Otter, commanded by Captain Dorr, was fitted out at Boston, and despatched to Sydney, where she anchored on 25 January 1796. Captain Dorr and a few of his crew landed at the very spot where Mr. Muir was located (the vicinity of Jeffrey Street in the modern suburb of Kirribilli), under the pretence that they were proceeding to China and were in want of fresh water. The captain had an audience with Mr Muir, and not a moment was lost. On the morning of 11 February 1796, Muir was safely taken on board Otter, which instantly set sail.Page 289 Other accounts state that Muir rowed out of the harbour and met Otter outside the Heads. Muir's own account of his escape, as given in subsequent letters preserved in Spanish archives, is that Captain Dorr, coming into Port Jackson in January 1796 agreed to give him a passage to Boston provided he could effect his escape without danger to Dorr. On the evening of February 18, the day before Dorr was to sail, Muir put to sea in a small boat, with two servants, taking nothing with him but the shirt and coat on his back, and that about the middle of the next day they boarded Otter at a considerable distance from land. One account states that as many as 20 convicts escaped from the penal colony in Port Jackson aboard Otter. Three of the convicts were left on Nomuka Island in Haʻapai, Tonga on 15 March 1796.
