WAR ON THE GOLD STEALERS

Shannon News, 13 July 1926, Page 1

WAR ON THE GOLD STEALERS

♦ - DRAMAS OP WEST AUSTRALIAN FEILDS. ] (By L. Revill,, in Sydney “Sunday, News.”) The history of the war against gold stealers on the West Australian goldfields is a story Of adventure which had not hitherto been sullied by anything approaching the savagery of the murder of the two detectives at Kalgoorlie. Combats between the hunters and the hunted were extremely rare. The coups of the gold stealing detection staff had to be so weli-pianned that the possibilities .are that the quarry realised that, by the time the hand of the law had fallen on them, the not had been so ' well drawn that it was useless to resist. Or it may have been that the strikingly tolerant public attitude towards the gold stealing deprived the business of the desperate atmosphere which surrounds ordinary robbery. ■ , Lack of Thrills. The only episode which approached the sensational over a long series of cases was the action of one operator in drawing a revolver when he was arrested. His story afterwards was that he thought that the detectives who rushed him out of the darkness, were desperadoes, who meant to attack him. Dummy Mines. The only sensations to which the public have been treated hitherto were the surprises which the detectives sprung bn gangs which were carrying on illicit gold dealing on an extensive scale, fit was the practice in some cases for men to work small plants, ostensibly mining ore drawn from their own mines, which were kept fully working. The whole business of these concerns was carried on with every appearance of being above board, even to the returns of ore crushed and gold won which were supplied to the Mines Department. Everything was all right, save the geld—which, was stolen. The gangs were receivers on a large scale cloaking the activities under the < guise of respectability. ■ , , N • Two big organisations of this kind were raided by the police a few years ago. In one case the detectives secreted themselves in an abandoned hut, and, with powerful glasses, kept watch on the operations of one plant day and night for a couple of months. The late Detective-Sergeant Pitman, one of the men brutally done to death, was engaged in this case. A peculiar result of the operations of the psuedo mines was revealed when, some years ago, the Department of Mines, in an attempt to give a fillip to prospecting, decided to furnish details from its official returns of shows that had been worked and abandoned while there was still gold in sight. It was then realised that this data would be far from reliable, as the returns of gold won from a good many mines were false, the ngures given being', of stolen gold, and, therefore, no indication of the possibilites of the locality. Humorous Side. The chronicles of .the gold robbers were not without- their humour. The story goes that on one occasion a gold receiver had a dispute with a miner over the price to be paid for a parcel of stolen specimens. The deal was held up for a few days until the receiver let the miner know that ne would consider his terms. While the miner was handing over the gold in the receiver’s hut he was amazed to see a look of horror on the laltter’s face. Wheeling round, he saw through the door appearing over a fence the cap of a police trooper approaching. He dropped the gold and fled. A few minutes later the receiver and his accomplice, in a “borrowed” police cap, were laughing heartily over the success of their ruse. Running the Gauntlet. Extraordinary skill was shown t>y the gold thieves in running the gauntlet of the “change-houses” on the. mines with their booty. After leaving the shaft in some cases they were required to shed their working clolthes in one room, and pass naked to an- : other, where they donned their homeI going attire. The change was effected under the eyes of special men placed on watch by the mine officials. And in spite of this, much gold was smuggled through. 1 Gold stealing, by many of the gold-fields public, alt least, was looked upon more as a misdeamour than a crime. It was a practice which held none of the public menace of ordinary robbery, and, therefore, one which many people felt they could afford to regard in a different light out ( of a more than sneaking sympathy I for the undergorund worker, who gambled with death, and, perhaps sometimes injudiciously “tried to raise the value of the stakes..