George Hughes, a convict 'with some abilities in the printing line' (Collins 435), was employed from 1796 to about 1802 in the production of broadside government orders using the primitive wooden screw press which had arrived in New South Wales with the first fleet, becoming in the process Australia's first printer. Hughes also used the press to produce playbills for the first theatre in Australia, where he himself was among the performers. Hughes continued as a printer after the expiration of his sentence (about 1798), but after the arrival of George Howe in 1800, Hughes's services as a printer were less important, and he seems to have left the government printery by early 1802.
References
David Collins. An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales (London: Cadell and Davies, 1798-1802).
See also: Robert Jordan. The Convict Theatres of Early Australia.
