AN AUDACIOUS BUSHRANGER.

Southland Times, Volume I, Issue 9, 9 December 1862, Page 3

AN AUDACIOUS BUSHRANGER.

IThe Sydney Morning Herald furnishes some cresting particulars of the exploits of the torious Mudgee bushranger. Sometime since ister Cadell, a young lad, was sent by his ither with a message. As he walked his pony the Long Hill, five miles from Mudgee, he ticed someone on horseback in the pine scrub the top of the hill, but thought this nothing ango, as drovers frequently let their cattle ize round the hill at this part of the road. > reached the top of the hill, and had just »an to canter on when a mounted man dashed m behind a clump of cherry trees, put his rse's head over his pony's neck, held a revolver V^M him and ordered him " stop." He could not in up his pony for second, and was pushed off cc ' ie road before he did so. Tne bushranger then *na dd, " I won't hurt you, but you must come a i ith me." He then rode beside him to a holts iw, some fifty yards from the road, ordered j jm' to dismount, and lay down under a •mall i cc. He then hung his own horse to a sapling, °" nd took the stirrup-leathers out of Master C.'s SI iddle, and hung them high up in a tree. At eh lis moment the up-mail was heard passing, and en Mt bushranger leant down not to be seen by it. '. should here mention that, on Master Cadell ™ eing taken into the hollow, he noticed two men a I »ying under trees or saplings, and Mr. Smith, f Appletree Flat, whom he knew, tied with his ret ands behind his back, to a sapling; and it ot ppears the first of these men was stopped ber - ween five and six in the morning, the second etw»en seven and eight, Smith at two o'clock, »** nd Master C. at about twenty minutes to ten. [>ow) n the mail passing he took Master Cs stirrup"Mea thers from the tree, and mounted his pony, mind told him if he got up or moved he wouid |S gjMhoot him. He then went out into the road, and vXhortly came back with two more men — one the other on foot — both known to 'Ojßflaster Cadell ; he tied the footman first, and Htbis seems to have exhausted the strands of erJß'ide he had with him, for, on ordering the sea^S;ond man to get oft' his horse, he held his re„JjJrolver and untied the man's neckcloth with the and with it secured him to a sapling. In Hieing these two men, he placed the revolver Hinder his left arm, and used his hands very ex—»Byonly. He now took his own horse from the plßEapling on which he had been hung, and led him jg.jßlp the thicket of cherry trees before mentioned, .1 B^eraarking to Master Cadell that his pony was a IjHgood one, and he would use him for the day, le Kill the mail came down, and keep his own ceJfcorse fresh. He speedily returned, having esBtififchanged his saddle from his own horse to the ?(Bp° ny - and for a good while kept railing at jHpmith, and saying, "You prevented me getting jttke mail last time, by getting your hands untied I Htosoon, but you will not manage ifc fco-day. He rflSalso every ten minutes or so galloped to the top of Ml tho Pine Bidge (some three hundred yards from lt{ the hollow) and back again. It was a good while jo before he brought two other men down on horsej back, and he tied them with some rope they had '•* with them, back to back, to ono tree. This now W made seven men and Master Cadell, 3nd he seems A to have got into good humor with himself, and sj boasted of his exploits during the three years he r fJ had been "Jack Sheppard;" and spoko cf his I I horse, and his regret that he d^jtyot get a pair of ■,4. shoes on him when in Mudgee f sterday ; " but I .'.• iaVe a fresh one at the tamp, fiv_- miles from here, •"; timt nothing in Mudgee can touch;" mentioned *Hwvliero he got the hay to feed his horse the last jjs %'uae he was waiting for the mail and stopped f- e( Smith, and that he was only waiting for the down J . mail to-day when he would let them all go, &c. a He continued his rides to the ridge, and ere long a ® lot of fat cattle came along, driven by Mr. Robinvl son, of Wilberforce, who also had a man with him. r. The cattle they were ordered to drive to the bottom 1 of the hollow and round them up there, the man |0 j waa sent to the further end to, keep them tlv.re, and Robinson was told to remain at the end near ' ' where the bushranger himself occasionally took his ID ■ stand. The time now appears to have hung heavily Son his hands, and ho amused himself firing at a ■ target. He rode up to a tree and cut a piece of - bark out of it with his knife ; he then fired a revolver when about thirty yards from it. He said he haa missed it, and would try another. He then rode furtner away (he called it one hundred yards), tcok another weapon, described as one barrel fourteen or fifteen inches long, and cook deliberate aim over the pony's head, and hit the tree, he said a little to one side of the mark. This weapon he carried in a holster at his side. The ; time was now drawing nigh for tbe mail to bo passing down, and he had frequent trips to the • road. At length it is driven into the hollow, cou- • taining, besidess the driver, four male and two female passengers, the bushranger behind it. They are ordered to alight ; they do so, the driver reI raaioing on the bor. The females are told to stand aside under the shade of a tree ; the men are told to tur n ou t; their pockets. They clo so. He then, with revolver in one hand, searches them with the other; he then gets into the coach, and throws everything out ; he then gets down, and is seen emptying the mail bags, from one of which' — a large one — a number of letters with red tape round them are seen to fall ; he sits down on his heels, snd ia seen to open the letters with both hands, tearing open three or four at a time, and also frequently putting his hands into his pockets, the mail passengers looking on in silent amazement. He then gets the pony, which he had hung up to ft sapling while searching the passengers and the hags, and is seen to take off his glove and shake • hands with the mail driver; ho mounts and touches the pony with the 6pur and canters up the hill, r firing iour shots from his revolver in rapid succession. While doing so, his one-barrel weapon is 6een to fall from the holster, he cannot check the pony at once, and the mail driver ha 3 nearly reached it, when he returns and presents the one out of which he had fired the four shots, and said .if he touched it he would shoot him. The mailman j asked him if he should hand him the weapon, and ho told him to do so, and called to Master Cadell, *' You will find yeur pony on the road." By that time all the men were loose. He (Master C.) went up to the road, one of the men (Martin) with him. The bushranger had puthis own saddlo on his own horse by this time, and had also re -saddled Master C.'s. He then cantered away a little distance, turned round, rode back to tho face of the hill, and said " Good evening," wheeled round and rode off very fast. Messrs Cox, Cadell, Orridge, Brenyon, Sergeant Hardy and the mounted trooper, with two black trackers, were promptly on the ground, and it is hoped some clue will be got. A minute description of man and horse (a very fine one) is in tha possession of the police. The mail drove back t Mudgee at once, wsth all the letters and papers they could gather up, and tho passengers went on to Simpson's Inn, at Brombee. -