Joseph Tuso: child convict
Traces: Tell us a little about your ancestor, Joseph Tuso. How did he come to be a First Fleet convict aboard the HMS Scarborough?
Janette Baker: At the age of 14, Joseph was tried and convicted at the Old Bailey on 7 July 1784. The crime was assaulting John Ansell on the King’s Highway, on 26 May.
Joseph was working with a man who, in the court transcripts, John Ansell described as ‘a great man, a great thief ’. He described my ancestor Joseph as the ‘little thief ’.
The ‘great thief ’ had knocked John Ansell
