MURDER WILL OUT

Waikato Times, Volume XXXVII, Issue 3011, 31 October 1891, Page 5 (Supplement)

MURDER WILL OUT

[IIY C. CA9F.T.] As we sat drinking our soeon i tutnblor, I Raid : " Hy tho way, di 1 you find out tho truth about thn man who was fliid to have shoe himself on tho Ballarat road th<i othor day?"

"No," ho replied; "nnd if. i ono of the most unsatisfactory cnsc I havo met with. I have ascer tained that he left the digging with a man who had been his mat< in a claim, that they had been work ing together for six months, ant had beon fortutmto in the pieco o ground they had selected. Thosi who should be in a position to knou something about it, affirm that thej must have had from two to throt hundred pounds worth of gold cacl when they left for Melbourno That it was not&caso of suicide and that the man was murdered, was proved conclusively by the doctor's evidence at the inquest The post mortem examinatiot showed that he had noc even beet ehot, as was at first believed, for nc bullet was found in tho head, noi was there any holo through which it could have passod out; tho brain itself had only boon perforated tc tho dopth of about an inch and a half; where the round bit of skull was found embedded.. In other respects tho brain was uninjured. The doctor said it appeared quite clear to him, that tho wound had boon caused by somo such instrument as a hammor with a long narrow head or porhapa a hunting whip with a hoavy handle; tho force of the blow must have been onormons to make such a clean perforation without splintering or cracking tho bono of tho skull in other directions." I weut to Ballarat, and ascertained thore that the two men had not been on good torms with each other; though they had been mates and worked together for so long a time. Tho\ frequently quarrelled, and only o few weeks previously hud stripped to fight, but wore prevonted by tlm representations of their friends. In all thest) quarrols, it was admitted that deceased whs to blame; he whs ii violent tempernd mun ami would and tho foulest language and threaten thoso -iround upon the most frivolous occnsimis Wivmin, hin unite, who is now in j lii a wailing hi.s trial for aiurltir (having boon found jruilty <>i th r ; crirni i»y the corounr's iwy) i* said to h-ivo lieen a good nitunrl, evontmnpered mm, who required n good dull of rousing bufore resorting to blows. On their way to Melbourne they h-id Htoppod at a public houso, about 14 milfa out of town the night preceding tho murder, nnd a vi ilnnt quarrel ugim took place bntwen them. Upon this occasion also, according to the landlord ; the deceased was the usjgressor, and l»y far the most violent, threatening that ho would do for th« other yet. In coascquence of this ; and to avoid further quarelling (the landlord believes) the m»n, now in custody started from his house very early in thn morning ; whilst the murdered man did not li'avo till near 10 o'clock. During tin 1 morning he drank two bottles of English al«, and before starting had a largo dask holding about a pint, filled with rum, which

ho took with him. Before leaving he spoke of the quarrel whiuh he had had with his mate overnight, and 9aid it was about a bean shaped nugget, which, it was true his mute had found; but in the mulloolc he himself hud picked, then added :— " Besides, 'damn him, I found,' and pegged out the claim, and ho has got tho full worth bf the nu,gget in gold." He aftorwarda went out of tho room; rnturning in about 10 minutes j when he-took from his waistcoat pocket a lump of pure gold, shaped exactly like a large Windsor bean. " There," he said, " that's a curiosity, aint it ? Could any man or jeweller make a more perfect goldeu bean than that V The landlord says, he took it in his hand and examined it, and certainly, from its appearance, he should have thought it had been purchased at a jeweller's shop. When it was returned to him, he wrapped it up in a piece of linen rag and put it back in his pocket, shortly after leaving the room again, as the landlord conjectures, to put it in some safer place.

Now, it was this quarrelling and the ill-feehng known to exist between these two men, and the entire Absence of suspicion attached to anyono else, that caused the jury at the inquest to find the deceased's mate guilty of murder, but for my part I am convinced ho had nothing whatever to do with it Up seenn-d, when apprehended, to be quite horrified at the crime, spoke quite freely of their quarrels, and corroborated the dead man's statement of thn cause of the lait row. H.» said he knew his mate had >\ revolver with him, and it was hirdly likely ho should think of attacking n man thus armed. One thins* appeared rather against him. He left the public house at 8 o'clock in the morning, and did not reach Mel bourne till nearly f> o'clock in the afternoon, thus taking 9 hours to walk 14 milee, hut he a'jcounted'fir this by saying that tht; landlord hud cut him some sandwiches to eat on the road, nnd that he brought a bottle of beer away with him ; that when hn had walked about 10 miles he went n, little way to ono sidt! of the road, sac down and ate his dinner, drinking the beer at the same time ; and that ho them lighted his pipe, lay down, and,

without intending to do so, fell fist asleep. How long h<. , slept, h* dons not know, but thinks his nap must have lusted about throe hours ; thnt he also sat down and had a smoke upon two other occasions. Flo named the hotel in Melbourne where he slept that night, and also the bank where he disposed of his gold next d iy, getting «£27. r > for it. Of this he tool: i!2f> with him, leaving the rest at the bank on cill, getting at tho same time a cheque book from the clerk. Those latter statements were found to be correct, but of course were utterly valueless for establishing either his innoc a:ce or guilt. I was present fit the inquest, and henlall the evidence, but what impressed me most was the medical testimony, and I deterniened to pay another visit to tho spot where the body was found, to see if some additional facts connected with the murder might not be picked up. I thought it just possible that tlm

