Join National Library Director of Exhibitions, Guy Hansen, in the Special Collections Reading Room for the second video in this series, where he examines one of the oldest cartoons in the National Library’s collection, ‘Convict uprising at Castle Hill (1804)’.

Depicting different stages of the uprising in a clockwise direction around the cartoon, the sketch combines the whole story of the battle as well as events that happen afterwards, and Guy notes that it can almost be read as a comic strip.

The cartoon provides a commentary on what was happening in the colony of New South Wales at the time as well.

If you love cartoons as much as Guy, you can learn more about the cartoons in the Library’s collection in ‘Inked: Australian Cartoons’, available through the National Library Bookshop.

Like this video? Watch the first video in the series, Cripes! The cartoons of Australia.

The National Library of Australia acknowledges Australia’s First Nations Peoples – the First Australians – as the Traditional Owners and Custodians of this land and gives respect to the Elders – past and present – and through them to all Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

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