BUSHRANGING DAYS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21580, 26 August 1933, Page 2 (Supplement)

BUSHRANGING DAYS

OLD COACHMAN'S MEMORIES STIRRING EVENTS. RECALLED WOMAN SAVED FROM GALLOWS Memories of bushrangers and other excitements incidental to coaching the sixties and seventies fill the mind of Mr. James Richards, of Sydney, who, for many years, was in the service of Cobb and Company, and other firms. Mr. Richards, who was known to ;his friends, as "Brummy," because his father came from.Birmingham,, lives at Milson's Point, and recently he showed ;a Sydney Morning Herald representative a scar on his right knee —relic of a shot from a bushranger's pistol. Mr. Richards drove coaches between Albury and Wagga, Goulburn and Braidwood, Cootamundra and Temora, and along other routes. He saw all the frenzy of the gold mining at Araluen, and he drove a horse bus in Sydney istreets. 1 „ , , . The wound on Mr. Richards' knee was received, he said, from a member of Ben Hall's notorious gang—Hall, John Gilbert and John Dunn—about 12 miles from Goulburn, on the road to Braidwood. Four boys of the Faithfull family were returning on horseback from Bchool; each had a rifle, which he carried for shooting wild turkeys. The bushrangers appeared, and Mr. Richards found himself between the two groups. Shots were exchanged —the bushrangers would have given anything to get the rifles, said Mr. Richards —and in the skirmish a bullet struck him. In those days the bushrangers were on speaking terms with many of the

small farmers and townsfolk of the western and southern districts, and .Mr. Richards said ho was asked more than once by members of Hall's gang to obtain rifles for them—a request never obeyed. On ono occasion he had drinks on the Goulburn racecourso with members of Hall's gang, at a time when Dunn's head was worth £IOO0 — but it was more than Mr. Richards' life was worth, he said, to give them away. ' , Notorious Bushranger

Othor bushrangers Mr. Richards encountered ' wero "Tommy" and "Johnny" Clarke, and their uncle, Patrick Connell, who was later hanged; and he drovo the coach that took "Captain Moonlite" and his accomplice Rogan, under arrest, from Gundagai to Cootamundra. A crowd had gathered at the Cootamundra railway station to sea "Moonlite," who turned to thom and said, "Ladies and gentlemen, what are you looking at?" There was no answer, so the bushranger continued, "You are looking at a man who has only a little while to live, and there is nothing very amiable about it." Whereupon, said Mr. Richards, the crowd melted away.

Moonlite, whose real name was Scott —a former resident of Auckland —was rather given to speeches. After he had been sentenced to death in Sydney the following year (1880) he addressed tho jury at great length. In those days the driver of a coach was a man of great importance; he was given the freedom of all hotels, for it was realised that where he stayed his passengers would stay. Once Mr ; Richards was offered £IOO by a publican at Temora if he would stay at his hotel, but he rejected the offer. Mr. Richards told how he saved a woman from the gallows at Goulburn. He had an official letter to deliver to Captain Zouch, who was head of tho police at Goulburn. Captain Zouch, who lived two miles from the gaol, told him to wait while he read tho contents of tho letter. Only Three Minutes to Spare "Captain Zouch was in his pyjamas," said Mr. Richards, "for it was early in tho morning. On that morning a woman was to be hanged for the murder of her husband. When he read the letter ; Captain Zouch shouted to mo to drive as fast as I could to tho gaol, for tho letter I had delivered was a repvjfve for the condemned woman. "Not waiting to dress, Captain Zouch jumped into the cart. When we reached the gaol we had only three minutes to spare," said Mr. Richards. "The cap was ill ready on the woman's head. I never saw anyone look so pleased as she when she was told of the reprieve." Though Mr. Richards claims that the coach horses in his day wero well-bred, and better than tho horses of to-day, he says he has no regrets at the passing of tho coaches. "I've had a few motor rides, and they're pretty good," ho said. "They are an improvement on tlio horses. And anyhow,, I reckon the horses wero jolly pleased when tho trains and motors took their place."