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105
Hal l's official authority at Ross ceased on November 12, 1852 .
Before leaving he invited all the Justices of the Peace in the district
to join the official Visiting Magistrate on a last visit. Two Justices ,
Benjamin Horne and Arthur Leake of Ashley, accepted his invitation.
Both commended Hall for the exemplary cleanliness, perfect order and
comfort of the various departments .
received an Address from his former staff:
Sir,
The day after his retirement Hal l
Ro ss Female Factory
11th November , 1852
We, the officers of the above establishment cannot
al lmo, you to leave Ross without conveying to you our
heartfelt sorrow at your departure. Some of us have
lived under your superintendence some considerab le time,
and are well able to form a judgment of you, both as a
public officer and a private gentleman whose private
interests have invariably been put aside for the pub lic
good. It would be useless to fur ther comment on the
matter , for your worth as a man and as an indefatigable
public officer is well known to us . Therefore, we wish
you , your kind lady and all your fami ly, all the
happiness that it may please a Supreme Being to grant you.
Many years later, in 1881 , at the clos e of his life, Hall remembered and
spoke of the scene at his departure from the Ross Female Factory and of
the women who knelt before him, with tears streaming down their cheeks,
calling down a blessing on the "just doctor" .
Their reason for blessing
him in this way was revealed in 1855 by Hall's own words with which he
compared his behaviour in Ross to that of some other officials in the
Convict Department :
.... This is very certain; I bui lt no house, I wore no clothes ,
I traded in nothing wrong from the labours of those under my
charge; I offended _not the sight of any of my neighbours;
I violated neither the laws o·f decency or the rules of discipline
by the unusual (at least in Van Diemen 's Land) emp loyment of
women in the labours of men; I raised no onions etc . for sale by
the toils of pregnant women, or enriched my garden by tasking
the strength of women recently confined and still undischarged
from the lying-in-hospital . In fact, I was as poor, and as
honest, thank God, as if I had never been a superint endent of
convicts , and carried nothing more away with me from Ross of
this world 's goods, than I took there, with the addition of the
hard earned, profitless, yet , after all, dearly prized tears and
blessings of society's outcasts and the unusual but very emphatic
title of the "just doctor" . 6
6
Ross and Saltwater River story
Advertiser, Sept. 11, 1855
Tasmanian Daily News , Sept. 18, Oct . 26, 1855 .