The Gilbert Brigade

Frank Gardiner on left and John William Gilbert (1842 - 1865) on right

On 15 June 1862 John Gilbert took part in the Eugowra gold escort robbery and had a £500 reward on his head. 

In May 1863 Gilbert returned to the Wedden Mountains and became Ben Hall's right-hand man although they did not always work together.

Frank Gardiner Bushranger "THE KING OF THE ROAD" Workday Wednesday

"THE mere mention of the name of Frank Gardiner in  any part of the Western or Southern districts of New South Wales, is sufficient to set any of the residents in  those districts of 30 years' standing talking of the "old bushranging days." For Christie, alias Clarke, alias Gardiner, has been ever looked upon as the father of that bushranging which was followed by so many young men during the decade commencing in 1860."
"Frank Gardiner — I shall call him throughout this story by the name by which he was commonly known in the bush   — commenced his criminal career by "lifting" a horse when     20 years of age. He was born at Boro Creek, near Goulburn,   in 1830, and when quite a young man crossed the border into   Victoria. In October, 1850, he committed the crime of horse-   stealing, and as that exploit was the initial step in his down-   ward course, a short account thereof will not be considered out of place just here.  
At the time that Gardiner crossed the border into Vic-toria that part of the country was infested with prowling bands of well-mounted men, ostensibly in search of employ-   ment ,but really on the look put for horses and cattle that admitted of easy "lifting." It was the custom in those days for the station-holder to extend hospitality to all callers, and  it is said that on some stations the cost of entertaining the callers amounted to over £1000 per annum. It was a fortu-nate thing, indeed, for the colony that the discovery of gold was made, and that the periodical wanderers were drawn off by the excitment to different and widely separated fields.  
In was in June of 1850 that Mr. Lockhart Morton, who had recently entered into possession of Salisbury Plains  Station, on the Loddon, suddenly discovered that all the horses on his station, with the exception of four which were  in a secure paddock, had mysteriously disappeared. Search- ing round the run with one of his stockmen, Mr. Morton at last came upon their tracks, making straight for the Lower Avoca, and he at once arrived at the conclusion that they had been driven off by horse stealers. Returning home he found a message awaiting him from an adjoining station to the effect that three men had been seen by the shepherd three days before driving ofl the horses at a furious pace. Mr. Morton was a man of pluck and energy, and after making a supply of cartridges for his guns and writing to the chief con- stable at Melbourne, asking him to send intelligence of the robbery to Geelong, Portland, and Adelaide, daylight on the Wednesday morning (the horses had been removed on the   previous Sunday) saw him in the saddle fully equipped and determined to run down the robbers. (To be Continued.) 

Written by "Chatterer" C White. 
Printed in the Bathurst Free Press and Mining Journal Tuesday 26th January, 1892.

The spelling errors are in the original newspaper article.

RESOURCE: Trove

SEE: more general information on Frank Gardiner

Australia’s largest gold robbery

Stage coach hold-up, Eugowra Rocks, oil on canvas, 137.5 x 183 cm

by Patrick William Morony (1858-1939) painted in 1894.

It was at Eugowra, on the 15th June, 1862 that Frank Gardiner, and his gang of bushrangers, robbed the Ford & Co. coach on its way from Forbes to Bathurst in New South Wales. It was Australia’s largest gold robbery - 14 thousand pounds worth of gold and banknotes.
The rock, in the painting, above, where the bushrangers waited to ambush the coach is now called Escort Rock after the fact that the coach was a gold escort meaning it escorted or carried gold from one place to another.
Gardiner's gang included Ben Hall, John Gilbert, Henry Manns, Alex Fordyce, John Bow, John O'Meally, and Dan Charters.
"...the greatest achievement of Gardiner's gang, the Lachlan escort robbery; at Engowra Rocks, about forty-five miles distant from the town of Orange. Here the escort coach, carrying a sergeant and two troopers, was impeded by two bullock teams, without drivers, drawn across, the road. The driver made a circuit round them to pass, and when the coach neared a clump of rocks four men rose from their shelter. They were attired in red shirts, their faces were blackened, and they were armed with rifles. They dis charged their rifles in a volley at the coach. A bullet pierced the driver's hat, and another perforated his coat skirt. The constables in the coach were not hit. Then four other bandits stood up, and fired a second volley, whereupon the horses bolted, and the coach was upset. The gang rushed upon it and fired again. The sergeant was wounded in three places, and Trooper Horan in two. Trooper Haviland was uninjured, and he fled into the bush with the driver. The robbers carried away the escort boxes, two rifles, and the coach horses. Haviland and the driver ran to Clement's Station, and re turned with a party of men, who found only the scattered contents of the mail bags. These they gathered up, and, after obtaining fresh horses, proceeded on the road to Orange with the wounded police. They also discovered the bullock drivers, who had been bailed up by the gang,  ordered to draw their teams across the  road, and hide themselves in the bush, with, their faces on the ground. The coach arrived at Orangeat six o'clock   on the following evening. Shortly after it left the post office, a bullet struck Constable Haviland in the head, and killed him instantly. Doubtless it came from the rifle of one of the gang, who must have been lingering on watch in the   neighbourhood unseen. The robbers'  booty was heavy ; the escort boxes con tained 5509 oz. of gold, representing £22,000 in value, and £7490 in Oriental Bank notes. The gang consisted of Gardiner, Ben Hall, Gilbert, O'Mally, John   Bow, Alexander Fordyce, Henry Manns, and Daniel Charteris. They divided the booty into eight shares. Gardiner, For dyce, and Charteris put their gold on one of the coach horses, and proceeded towards the Weddin Mountains. The others took their shares separately, and went on other tracks. On ths following day Sir Frederick Pottinger, who was district superinten dent of police, set forth in pursuit of the bandits with eleven troopers, twenty   armed volunteers, and two black track ers. They followed the trail of Gardiner  and his two companions, whose pack horse became exhausted at the foot of the Weddin Range. While they were engaged in removing the gold they caught sight of their pursuers approaching, and fled into the hills, leaving behind 1239 oz. of gold, which fell into the hands of the police. Some time after Charter is turned informer. Manns, Fordyce, and Bow were arrested; Manns was hanged, and the other two were sentenced to life imprisonment. Gardiner disappeared. Hall, Gilbert, and O'Meally went on their way of blood and plunder for three years longer in defiance of the police.

