William Hutchinson ( superintendent ) William Hutchinson ( 1772 – 26 July 1846 ) was a British convict who was transported to the Australian colonies , ultimately to become a successful public servant and businessman . Hutchinson was by trade a butcher in England . In June 1796 , Hutchinson was convicted at the Old Bailey of stealing £ 40 worth of goods , and was sentenced to death , though this was later commuted to transportation for seven years . After spending three years in London on board the prison hulk " Newgate " , Hutchinson was transported to Australia on the " Hillsborough " , sometimes referred to as the " Fever Ship " since some ninety - five of the three hundred convicts aboard died from typhoid fever brought aboard from the prison hulks . Reaching Sydney in 1799 , Hutchinson was again convicted of theft after stealing from the government stores in Sydney , and was transported to the penal settlement on Norfolk Island . Hutchinson soon gained employ in the administration of the settlement , becoming an overseer of government livestock . In June 1801 , he married his first wife Mary Cooper ( also known as Mary Chapman ) , a convict who had been transported from Surrey , arriving on Norfolk Island in 1798 ; together they would have eight children , six of them born on Norfolk Island . In June 1803 he was appointed an acting superintendent of convicts on the island , and in 1805 he officially became an emancipist . By 1809 he was made a superintendent proper . Hutchinson acquired significant land holdings on the island , and did a handsome trade selling pork to the government . After 1803 , there was a push for the settlement on Norfolk Island to be disbanded , mainly on the part of the then Secretary of State for War and the Colonies Lord Hobart ; the military presence there was ultimately withdrawn in 1813 , and Hutchinson , along with the boat - builder Thomas Ransom , was among the last of the settlers to leave the island in February 1814 . Most of the Norfolk settlers were relocated to the recently founded Hobart Town , in the colony of Tasmania . However , Hutchinson had been recommended to the Governor of New South Wales , Lachlan Macquarie , by the former Lieutenant - Governor of Norfolk Island , Joseph Foveaux , and so Hutchinson instead returned to Sydney , where Macquarie appointed him the superintendent of convicts and public works , to succeed Isaac Nichols from April 1814 . Hutchinson gained much influence in this position , however after John Bigge ' s reports into the transportation system in the Australian colonies , Hutchinson was replaced as superintendent by Frederick Hely in 1823 . Hutchinson was to have been appointed chief wharfinger in Sydney in 1817 , though this appointment was never formally recognised by the British authorities . Hutchinson ' s eighth child with his first wife Mary was born in 1817 ; Mary is thought to have returned to England in March 1819 , and there was no record of her after that . On 21 June 1825 Hutchinson married his second wife , Jane Roberts , who was also a former convict ( having been transported for seven years , arriving in 1803 ) and who was the widow of another former convict turned businessman . Though the marriage only lasted a short time , two of Jane ' s sons from her first marriage married two of Hutchinson ' s daughters from his first marriage . Hutchinson became a significant businessman in Sydney , forming business partnerships with Edward Eagar , William Redfern and Samuel Terry , among others ; he also had extensive land holdings in Sydney , its suburbs and the surrounding towns , and also in Melbourne . His more rural holdings made him a successful pastoralist . He had participated in the 1816 founding of the Bank of New South Wales , and was a director of the bank from January 1929 onwards . In 1835 , he was elected to the board of directors of both the Marine Insurance Co and the Australian Wheat and Flour Co , and participated in the formation of the Australian Patriotic Association , and in 1840 he was one of the original directors of the Mutual Fire Insurance Association . At his death , Hutchinson left goods worth £20 , 000 ; together with his land holdings , his estate was worth £220 , 000 , or about A $ 1 . 77 billion in 2004 value . On this valuation , in 2004 William Rubinstein placed Hutchinson at 147th on his list of the two hundred richest Australians of all time .