MURDER AT MAUNGATAPU
DEATH ROUND THE BEND, by J. Halket Millar; R. W. Stiles and Co., Nelson, through A. H. and A. W. Reed, Ltd., 16/-. HERE was little bushranging in New Zealand, and most of it consisted of one gang’s murders as foul as any crime for gain in history. It may be wondered if the story of the Maungatapu murders, when five men were killed in cold blood on a bush road to Nelson, is worth telling through 200 pages, but if crime is not interesting, the mind of the criminal may be. J. Halket Millar, author of that excellent book High Noon for Coaches, gives us the story from the
criminals’ origins. to the scaffold. Burgess, the leader, Sullivan and Kelly, were offenders transported to Australia; Levy, a free immigrant, drifted into crime in New Zealand. Burgess was exposed to the full cruelties of the penal system, and Halket Millar suggests that this may have been a factor in sinking him to the depths of his infamy. At any rate, "he became a criminal of the most dangerous type, boasting of his deeds as bushranger, :robber and murderer." He was at least four times a murderer before he came to New Zealand. The trials at Nelson, reported here at length, have exceptional interest. Sullivan saved his skin by confessing, and then Burgess confessed to try to save the other two. In view of his history, Burgess’s command of English in his Statements, which included eloquent professions of repentance, was astonishing. The execution scene, with its prolongation by protestations and appeals, was truly awful. Dreadful as were the crimes, this may well have been used by opponents of capital punishment.
A.
M.
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 819, 7 April 1955, Page 12
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284MURDER AT MAUNGATAPU New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 819, 7 April 1955, Page 12
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