To The Outskirts of Habitable Creation: Americans and Canadians Transported to Tasmania in the 1840s

One of American history’s “lost stories,” To the Outskirts of Habitable Creation is the fascinating account of American and Canadian convicts exiled to an Australian penal colony. In 1837 an armed rebellion at Toronto against the colonial administration of British Canada spilled across the border, and U.S. citizens joined the cause. The so-called “Patriot War” kept the frontier in a climate of fear and uncertainty as a series of battles in Canadian territory continued throughout 1838 in the...