THE LATE UNLAMENTED MR. BAMFORD.

Grey River Argus, Volume XIII, Issue 1615, 8 October 1873, Page 3

THE LATE UNLAMENTED MR. BAMFORD.

William Bamford, who died i^ the Mejbpuriie Hospital lately, had been the hangman of Victoria since 1857, and had also until lately acted as flagellator. According , to Bamf ord's own statement he must have .been 73 years of age, and he alleged that he was born in England in 1800; ■■■ He was brought up as & wooltiorter, but steady industry did not suit him, and while a very young man he joined, the 33rd. Fusiliersj in which regiment he served for twenty years. He appears to have been a troublesome soldier, , for on one occasion, while his regiment was at Gosport, he received 300 lashes, and . eventually, for some serious military offence, was transported to Van Dieman's Land. He arrived in that colony by the Koyal Sovereign in 1841, and served his sentence with the ordinary ups and downs of convict life. Bamford came to Victoria in the early days of the diggings, and was unnoticed until 1857. Soon after the execution of the murderers of Mr Price old "Jack Harris," tie hangman of the period, was lost sight of, and his assistant ".Walsh" went up country. This was Bamf ord's opportunity ; and on November 6, being then in gaol he undertook to hang one John Mason, an old man, aged sixty, sentenced to death for murder. The execution took place in Melbourne. From that time, with .one exception at Beechwqrthj where v a substitute was found in the local gaol, Bamford has executed the whole of the criminals put to death in the colony. He used to keep count, and mutter after an execution the number he hadput out of the world. The black ruffian: who was hanged at Ballarat on the 11 th of August, made seventy-one. Bamford was nearly worn out at the time he performed this last duty, and the officer who had charge of him reported that he had no ea3y task to get him safely back to Melbourne. Before this the office of fiogger was taken from Mm, as on the last occasion that he wielded; the cat he was seized with an asthmatic fit, and was only ,-^just.able to complete his task. Strange to J say, the man who has succeeded Bamford, ■/ though much younger, arrived in the same ship and at the same time as he did. Bamford's appearance was rendered more repulsive than it would otherwise have been bythe loss of an eye, which he got injured in some drunken row in Melbdurne, some fifteen or sixteen; years ago. His. habits were very' intemperate, and any money he obtained from the Government was soon squandered in the company of a degraded lot of both sexes, who used ; to look out for him. when he was expected to leave, the gaol with money in his pocket, : ;and join him in his drunken orgies. He was accustomed to squat in some wretched place of shelter in the neighborhood of the barracks, and here could generally be found when he was by the authorities. To send notice to "Jack" that he was required to come into the igaol was sufficient. This would be given him two or three days ; b^fprehaiid, and then he would at once j vpluntaiily imprison himseM, sleep off his ; ■ drunkenness, make himself clean, and. be: ready to hang or flog, as his " job " might ; be. His spells of liberty were, however, few and far between, for he was t

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repeatedly convicted as, a vagrant. Doubtless the frequent intervals of temperperance thus forced upon him lengthened his days. The life he led outside the gaol^without. a change must have killed him years before. Bamford, as; a rule, performed the terrible work allotted ito him /quietly and efficiently. He wasj faithful, too, after liis kind, and could be depended upon. One sickening attempt to show good feeling to those he executed he never omitted. After he had pinioned his man, and so rendered him helpless,.he used always, to shake him bytheihand, andmurmnr " God bless you" before he pulled the fatal bolt. Like the gravedigger in Hamlet, "he had no feefingof his business." On one occasion, when the man executed died instantaneously, he was observed to lean over the drop, and, with an air of satisfaction, while looking at his work, remark, I? The best job in the country— that makes 47 J" '^ Bamford was not married; and so far as is known has left neither; kith or kin.