"THE WOMAN IN THE CASE"

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXIX, Issue LXIX, 29 September 1915, Page 5

"THE WOMAN IN THE CASE"

A NEW ZEALAND MURDER STORY REVIVED.

The other day the Sydney Central Police Court Magistrate put the stereotyped question, "Is anything of the defendant:-'" and the police prosecutor, with a professional air, replied that she had previously been before the Court. Something more was therefore known of the woman than the officer told the Bench. Indeed, a story could have been related concerning Caffrey and Perm, about the Sovereign of the Seas, and the buffeting she/ received in tempestuous weather, about a woman iield and a woman desired, about a. murder and a flight from justice, about a sensational arrest in a northern district, about two bodies that dangled from a gallows when the owners had paid the price of their crime. That story could have been told because the woman was-one" of three aboard the Sovereign of the Seas, a 30-ton cutter in which Caffrey and Perm sought to make their escape after the murder at the Great Barrier, near Auckland, 30 years ago. - WANTED SETTLER'S DAUGHTER.

There were circumstanced connected with that murder which combined to make it one of the most dramatic in Australasian criminal history. Caffrey was a master mariner, and Perm, too, was a seafaring man, and he and Caffrey traded along the New Zealand coast in the Sovereign of the Seas, a cutter, which was stout and seaworthy. The woman was taken aboard the cutter at Auckland, and the captain (Caffrey) considered that the situation would be rendered much more congenial by the presence of another female. His thoughts were on the engaging daughter of a settler on Great Barrier Island, outside Auckland harbor. The* Sovereign of the Seas was consequently tied up close to the settler's home, and the two men, who were obviously desperate characters, went ashore to endeavor to give effect to a plan which they had worked out in conversation.

The plan was to get the girl to join the cutter, and that they were prepared to use force if necessary to carry out their project was proved early in the interview. They found that the settler i was very strongly opposed to the- proposal they outlined, and his indignation' was forcibly expressed. High words j ensued, and Cafirey drew a revolver, which he nourished in the man s rate to impress upon him that they meant business. The old man would not yield, however, and in- the midst of a scene in which threats were made that the girl would be. taken by force if she could not be obtained by any other means, Perm drew his revolver and shot the settler through the head. A ISSVERISH ESCAPE. That was a situation which Caffrey had, not bargained for, and it was obvious then that-j with such a dreadful crime to be reckoned with, abduction was out of the question. To escape would be a sufficient problem without shouldering the additional burden of a struggling and unwilling woman. So they hurriedly retreated, went aboard the Sovereign of the Seas, lifted anchor, and with as little delay as possible, headed for the open sea. They agreed, after careful consideration, that their best plan would be to endeavor to reach South America, reckoning that in such a country their crime, would be unknown, and probably never would be known. They • were well provisioned, and they doubtlessly contemplated restocking at one of th^ many islands they would pass on the way. Fortune did not favor them, however, and their plans went astray. Heavy weather was encountered. The litt!e cutter was, the plaything of the waves for many i days. Only slight progress could be! anade. and the craft went so far out of her course that hope died in the breasts of the seamen, and eventually the idea of making a distant port in South America was abandoned A course was consequently set for the Australian coast, and after an adventurous voy-j age the Sovereign of the Seas reacfced Smoky Cape—a snot where the murderers considered would be a suitable] landing place

ASHORE IN NEW SOUTH WALES

Taking just those things they would Immediately require, __ the party arranged to abandon their ship, to scuttle ier, and to get ashore. * They took the desperate chance that they would evade detection, and that in the process of time the crime would be forgotten, and ithear safety would be guaranteed. It was a desperate chance, without a 4outot:; but it might have worked had iit not been that the scuttling of the Sovereign of the Seas was not sufficiently complete to hids its identity. The men allowed the name to remain intact, raid in due course the wreckage was found with the name prominently revealed. Interest in the crime—which, on account -of the time that had elapsed tsinee it was committed, had almost been forgotten—was at once revived, and, in conjunction with theories that the perpetrators had met their death in mid-ocean, others were propounded that they had possibly got ashore, and had escaped into the interior. As a consequence strangers were carefully wached and the free days of the two men were numbered. CAFFREY BETRAYS HIMSELF. To render their chances of evasion as good as possible Perm and Caffrey parted. Perm was compelled to lie low, because in landing from the scuttled cutter he injured his back, and for him rapid movement was out of the question. Cafrrey went to the Bellringer River, and at a township now known as Urunga he worked at a saw mills and rone works, and at other employment. He did not arouse any suspicion for some time, but he developed nervousness, and at length that proved to be his undoing. One of his mates noticed his restlessness, wondered that he tossed about so in his sleep, and at a habit he formed of jumping up in bod in the silence of the night^and staring fearfully around, as thouglTsomeone hnd called his name, or as though, the ghastly body of the murdered man had obtruded itself into his dreams. His mate be</an to theorise when Caffrey's behaviour showed no change, and he mentioned the facts to Constable May, who was then in the district, and * who afterwards served in Newtown until he reached the retiring age. Next night Caffrev repeated the actions that proved, the existence of the guilty conscience, and his companion exclaimed. 'What's the matter with you, man? Anybody would think you' had murdered someone the way you behave!" CONSTABLE'S EFFECTIVE RUSE. The remark seemed to Caffrey to be double-edged, and,, next day he'packed his swag, told the boss. that he was f going to look for another job, was paid off, and went away down the road that was to. lead to his destruction. Some distance on he' met another swaggie who had a hard luck story to tell concerning the country he "had passed through. There was no work to he soy ' there, he said, and he suggested that they should go along together in the direction from which Caffrey came, hoping to get a job beyond the'rivev. When they got to the river they took the punt to cross it, and in a second the manner of the persuasive swaggie changed. His tired manner disappear- '

Ed, and Cafrrey—a heavily-built man, who towered over the other manfound himself looking down the barrel of a revolver and heard the constable— for it was May, impersonating the swagman—announcing that he had better make no fuss, that his game was up Caffrey admitted that he was trapped, and gave no trouble. Perm had little chance of escape once it was known that Catfrey had been apprehended. He was run down on the Macleay river near Trial Bay, and the v\vo men were taisen over to Auckland tried, and sentenced to death, t^affrey protested his innocence right to the vriia, and he was innocent of the settler[s death, too, for Perm made a confession admitting that it was he who fired the fatal shot. They were hanged together. The woman who appeared at the Cen+ral Court Ust week was a witness at the memorable trial. She drifted to ! byaney when it was all over, and now I and again she is seen by somebody who knows how closely she was associated with the principal actors in that sensational drama. Then the story of the crime is told again.