The tall showcase features some very interesting artefacts from a well; filled in around 1818 with household artefacts relating to an industrious....and infamous... convict named George Cribb.

Picture this: the year is 1808, and George Cribb—a 30-year-old butcher with a knack for getting into trouble—is sentenced to 14 years of transportation. His crime? Using forged banknotes, a serious offence that lands him on the convict ship Admiral Gambier, bound for the distant shores of New South Wales.

By the time he steps off the ship in December 1808, George is ready to make the most of his fresh start—or so it seems. His co-accused and sentenced partner in crime Fanny Barnett also transported to the colony for the seven-year sentence also arrives and, despite George being a married man in England, he and Fanny marry and start a new life together in The Rocks.

Aside from his disposition to increase his means through questionable activities George’s skills as a butcher were, much needed in the blossoming colony. Although under sentence Cribb, wasted no time setting himself up in business.

By June 1809, he was already advertising fine fresh pork to the city’s hungry settlers. He somehow found the funds to begin buying up land in The Rocks, fast becoming Sydney’s bustling and often rowdy district by the port.

Over the next few years, he became a property mogul of sorts, snapping up allotments in the area between Cumberland Street and Gloucester Street where the Sydney Harbour YHA and its associated Big Dig site now reside. By 1813, Cribb had acquired almost half a block, giving his name to the nearby Cribbs Lane.

Cribb built a slaughterhouse and butcher shop on the property, turning his real estate into a hub for the meat trade. His shop on Gloucester Street was a hive of activity, and his entrepreneurial spirit helped him thrive in early Sydney’s chaotic economy.

The slaughter yard on slightly higher land had unfortunately poisoned Cribbs well, as the waste and run off from the slaughtered animals ran un-contained into this water source, by 1817 the water within was no longer able to be consumed. This meant the well was now used by George as a dump for household rubbish, giving archaeologists a unique insight and timeline of Georges activities.

You will note some fine pieces of nearly complete China cups in the well show case. In 1815 it is known that George’s first wife Martha arrived in Sydney and George not wanting to be caught out as the bigamist that he was, paid Fanny, who had now served her sentence 300 pounds to return to England.

How the China ended in the well will never be exactly known, was it the colonial wife not wanting the English wife to have her fine things?

Or was the English wife enraged enough to rid the house of the other woman? Or perhaps George was destroying the evidence. Another item from the well, an alcohol still, demonstrates that George had many things to hide!

It is documented that the authorities suspected George of trading in illegal alcohol, a crime not too dissimilar to that of forging bank notes, as alcohol was very much a colonial currency. His place was raided and no evidence found until the 1990’s when the well was excavated and the evidence found.