The huge escort robbery was Gardiner's final exploit." TROVE: The Capricornian Newspaper. Rockhampton, Qld. Saturday 14th October 1905.

Read the details of the robbery here.

Linked up at History and Home

Owen Hargrave Suffolk "The Convict Poet"

Owen Hargrave Suffolk was born April, 4th 1829 in Middlesex, England. His father was William Johnson Suffolk and his mother was Ann.  He was born into a middle class family and was both well spoken and literate. In the 1841 England census an older child was in the same house as Owen named William.

Owen Hargrave Suffolk was transported to Victoria, Australia in 1847, on the Joseph Somes, for petty crime in the County of Middlesex:
7 years for Forgery of an Order of the payment of money with intent to defraud   Robert Wilson; also for unlawfully obtaining 2 sovereigns, 1 half-sovereign, 1 crown, 1 half-crown, 2 shillings, and 1 sixpence, and other monies, of   Robert Wilson, by false pretences*

He wrote many poems including those about prison and bushranging e.g. For Frank Gardiner, (below) and was dubbed 'The Convict Poet'.

Suffolk spent more than sixteen years in colonial goals. He was incarcerated in both England and Australia for a total of 5 terms but this never seemed to deter him from leading a life of crime. When he finally returned to London he continued in his life of crime - he became a bigamist, faked his own death and escaped to America with a widow's money. In March, 1867, he married a widow, Mary Elizabeth Phelps. In 1880 he married Eliza Shreves.

"For Frank Gardiner.

It is not in a prison drear
Where all around is gloom,
That I would end life's wild career,
And sink into the tomb,
For though my spirit's ever bold
Each tyrant to defy;
Still, still, within a dungeon cold,
I could not calmly die.

It is not that my cheek would pale
Within a lonely cell;
It is not that my heart would quail
To bid this world farewell.
For if oppressed by tyrant foe
I'd freely be the first
To give my life, and strike the blow
To lay him in the dust.

But place me in a forest glen
Unfettered, wild and free,
Wtih fifty tried and chosen men
A bandit chief to be.
'Tis there, when fighting with my foes
Amid my trusty band,
I'd freely leave this world of woes,
And die with sword in hand. "

He started writing  his autobiography in 1858, describing his life as bushranger, horse thief, prisoner and con man, called Days of Crime and Years of Suffering, published in 1867.

RESOURCES:
1841 England Census about Owen Suffolk
England & Wales, Criminal Registers, 1791-1892
England & Wales, FreeBMD Marriage Index, 1837-1915 about Owen Hargrave Suffolk
Convict Records of Australia
* The proceedings of The Old Bailey from 1674 to 1913

Happy Jack

Wood engraving of John Gilbert
by Eugene Montagu Scott,
held at the State Library of Victoria, Australia.



John Gilbert was born in Canada in 1842 to William John Gilbert (1797 – 1879) and Eleanor Gilbert nee Wilson (1802 – 1845).
He arrived at the Victorian goldfields in 1852 together with nine members of his family to search for gold.
At the age of 12 he left home to work as a stablehand for his sister Eleanor and husband, John Stafford, and he became a good horseman and was called "Happy Jack" due to his good disposition.  He later went to the Kiandra goldfields in New South Wales.
By 1862 he was robbing stores and coaches with Frank Gardiner, the bushranger. He participated in the gold coach robbery at Eugowra.
When he was shot and killed, in 1865, he had a 1000 pound reward on his head and had been involved in around 630 hold ups including the death of a police man.

Read the story of his death.

