"GHOST HOLE"

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 110, 31 December 1931, Page 6

"GHOST HOLE"

MIDNIGHT SEARCH STORY OF DEAD DOG THAT BARKS IN EERIE SILENCE SCENE OP MURDER SYDNEY, Wednesday. Constable Lamngton Ulrich. recently defied popular superstition by recovering at midnight the body of a youth who had been drowned in the dreaded "Ghost Hole" at Ulmarra, near Grafton. Ulrich, a mounted policeman, was off duty, shopping in Grafton, when a call came that Earl Chard (16£), of Swan Creek, four miles from Ulmarra, had been drowned in the "Ghost Hole," one of many deep holes in a watercourse running through Pillar Valley. Ulrich rushed back to his job. Though six feet in height, Chard could not swim, and when he disappeared, his two cousins, Heather and Bert Jones, fled from the "Ghost Hole" in terror. Ulrich secured a boat on the way home, and while trembling townsfolk watched him, rowed ipto the middle of the hole. There were several who thought the constable would never return to the shore alive^ — they knew the story of that dreaded hole, and feared for his safety. But he dragged out the body at midnight, and then broke the awful news to the dead youth's mother. The "Ghost Hole" has a weird history. Many years ago, the story goes, when that country consisted ofolarge cattle stations, Pillar Valley Station was located on-the bank of the hole. The cattle men were away at Red Rock, mustering stock, when an old prospector called, and was given shelter by the Chinese cook. He had gold — plenty of it, — and the Chinese smashed in his skull, dragged the body to the waterhole, tied weights to it, and pushed it in. Then he hid the gold. Nobody knew of the tragedy until the Chinese took ill, and confessed, before dying. The murdered man's old dog made a habit of going to that waterhole every night, barking mournfully, and aven now, 40 years afterwards, people positively declare, his wails are heard every night at the same time.

One man, now dead, always declared that after the body had been thrown in the water, he used to take his cattle to drink there every night. The last bullock to drink would be grabbed by some mysterious hand, dragged under the water, never to be seen again. Many declare that they have seen weird fish in the water. They are small, and are not often seen, and all known methods of catching fish would disappear — "as if they never existed," witnesses declare. "Until you arrived," Constable Ulrich was told, after the tragedy, "nobody was keen on going in after the poor chap, who was drowned — they knew the ghost story too well!" Constable Ulrich's brother, also a policeman, who is at Vaucluse, is hero of a score of Gap rescues.