 7 August 2020