MURDERED BY BLACKS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17527, 23 July 1931, Page 7

MURDERED BY BLACKS

EQUIPMENT TAKEN WEST AUSTRALIAN TRAGEDY PERTH, July 7. A report that two unknown white men had been murdered by blacks in the Rawlinson Ranges, 400 miles north-east of Laverton, which is 150 miles north of Kalgoorlie, was received to-day by tlie Commissioner of Police. Mr. R. Connell. from the Laverton police. Tlie police forwarded a letter from Mr. Spencer Gall, leader of the Adelaide Quest Syndicate party, stating that from several sources lie had received reports that natives there had attacked two white men, ransacked their equipment, and made off, leaving the bodies behind. Mr. Gall had met two men, Johansen and Fabian, who had moved towards Hie Rawlinson Ranges from Fdjudina. He knew of two other men, Brown and Brnmhle, who were well known at Oodnalta, and who were aporoaehing the Rawlinson Ranges fiom Alice Springs. Mr. Gall said the reports suggested that the tragedy had occurred at Hie eastern end of the Rawlinson Ranges, at Sladon Waters, a camping snot which the Quest party had recently vacated. Sladon Waters is about 40 miles west of the Western Australian border and about CO miles north of the border between South Australia and Northern Australia.

Mr. Gall seems 1,0 lmve heard of the tragedy when in the vicinity of Warliurlon Ranges, wliich are 300 miles ncrth-easl of Laverton. A Government party, under Messrs. If. L. Paine and F. G. Forman, is surveying pastoral properties in the Warburton range district. The party, which is armed and equipped with a wireless receiving set, listens-in each Tuesday night for messages from headquarters. To-morrow night a message will he broadcast, to them, reporting the murders and instructing them to take every possible precaution against surprise 'by natives. Mr. .Samuel Hazlelt, a well-known prospector, accompanied by his son, is ahead of l’aitie’s party, and has been through the district three or four times during the past two years. Mr. A. 11. Glarke, manager of Glenorn Still ion, who arrived in Perth to-day, said his experience of the natives beyond Laverton was that even near a station in a drought season they were nuisances, because of their pilfering. There was now plenty of food and water in (he Jtawlinson Range district, according to what he had heard. The equipment, of white men jvlild he a sore temptation to the natives in any season. 'There has been no news of 11. A. St iTaslett and his son, aged 22, for a considerable lime. He is a (lovernment-as-sisted prospector, He was in the locality in 1904 (when lie was speared by blacks), in 1:92.9. and in 1930. It was on his report regarding the pastoral possibilities of tbo district that Mr. Paine’s parly was sent out.