Gangland Robbers Read Online Free Page B

abducted women for themselves. Howe’s woman, ‘Black’ Mary Cockerill, provided him with useful bush knowledge and helped him avoid capture, until he turned on her.
    One of the more likely contenders for the title was Jack Bradshaw, also known as George Davis. Born in Dublin in 1845, he came to Australia at the age of fifteen and worked as a shearer. He seems also to have been a small-time confidence trickster, working with ‘Professor Bruce’, who claimed to be able to read people’s skulls. Bradshaw would already have cased the particular small town they were operating in and reported back to Bruce for his ‘readings’.
    Bradshaw then became involved in horse stealing, working with John Mulholland, known as Flash (or Lovely, because of his extreme ugliness) Riley. (Lovely Riley should not be confused with John Finnerty, or John Burns, known as ‘Riley the Bushranger’, who, in 1874, robbed the Warialda mail coach and was finally released from prison in 1900. His career lasted from the month following Ned Kelly’s execution until the day the Indigenous Governor brothers began their murderous spree near Gilgandra in 1901.)
    In May 1880 Bradshaw and Riley held up the Commercial Bank in Quirindi, an event described as ‘unsurpassed by any of the exploits of the notorious and bloodthirsty Kelly gang’. Richard Allen, the manager, had gone to the stables behind the bank to rug up his horse when he was bailed up by two men who took him to the bank, where his wife was being held, and demanded the keys to the safe. Allen told them the local chemist had them, but when the robbers threatened to blow the safe, he handed over what he said was a duplicate. Even though he managed to hide some of the money and securities in what was called the treasury drawer, they took £600 in notes and gold, and demanded the record of the numbers of the notes—in fact there was a duplicate. They also demanded food and whisky, and when they had finished, told Allen that the premises would be watched during the night and he would be shot if he put his head outside.
    Allen had asked if he could keep his watch and the men had said their target was not him but the bank. It was more likely that they thought they might be identified if they were found with it. The robbers were masked but Allen claimed he could tell that one of them had a scar on his nose and cheek, and an unusual accent.
    After the robbery, Bradshaw had initially left the area, and returned after getting married, only to be arrested on 4 October at the Namoi River. On 15 November Bradshaw and Riley were found guilty of the robbery. Their arrests had come in a roundabout way, down to a dobber de luxe in the form of the cockney Joseph Goodson, described as a man with protruding grey eyes that looked like marbles and almost flashed when he became excited. He had been involved in a robbery at Cobar in central New South Wales, during its race meeting, when £375 was taken in gold, silver and cheques from a local store. The manager put up a £50 reward and 20 per cent of the value of the cheques. Goodson dobbed in his mates and, while he was in protective custody at the police station, took the opportunity to dob in Bradshaw and Riley as well.
    His version of events was that there had originally been four men for the bank job. They had drawn lots as to who should go into the Quirindi bank: one and two would go in, three would mind the horses and four would keep a lookout on the front door. Goodson drew number four but the others wanted him to go into the bank and, as a result, he and his offsider pulled out of the job and went to Cobar. Bradshaw and Riley received twelve years working on the roads, and Goodson was given £200 as a reward.
    Riley had buried his share of the proceeds in the area, and claimed that when he was released after serving eight years of the twelve-year sentence, he returned and dug it up; literally living, for