TIMELINE OF EVENTS
Thursday 17 October – Griffin arrives in Rockhampton from Clermont
6 Chinese gold diggers entrust him with £252 worth of money and gold, for safe keeping. Griffin subsequently gambles this away. The Chinese men make repeated demands for the return of gold or its value and even follow him to Rockhampton. Griffin, unable to pay the debt, finds himself in great difficulties, desperate and probably at this point conceives the idea of robbing the gold escort.
Chinese gold digger starting for work, ca. 1860s (Image courtesy SLQ, RN116084)
Thursday 24 October – Sergeant Julian arrives in Rockhampton with the Clermont gold consignment
Julian delivers the gold to the bank and receives instructions from Commissioner Griffin to make the return journey to Clermont with the exchange notes and coinage on 26 October.
Saturday 26 October – Mr T.S. Hall, manager of the Rockhampton branch of the Australian Joint Stock Bank prepares the money for transport.
4 packages containing a thousand £1 notes each; two bundles containing £5 notes equalling £3849 and £151 in gold, silver and copper coins. The numbers of the notes were ‘narrated’ (recorded) and then the whole amount equalling £8,151 was packed in 10 canvas bags.
Commissioner Griffin announces his intention to travel part of the way to Clermont with the escort
Griffin’s presence with the escort was quite unnecessary and unofficial. He told the Bank Manager that he would go no further with the escort than Bartholomew’s Hotel at Gogango, a few miles out, but he gave different stories to other people. Sergeant Julian appears to have been profoundly distrustful of Griffin. Coming from Clermont, he would certainly have heard of Griffin’s financial embarrassments, and probably considered the Commissioner’s presence on the escort to be both obtrusive and suspicious.
Sergeant Julian takes delivery of the money from the bank
However when the escort Constable Patrick Cahill fails to arrive by 3pm, he promptly returns the money to the bank and rides back to the escort camp, located four hundred yards from the residence of Mrs Ottley, whose daughter Griffin was courting. Cahill arrives at the camp.
Sunday 27 October – That afternoon the escort travels 15mls (24kms) and camps off the road at Griffin’s suggestion.
Sergeant Julian takes to sleeping on top of the saddle bags containing the money.
Monday 28 October – 3am Griffin sends Constable Cahill after the horses.
Griffin moves himself and his blankets closer to where Julian is lying and appears uneasy and continuously keeps an eye on Julian. The Sergeant in turn keeps a sharp eye on Griffin until the Cahill returns to camp. Griffin asks Julian how much money he had received, and if the notes were signed, and then remarks that he now considers the party too small to travel with £8,000 to which Julian disagrees.
Griffin decides that the horses needed shoeing and that he will accompany Cahill to have them seen to. He instructs the Sergeant to stay with the money but in the end the whole party returns to the camp near Rockleigh, where they found Constables Power and Gildea.
At this point Julian becomes so suspicious of the shifts and devices of Griffin, that he resolves to get out of the job if he can. Leaving Gildea, Power and Cahill in camp, he follows Griffin to the Rockleigh residence and protests against being left alone with so much money. Griffin is furious and returns to escort camp with Julian. The 3 Constables leave to pick up the mail in Rockhampton, leaving Griffin and Julian alone in the camp.
Julian is accustomed to laying his blanket on the canvas treasure bags, and sleeping there but this night Griffin takes Julian’s place on the bags and an arguments breaks out; Griffin accuses Julian of not wanting to go to Clermont but that he would force him to go. Julian asks for his discharge and is refused and then asks for permission to go to town to see a doctor as he is ill, which is also refused.
Power, Gildea and Cahill return to camp, and Griffin goes off to Mrs Ottley’s, presumably to sleep there. When Griffin is gone, Julian moves the treasure bags to a different tent, and spread his blankets over them. Sleeping lightly, and in an apprehensive state, he hears Griffin arrive in the early morning and call out in a low voice call “Julian! Where are my blankets?” The Sergeant tells him that they are in the tent where he had been lying down the day before.
Griffin probably had intended on broaching the treasure bags that night.
Gold Commissioner Thomas John Griffin, c1864 (Image courtesy of the QPM, PM1923)
Tuesday 29 October – At daylight Griffin goes back to Rockleigh, telling the men to be ready for a start after breakfast.
Morning
At that meal the troopers thought that the tea had a bitter taste and they accused Gildea, who was known jokingly as ‘The Doctor’ (having been formerly a medical student) of putting salts in it instead of sugar. Julian saying, “There’s plenty of milk to drink”, empties out the tea, and sees a white sediment at the bottom of the billy. He thinks, unsuspiciously, that some bitter leaves or bark had given the tea the queer taste.
Late Morning
As the escort prepares to leave the Rockleigh camp Griffin tells the troopers that he will take them by a short cut across swampy country. He leads, but keeps looking backward, as if watching for something to happen or perhaps for the poison to work. 5 miles across the swamp, they approaches Archer’s Gracemere Station and Griffin says he remembers leaving behind, at the clubhouse in Rockhampton, a small parcel of gold which had come down with the last escort by mistake.
He orders Julian, Power and CahiIl back to Rockleigh camp with orders to unload the packhorses when they get to camp.
Late Afternoon
Once back in Rockhampton Julian returns the money to the bank – he is well and truly fed up with Griffin’s behaviour. Griffin sees the escort returning from the bank and confronts Julian demanding to know what he is doing in town to which Julian replies that he has returned the money to the bank for safe keeping.
