Awesome Documentary Time: Voyage of the Courtesans
England's want of a new colony to replace the newly-lost America helped create Australia . With little in the way of settlers, the English used prisoners to work and built a country from half a world away.
This documentary covers a handful of people researching their ancestors-- and their ancestor's doings which got them imprisoned.
After losing the American colony, the British certainly weren't going to allow that to happen again, and so slave labour was used to build the new country. Everything would be kept under tight control and has remained so ever since.
Modern America has taken a page from that book.