INTERCOLONIAL NEWS.

Southland Times, Issue 629, 8 February 1867, Page 2

INTERCOLONIAL NEWS.

KEW SOUTH WALES. YOJJR MEN MTJEDEEED AT JINDEK (From the Braidwood Dispatch, Jan. 16.) The magisterial inquiry was commenced at Jinden, on Friday, the 11th inst., and concluded at Braidwood on the 14th ; and the following narrative of evidence was given : — It would appear that the four special constables in question, John Carroll, Ennis M'Donnell, John Phegan, and Patrick Kennagh, left Braidwood a little before daylight on Sunday morning, the 6th inst., to proceed to the Jerrabatgully and Jingera country. They seem to have had some delay at Jembaicumbene in obtaining horses, for it was only on Tuesday morning that they passed through Bal-' lalaba police station, about eighteen miles distant. They were seen at that spot about eight o'clock on Tuesday morning. They arrived at M. N. O'ConnelTs public-house, Stoney Creek, about ten miles further on, between ten and eleven the same morning. They were at this time riding. They remained there a couple of hours, had dinner, and stated on leaving their intention of going to Jinden that night. Connell deposes to their being armed with two revolving rifles and some pistols. After passing ConnelTs they are heard of at Dempsey's, a few miles further on, inquiring their road, and again at Eairfield, the station of Mr Ahem, where they had some tea, stayed an hour, and then went, on towards Jinden, where they arrived on horseback about half-past five in the evening. They remained all night, and after breakfast the next morning (Wednesday, the 9th), being furnished with directions as to the road to the free selection of a man named Gruinea, they left Jinden on foot. They started about eight o'clock towards Guinea's, about four miles distant. They are next heard of at the free selection of a man named Hezekiah "Watt, which they reach about eleven that morning. Here they had dinner, anc*. after a stay of one hour or two hours, signified their intention of returning to Jinden. When they left Watt's they were armed with two revolving rifles and some pistols as previously, and were, as an important witness at the inquiry states, particularly cautioned to avoid any beaten tracks or roads. This is the last place they were seen or heard of alive. They did not reach Jinden that night, and their not returning, as they had intended, Mr E. Smith states, made him uneasy — so much so that the next morning (Thursday), when sending a messenger with a letter to Bell's Creek, he desired the man to make inquiries about Carroll and his party along the road This man, John Lynn, started on his mission about ten o'clock. He says in his evidence, " when I got about a mile and a half or two miles from Jinden, I found the dead bodies of two men that I recognised as two of the detectives that had left Jinden on foot the morning before. I galloped back and told Mr Smith what I had seen. Mr Smith at once accompanied me back to the spot, and then sent me off to give information to the police at Ballalaba." Mr Edward Smith states that he at once rode to Watt's selection to obtain assistance to search for the other men, as he then had some hopes that they might have escaped, and were still alive concealed in the bush. Watt and a laborer on his farm, named George Smith, returned with Mr Edward Smith, and assisted in the search for the missing men. After looking about for some time without success, they made inquiries at a hut about a quarter of a mile distant from where the two dead bodies lay, and here they were told by the occupant, a woman named M'Enneny, that about an hour before sunset on the previous evening she had heard a number of guns going off together — nine or ten reports, she says. This firing was in the direction of where the two dead bodies lay. She then went on to state that this first firing stopped for a little while, and then began again in a different direction. Her words are, with regard to this second firing, that it resembled the " quick cracking of a stockwhip." She further states tnst she at the time thought it was four men that she had seen pass in the morning (and one of whom she knew to be Carroll) discharging their guns, and adds that a few minutes after this second firing, she saw three men walking leisurely across the creek below her house. On obtaining the particulars from this woman, Mr Smith and his two companions went in the direction of the second firing, indicated by the woman, and, after a careful search, found two more dead bodies, those of Carroll and Kennagh, those first found on the track being Phegan and M'Donnell. The bodies were all pierced with gunshot wounds. Phegan was found lying on his face, the three others on their backs. Soon after the two second bodies had been discovered," Sergeant Byrne and a party of the regular police, with a black tracker, arrived on the spot, 5 and after searching more carefully found three revolvers, a portion of the arms of the murdered men, with the chambers of all loaded, and the nipples capped. Kennagh's hat was also found close to the body of M'Donnell, which goes to show that the party when first attacked were together, and, in. all probability, when M'Donnell, and Phegan were suddenly

shotdo^r^tro ■&***▼<*• eithtoftt* treated fighting to the spot where theif bodies were found, or finding; further resistance useless, were afterwards taken into the bush and barbarously murdered, as it borne out by the medical evidence as to the course of the bullets traced* in the post-mortem examination. On Friday evening, at the conclusion of the post-mortem, four graves were dug at a short distance from Jinden, and the bodies being enclosed in sheets of bark— the only coffin material available in that out-of-the-way spot— were committed to their temporary resting-place. The spot where the first attack took place, and where Phegan and M'Donnell fell, is otifl well suited to the purpose for which it had evidently been selected by the bush* rangers. Two large trees, capable of concealing five or six men, stand some three and twenty yards from the road in use between Guinea's hut and Jinden — all save this being open bush, with a sprinkling of small gum sapplings and honeysuckle trees, and immediately above the spot a slightly sloping range passes along parallel to the road mentioned. If we may be permitted to conjecture, our impression is that Carroll and his party, after leaving "Watt's hut had loitered aboct the neighborhood looking out for information, and disregarding the caution they had received, assuming it to have been given, the best advice they could possibly had in such a neighborhood, in the very heart of the bushranging haunts, viz., to avoid all beaten tracks and roads, had, in spite of this caution, taken their way along the track, at the time perhaps holding the bushrangers too cheap, and having been watched all day, were suddenly pounced upon and shot down when ieast suspecting it. In whatever manner these murders were effected it is not impossible that some clue may hereafter lead. to the clearing up of the present mystery that four men, well armed, and in a neighborhood where they were surrounded with ruffians whom they must have been satisfied, and especially in their own case, would stick at nothing, should have been, or to have approached, without the least suspicion, such a likely place of attack. A public meeting, convened for the purpose of expressing sympathy with the wives and famalies of the recently murdered constables at Jinden, and to discuss what steps should be taken in conjunction with the Government for the suppression of crime in this district, was held this afternoon (Wednesday) „ The Court-house was densely crowded, all the leading persons. in the district being present.