Griffin, seeing his whole plan frustrated, goes into a furious rage, suspends Julian and appoints Power in his place. Griffin explains to the Bank Manager that the money can now be handed over to Power. Mr Hall, says that he will only send half the money as Power is inexperienced with this new responsibility. The amount is reduced to £4000. In the afternoon Power takes delivery of the £4000 and Griffin meets the Chinese gold diggers and promises to pay them at the Clubhouse the next morning. When Power returns to camp with the money, Griffin takes charge of it, with the excuse that the boys can then have a worry free night’s rest. He takes the treasure bag to Mrs Ottley’s. That night Griffin steals £270 in notes.
Wednesday 30 October – Morning
Griffin goes into Rockhampton and pays off the Chinese gold diggers.
He returns the remainder of the money to Trooper Power, who notices that the parcel has a new covering which is explained away by Griffin as ‘for more careful conveyance’. Power is not happy with this answer and says “Mr Griffin, as this is the first time I have been entrusted with such serious responsibility, I would like to see the parcel in the same condition as I got it from the bank. Will you please remove the outside cover?” to which Griffin replies, “I assure you it is all right. It has not been out of my possession since you gave it to me.”
Power seems to have become suspicious of Griffin, and in order to gain time, draws his attention to a lame horse. Griffin tells Cahill to bring up the horses, but Power warns Cahill in Gaelic (which they both understood) not to do so but to drive them further off. Cahill does this, and on returning to the camp, tells Griffin that he could not find the horses. [It is unknown if Julian had warned Power the previous evening of his suspicions of Griffin but it certainly appears that there may have been some type of warning for Power to watch Griffin closely and to now question his actions.]
Power is allowed to take the lame horse back to Rockhampton, where he sees the Bank Manager and asks him to come out to the camp to see that the parcel is all right.
Thursday 31 October – Mr Hall, the bank manager, arrives at the escort camp.
Hall asks Griffin to seal the treasure bags, to which Griffin protests that this will be useless, as the seals will break through from the friction on the horses’ backs. To which Hall agrees.
After Hall departs, Power demands that Griffin seal the bags or he will not take charge of them. Griffin yields and seals the parcel from which the notes have been abstracted. There is no doubt that this action sealed the fate of Power and Cahill, as on the arrival at Clermont the notes will be found missing, and if Griffin’s seals are found intact, suspicion will fall upon him, as he has taken the money away from Power and kept it in his own room.
Friday 1 November – The escort starts out in earnest for Clermont after a week’s delay.
Monday 4 November – The escort reaches a wayside accommodation house at Bedord Dam. While the troopers go to escort camp, Griffin goes to the house and orders lunch from Mrs Ashcroft, the landlady.
While at lunch, Griffin ‘flashes’ his revolver, and asks some questions about Edward Hartigan better known as the ‘Snob’, a well-known criminal of the time.
Parker Cahill Hartigan alias ‘The Snob’, taken from the Queensland Police Gazette No. 57, 20 November 1897.
The troopers come up to lunch, and are shouted drinks by Griffin all afternoon.
Constable Moynihan from Dawson station, arrives. Power is greatly relieved and asks him to accompany them to Clermont. Power says to Griffin: “Here’s Moynihan, Mr Griffin, looking for police horses. Might he not come on to Clermont, and save you the trouble of going further?” to which Griffin replies, “Oh, certainly. How are you Moynihan? It is lucky I met you, but you will have to make an early start tomorrow.”
Griffin then drugs Moynihan’s drink. Early in the morning the escort cannot wake him and departs. To his good fortune Moynihan sleeps peacefully until 10 am.
THE MURDER OF THE TROOPERS
Tuesday 5 November
Early in the morning the escort arrives at the Mackenzie River crossing, 130 miles from Rockhampton.
Griffin leaves the troopers in camp, and goes the Bedford Arms Hotel for breakfast. He tells Alfred Bedford, the owner, that he will be leaving the escort here and going back to Rockhampton. Taking the trouble to explain that he had only come this far to try and make Mrs Ashcroft prosecute the ‘Snob’ who had shot at her.
As Bedford is also leaving for Rockhampton, it is agreed that he and Griffin will travel back together, while the escort goes on to Clermont. At Bedford’s, Griffin endeavours to get a supply of laudanum with the excuse that he is suffering from diarrhoea.
All day the escort party comes and goes between the camp and Bedford’s, drinking and socialising.
At 8.30pm the troopers leave Bedfords to head back to the camp with a couple of bottles of beer. Griffin, after purchasing a pint of brandy, follows them.
In the early hours of the morning, Bedford is awakened by the sound of revolver shots. One is heard about 2am, and the other at 3.30am (he looks at his watch to fix the time). Griffin returns to the hotel, carrying his saddle and swag at 3.50am, and awakens Bedford. Griffin appears tired and anxious to get away. Griffin tells Bedford that he had lost himself for an hour in the bush and only discovered the house by the crowing of the cocks.
Bedford tells Griffin that he has heard 2 shots but Griffin says that he had only heard one, which was fired by Power who had become lost himself while looking for the horses.
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This information was researched by Curator Lisa Jones and sourced from the best Queensland Police Museum resources available at the time of writing. The Police Museum is open 9am to 4pm Monday to Thursday and 10am to 3pm on the last Sunday of the month (Feb-Nov) and is located on the Ground Floor of Police Headquarters at 200 Roma Street, Brisbane. Email: museum@police.qld.gov.au
“FROM the VAULT – Gold and Greed Part 2: the murder of Constables Power and Cahill in 1867” by the Queensland Police Service is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (BY) 2.5 Australia Licence. Permissions may be available beyond the scope of this licence. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5/au/legalcode