Rum Rebellion his actions because he was the legitimate authority. However, imprisoning people and threatening to do the same to the court when they failed to yield to the will of said authority would seem to be legally problematic. Duffy states that had Johnston arrived when summoned on 25 January the Rum Rebellion probably would never have happened. Rum Rebellion The Rum Rebellion of 1808 was the only successful armed takeover of government in Australian history. During the 19th century, it was widely referred to as "the Great Rebellion". On 26 January 1808, 20 years to the day after Arthur Phillip founded
History of Sydney the officers of the Rum Corps, many of which were land owners such as John Macarthur. In 1808 these conflicts came to open rebellion, with the Rum Rebellion, in which the Rum Corps ousted Governor William Bligh (known from the mutiny on the "Bounty"). The New South Wales Corps was formed in England in 1789 as a permanent regiment to relieve the marines who had accompanied the First Fleet. Officers of the Corps soon became involved in the corrupt and lucrative rum trade in the colony. In the Rum Rebellion of 1808, the Corps, working closely with the newly established