Within a decade there was considerable pressure on the authorities to deal with increasing numbers of female convicts who could not be adequately accommodated at the factory.

[3] The factory was built using convict labour from locally quarried sandstone and was completed in 1821[4] at the cost of £4,778.

It was a place of assignment, a hospital, a marriage bureau, a factory, an asylum and a prison for those who committed a crime in the Colony.

The reason it is called a factory is because it manufactured cloth - linen, wool and linsey woolsey.

It was also the site of the colony's first manufactured export producing 60,000 yards (55,000 m) of woven cloth in 1822.The women also did spinning, knitting, straw plaiting, washing, cleaning duties and if in third class, rock breaking and oakum picking.

[5] In October 1827, the factory was the site of women rioting as a response to a cut in rations and their poor conditions.

Ann Gordon began her work as the factory's new matron and superintendent with her first task being to negotiate with the women who had escaped from the building.

In less than an hour over 100 women escaped en masse and proceeded into the town where 40 soldiers and the threat of guns brought them back.

He had complained previously that there was no one available to take the role but he had offered the position to Gordon at £150 per annum (£50 less per year than her predecessor).

[8] In 1836 Gordon was dismissed, although the governor, Richard Bourke said there was no wrong doing, and she received a years salary in compensation.