Macquarie’s detractors

Among the exclusives with a firmer claim to social superiority were the civil and military groups appointed to preside over the machinery of the convict settlement and the small group of free settlers. This group included the judges, brothers Ellis and Jeffery Bent, and the brothers Gregory and John Blaxland. Macquarie initially had a cordial relationship with Ellis Bent, who did temporarily accept former convict lawyers in his court, but Jeffery was combative and socially aspirational. He refused to disembark in the colony until given a 13-gun salute.