weapon itselt might be hidden somewhere about. 1 gave nearly two whole days to this search, and at last, gave it up, having discovered absolutely nothing more than was already known. I had waked about a quarter of mile on my way home, when foeling rather tired, I sat

down upon thn trunk of a tree, that had, I suppose, bepn blown down some time before, and now lay on one side of the road. The top only of the log was visible, as grass and weeds had grown up and nearly smothered it. I uotjcud on sitting down that the grass was somewhat

trampled on th(> sdn next the road, but this was not perhaps to bo wondered at, as others might have abo used it for a seat. My mind was still busy with the business that

had brought me there, and I began speculating upon tho possibility of the murderer having s-it down upon

this same log to examine his gains, .and (the thought; struck me) perhaps, conooa! the weapon with which he hud committed the crime. Instantly I began to feel about in the grass under the log, a rather risky thing to do, as it was a likoly place for a snake to lie concealed. I had not searched long b'fore I felt something that I thought had no business to he there. 1 pulled it out hurriedly (ray dreid of snakes l> ing considerable), and that I had made an important diic >v -y, though scarcer th" O'K' I had expected. What I drew from under the log was a leather pocket, or Img, with \ strip of raw hide attiched to '-nch side. This thong had evidently been cut leaving about eighteen inches attached to one side of the big and six inches on th ■ of.her. As. I drew i r out, t'ifl longer piece of hid ■•■ liroucfhi , w'th it part of a cake or' tohi co, round which it had got wrapped. [ forgot to mention that on the lover part of the right side of the murdered man's neck vras a red mark, a 9 if made by a string with some weight attached to it; and his mate informed me that he always carried his gold in a leither bag under his shirt and round his neck, from which it was suspended by a string. The moment I clapped eyes on this bag I felc sure that it was the one which had held the dead man's gold, and for confirmation, on examining the inside, I couH plainly see several small shining specs of gold. When looked at with a powerful magnifying glass the inside of th* pocket seemed almost covered with these tiny specs. I have no doubt that the murderer knew that his victim had gold concealed about his pers-jn, and perhaps had ascertained how he carried it. At all events; there was the faot that the gold had been found and taken away by cutting the thong that bound it to his neck.

Here ho got. up, and went to a small eheffonier in one corner of tbe room, unlocked one of its drawers, and handed me tho leather pocket he had found. He also threw on the table rother more than half of what had been a large cake of tobacco. I took up tho bag first, and remarked that it would hold several pounds weight of gold, as it was fully inches deep and six inches wide.

"Yes," he replied, "and by all accounts there was, in all probability, nine or ten pounds of gold in it when he left Bullarat. If you will just oxamino the inside of tho bag carefully, I have no doubt you will see the signs of what had borm carried in it."

I looked, as he directed, and saw quite plainly several shining yellovr particles in the seam where it had been sewed. I then roplacel it ou the table, remarking as I did so, " Well, poor fellow, no doubt he worked hard enough to got it, little thinking that its possession was to cost him so dear. I then took up tho cake of tobacco, and beg.iU to turu it over in a careless sort of maiiTior in my hands. All ut onoe a kind of shock went through mo. I jumped up and said : ''By Go 1, George, T cue a pipeful of tobacco ott' this very stick not more thuu ii furtnight ago "

" fhe rlpvil you did !" hp said. " How could that \»>, and hnw can you ilUtin.uish one stick of to-n-ioco from another? You must be mistaken. Pooh, man! you were away in Adelaide liefore the murder was committed, and cakes of tobacco do not Inst very long as a rule. Hut still—(as ho saw I really meant what I said) —if you can be sure of what you say, and can afford me sufficient information to lay me on the track of the man who owned it a fortnight ago, you would

not only do me a service, but relieve the mind of that poor devil now lying in jail and waiting to l>o tried fora murder I don't believe he committed, for I have no sort of doubt that the man who hid that pouch and lost his tobacco in doing it was the real criminal. Sit down, old man, and tell mo all ahout it "

My momentary excitement passed away. I sat down again, and af once began the recitnl of the facts, with which you have already been made acquainted, for, of course, you understand that this was the very cuke of tobacco from which I had extracted the piece of wire nail.

When I had finished, I told him that I had no doubt we could still find the bit of iron in the fireplace where the man had thrown it, as 1 remembered perfectly well seeing it lie upon the white hearth underneath the fireplace, after falling through th« fern leaves in the grate. " There has been no cold weather since then," I said, " and no fire is likely to have been lighted, so it will still be here." Ho seemed, after he had examined the tobacco and heard how the hole came there, to believe at once that he had got the clue he wanted, and proposed that we should start immediately for the hotel and endeavour to find the tell-tale bit of iron, (To be eonti.nued.)