Colonial Australia's first artwork sold to a museum

An attendant holds, what's claimed to be the first piece of Australian colonial art, the Charlotte Medal at an auction house in Melbourne July 22, 2008.

SYDNEY (Reuters Life!) - An engraved silver disc believed to be colonial Australia's first work of art was sold at auction on Tuesday for A$873,750 (almost $857,000) to an Australian museum, the organizers of the sale said.

"The Charlotte Medal" was engraved by a convict forger who arrived in Australia in 1788 on the First Fleet, the name given to the 11 ships that sailed from Britain to establish the first European colony in Australia.

One side of the medal depicts a fully-rigged ship while on the flip side is a description of the voyage and places they stopped on route.

John Chapman, a retired dental surgeon and collector of historic Australian pieces, bought the medal for A$15,000 in 1981 but at the age of 80 decided the time was right to sell it.

The medal, which was expected to sell for about A$750,000, was bought by the Australian National Maritime Museum, said Kay Hamilton of auction organizers Dallas Brooks Centre in Melbourne.

"I'm very happy to know it's gone to a good home, where everyone can view it," Chapman told Reuters. "It is the first piece of colonial Australian art. You can't get earlier than that."

The Charlotte was one of the convict ships led by Captain Arthur Phillip which arrived in Sydney's Botany Bay in January 1788 but did not disembark until a more suitable location was found a few days later at Port Jackson.

This date, January 26, marked the beginning of the first British settlement and is now celebrated as Australia Day.

It was during these final few days on the ship that the surgeon aboard The Charlotte got forger Thomas Barrett to create a souvenir of the journey using what is thought to be a metal medical dish.

Barrett, who had escaped the hangman twice in his native Britain, had the dubious honor of being the first convict to be hanged in Australia for stealing provisions a month after he got ashore, Chapman said.

($1=1.024 Australian dollars)

(Reporting by Pauline Askin, Editing by Miral Fahmy)