Campbell Town convict bricks going back in place

Northern Midlands Council has confirmed that Campbell Town’s historic convict brick trail will be reinstated as part of Stage 1 of the Campbell Town Streetscape Development.

The bricks were temporarily removed and placed in storage to protect them during road and footpath construction but then became the subject of a massive community campaign when it was revealed they would be reinstated as a series of "ship-shaped" clusters of about 100 bricks scattered around the township.

Residents, business owners and descendants of the convicts were upset that the continuous nature of the trail - which many used as a memorial space - was being broken up.

The names on the bricks belong to individual convicts who were transported to Australia between 1788 and 1868 and the project was originally a privately run initiative where descendants of convicts paid to have a brick created.

Each brick provides a snapshot of a person's life and forced journey to Australia, typically including the name, age at time of transportation, ship name, date of arrival, crime committed and sentence length.

The first brick was laid by Mayor Kim Polley on August 28, 2003, and is uniquely dedicated to all those who died during the voyage and never reached Australia.

Johnson, Slater, Anster, Stenson, Lettice are just a few of the surnames that feature in the trail.

To maintain safety and minimise disruption, bricks will not be reinstated across property access points or in areas commonly used by businesses for outdoor dining, signage, temporary infrastructure and will avoid underground services where required.

Work to lay new foundations for the brick trail has already begun and will continue over the next six months, in conjunction with the ongoing Campbell Town Streetscape works.

Northern Midlands Council mayor Mary Knowles said Council had always been committed to reinstating the trail.

“We listened to the community and the bricks will be once again run the length of the main street right down to the Red Bridge,” she said.

Ms Knowles also said adding more bricks in the future was not off the table, and there are some names that were supposed to be included originally that weren’t and they will be added.

“The street redevelopment is coming along nicely with no more angled parking, plus we’ve decided to not mark all of the spaces along the street so caravans and trucks can still pull up further along from the central business area,” she said.