Frank Gardiner led a notorious gang

Frank Gardiner 1829 - ? date unknown

Frank Gardiner was born Francis Christie in 1829 in Ross-shire, Scotland to Charles Christie (1791 – 1864) and Jane Christie (1800 – 1842), née Whittle. He came to Australia in 1834 with his parents.

He began his career as a criminal in 1850 by stealing horses and was apprehended and tried at the Geelong Circuit Court and sentenced to five years imprisonment, with hard labour, as Francis Christie, in Pentridge, Melbourne.  He escaped and was recaptured 4 years later when he was again arrested for horse-stealing and given seven years hard labour.

He conducted the largest robbery of gold in Australian history in 1862 with Ben Hall and Johnny Gilbert. Who were part of his notorious gang: (This list is from WikiTree)

1. Ben Hall - Shot dead by police

2. Frank Gardiner - Sentenced to 32 years in prison (served 10 years and then exiled from Australia

3. John Gilbert - Shot dead by police

4. John Davis, one of the Three Jacks-Sentenced to 15 years in prison

5. John McGuiness, one of the Three Jacks - Shot dead (probably by Gardiner for leaving Davis alone to fight police)

6. John Connors, one of the Three Jacks

7. John Youngman - Skipped bail and disappeared

8.  Patrick Daley - Sentenced to fifteen years in prison

9.Henry Manns - Hanged

10. Alexander Fordyce - Sentenced to death, later commuted to fifteen years in prison

11. Dan Charters - Caught, testified against the gang

12. John Bow - Sentenced to death, later commuted to fifteen years in prison

13. John O’Meally - Shot dead

14. Fred Lowry - Shot dead by police

15. Larry Cummins - Sentenced to fifteen years in prison

16. Francis Foley (younger brother of notorious bushranger, John Foley) - Sentenced to ten years in prison

17. Michael Burke - Shot himself dead after receiving a mortal stomach wound

18. John Vane - Sentenced to fifteen years in prison, paroled after six years

19. John Dunleavy - Sentenced to life in prison

20. Jin Gordon, AKA Old Man James Mount - sentenced to twenty five years in prison

21. John Dunn - Hanged

22. John Peisley - Hanged

This hold up, of the Lachlan Gold Escort coach, near Eugowra, N.S.W. was of 14,000 pounds.
Gardiner fled to Queensland and was arrested there in 1864, tried and found guilty on two charges and given a sentence of 32 years hard labour. In 1874 Gardiner was released, due to public petitioning. A large petition signed by Members of Parliament, magistrates, doctors and many notables was given to the Governor, Sir Hercules Robinson. The Governor decided that Gardiner had been harshly sentenced and released him subject to his exile. This decision caused a public controversy which led to the fall of the Parkes government.

In 1874 Gardiner travelled to Hong Kong and then California where he later owned the Twilight Star Saloon in San Francisco. There are many rumours about his life in America, none of which have been proven. 
It is not know for sure when he died and his death was reported many times between 1880 to 1904. The uncertainty is mainly due to the destruction of records in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

Unfortunately, as yet, I cannot find a better portrait of Frank Gardiner or Frank Christie (his real name).

SOURCES: 
Ancestry Family Tree.
Australian Dictionary of Biography Gardiner, Francis article by Edgar F. Penzig.
TROVE: The Capricornian Newspaper. Rockhampton, Qld. Saturday 14th October 1905.
Charles White, Australian Bushranging, Gardiner "King of the Road".
G. E. Boxall, The Story of the Australian Bushrangers.

Young Ben Hall

Ben Hall (9 May 1837 - 5 May 1865) 

Ben Hall was born in 1837, in the Hunter Valley of New South Wales. His father was Benjamin Hall born in England and his mother Eliza was born in Ireland. His parents had both been transported to Van Dieman's Land due to minor stealing offences. His father was given his certificate of freedom in 1832 and he married Eliza Somers in 1834 in New South Wales. Ben was their fourth child and as a teenager he worked on numerous cattle properties gaining a good reputation as a hard-working stockman.
At 19 he married Bridget Walsh at Bathurst and 2 years later they had a son who they named Henry.
In 1860, Ben Hall and John Maguire jointly leased a  run of 10,000 acres near Forbes, in the Central West of New South Wales.  They built a house, sheds and stockyards and became successful graziers of cattle.

“I'm not a criminal. I've been driven to this life.  Pottinger arrested me on Forbes racecourse last year and I was held for a month in gaol, an innocent man.  While I was away me wife ran away - with a policeman.  Well, with a cove who used to be in the police force.  Then I was arrested for the mail coach robbery and held another month before I was let out on bail.  When I came home, I found my house burned down and cattle perished of thirst, left locked in yards." Ben Hall.

His life changed, his wife had left him, his house and cattle were gone and he met the notorious bushranger Frank Gardiner.

SOURCES:

• New South Wales, Australia, Certificates of Freedom, 1810-1814, 1827-1867 about Benjamin Hall (his father)
• Australia Marriage Index, 1788-1950 about Benjamin Hall (his father)
• New South Wales, Australia, Registers of Convicts' Applications to Marry, 1826-1851 about Eliza Somers