He was sentenced and transported to the convict settlement at Sydney Cove for the space of fourteen years on 31 August 1793.

[7][8] Captain Dorr took Muir and other escaped political prisoners onboard and sailed to the Pacific Northwest Coast.

[3] Some sources say that the ship struck a chain of sunken rocks near Nootka Sound, on the west coast of North America, and was wrecked.

Other reliable sources state that when Muir parted from Otter at Nootka in June 1796, Otter continued north to Bucareli Bay, on the west of Prince of Wales Island and then sailed into the harbor of Monterey on 29 October 1796, the first United States vessel to enter a Californian port.

Some accounts state that she was probably a 168-ton ship, the Master was Daniel Bennett and she was owned by Loring & Curtis.

In 1775 his father Ebenezer Dorr (1738-1809), like Paul Revere, rode from Boston to warn residents of Massachusetts about the advancing British army.

The incident in which Otter rescued Thomas Muir, a famous Scottish political exile, is well documented.

In the middle of April 1794, he left England on board Surprize, and after a tedious voyage reached Sydney on September 25 of the same year.

[6][17] Otter, commanded by Captain Dorr, was fitted out at Boston, and despatched to Sydney, where she anchored on 25 January 1796.

Captain Dorr and a few of his crew landed at the very spot where Mr. Muir was located (the vicinity of Jeffrey Street in the modern suburb of Kirribilli), under the pretence that they were proceeding to China and were in want of fresh water.

[6] One account states that as many as 20 convicts escaped from the penal colony in Port Jackson aboard Otter.

The following day, Péron and a small party landed and some trading took place near the ship as adzes, mats and other artifacts were exchanged for knives and European goods.

[9] Some accounts state that many months later Otter was wrecked when she struck a chain of sunken rocks near Nootka Sound, on the west coast of North America.

Spanish accounts note that Otter is said to have been the first United States vessel to arrive at Monterey, California, in 1796.

When ready to sail he asked permission of Governor Borica to land eleven English sailors who had secretly boarded his vessel at Botany Bay, Australia.