“KEIGHTLEY’S RIDE”

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 51, 23 November 1929, Page 25

“KEIGHTLEY’S RIDE”

BUSHRANGING INCIDENT RECALLED A RACE FOR A LIFE A few weeks ago came news from New York of the death of Mr. Cyril Keightley, an Australian actor, who was not unknown in New Zealand. It was then stated that he was the son of the onee-famous Mrs. Keightley, the heroine of “Keightley’s Ride,” an Ofttold story of the bushranging days of . the ’7o’s in Australia. The story of this ride is recalled by Mr. Barry Marschell, of Wellington, who was some forty years ago personally known to Mrs. Keightley. Her husband, a very handsome and well-born man, was a squatter in the country out from Bathurst (New South Wales). At that time the Kellys were out, with other gangs of bushrangers, who stuck at nothing to gain their ends. But it was not the Kellys who disturbed the peace of the Keightley home, but a gang headed by Burke, Gilbert, and Ben Hall. Burke, for some reason or other, hated Keightley, and it was he who instigated the attack. Held to Ransom. One day three armed men appeared out of the scrub, and had no difficulty in holding the place up. Keightley, as the one man likely to prove dangerous, was secured, and Mrs. Keightley, who was then a tall, handsome woman, was Informed that the price of her husband’s life was £5OO, and she had better get it, or he would be shot dead. Knowing Burke’s enmity towards her husband, Mrs. Keightley knew very well that the threat would be carried out, so she. saddled her horse and rode madly through the night by a rough bush track into Bathurst, secured the ransom money from the bank, and without any rest rode back—a total distance of between 180 and 200 miles. When she arrived in the grey of the morning, it was to find her husband bound hand and foot and tied to a tree at a place called “The Rocks,” whither he had been dragged to await the zero hour. Burite’s Fiendish Attempt At Revenge. The bushrangers, though they had drunk all the whisky in the homestead, and had made the station hands cook and maids dance and entertain them during the night, kept their word, and on the money being paid over, Keightley was released and the men made off to the bush with their plunder. v It seems that Burke was not at all pleased at being foiled in the attempt to take Keightley’s life, and during Mrs. Keightley’s absence had decided to seek a fiendish revenge through the Keightley children. They were drowsing before the fire, scarcely realising the terrible drama they were witnessing, when Burke took the kettle, emptied out the water, and in its place threw in a handful of cartridges, trusting that when they exploded with the heat the children would suffer. But Gilbert, would not Stand for such insensate cruelty, and stopped it before the kettle was restored to its place over the tire. The incident was dramatised in 1800 by George Leitch and Barry Marschell, and with the financial aid of one, Michael Rodden, was produced at Hobart. Mrs. Keightley, still a handsome old woman at 71, was induced to play the heroine. Her role, as originally written, extended to 60 “sides” (or sheets), but as she. was unable to memorise it, the part had to be cut down to three “sides.” That, and the dear old lady’s total incapacity to act, ruined the play, which never saw, the footlights outside Hobart town.