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After a six day
search through gullies, streams, and mountain ranges a
detachment of Mounted Police with Private George
Colway in the lead came across their quarry. The
three men they had been pursuing for five days had encamped in a
gully between the ranges in an area known as Weary's Creek (Werris Creek). The troopers
took the bushrangers by surprise and they had no opportunity to resist. In
desperation the three men fled their camp however after months of living
rough in the bush without adequate supplies and shelter, they were no
match for the police and were soon captured.
Five days earlier on the 20th November 1837 they had bailed up teamsters
at Currabubla Creek. It was a fine night with
no moon, perfect for the robbers, who entered the camp
about ten o'clock that night. After bailing up the
four teamsters and an aborigine under the drays they
proceeded to ransack the supplies
which belonged to
Rev. Rusden
and
Richard Stubbs . They stole flour,
tea, sugar and tobacco and filled water kegs with
eight gallons of brandy. They also stole two
guns and some clothes belonging to the Rev. Rusden, and
this was to prove their undoing.
The three accused of robbing the drays
that night were John Sullivan, John Dooley/Doolan
and Timothy Bowser.
Timothy Bowser had been on the run since May 1837 after he absconded from
Newcastle Stockade. He teamed up with
John Dooley who was said to be a runaway from
Justice Francis Forbes' estate. Bowser and
Dooley were clearly identified in Court by the
teamsters Thomas Power who arrived on the
Heber
three months previously and
Henry Howard. Both gave evidence in Court stating they were not
ill used or personally robbed by the bushrangers.
Twenty five year old
Timothy Bowser alias Bolster had arrived on the
convict transport
Fairlie
in 1834. He had been sentenced to 7 years transportation in Middlesex in
1833 for
feloniously breaking and entering the dwelling-house of James
Carpenter, at the Bricklayer's Arms, on the 14th of August, and stealing
therein two live tame rabbits. >>
Old Bailey Online
In Australia, Bowser was soon in trouble again. He was
convicted of highway robbery before Mr. Justice
Burton and a sentence of death was recorded
against him. This was commuted to three years in an
ironed gang; he was sent to Newcastle to serve his
time in the iron gang. In May 1837 he absconded from Newcastle with
Patrick Conlon and headed up the Valley.
Bowser's description was posted
in the Government Gazette at the time, his occupation was given as
Plasterer's labourer and he was 24 years of age. A little
above average height for the times at 5ft 10 in., he had a freckled
complexion and dark brown hair with dark hazel eyes. A scar on the
left side of his forehead, and tattoos AB outside right arm and MT on the
back left wrist made him easy to identify.
John Sullivan was possibly unlucky enough to be in the
wrong place at the wrong time - not for the first time
in his life. By the age of twenty Sullivan was
not only condemned as a bushranger but had also endured being ship
wrecked when his convict transport the
Hive
was wrecked at Jervis Bay.
Sullivan stated in Court that he had only fallen in
with Bowser and Doolan an hour before being captured at Weary Creek
- and no-one at the drays could later positively identify him as taking
part in the robbery. He was from Cork and seventeen years old when
he arrived in the colony in 1835. He was
soon assigned to
Archibald Bell junior at Invermein. Despite his
protestations, John Sullivan along with Doolan, had a sentence of death
recorded against him for the robbery.
Of Timothy
Bowser the Chief Justice was not so sure and consulted with his brother
Judges to decide whether Bowser was not a fit person to be executed.
He was
later sentenced to transportation to Norfolk
Island for life, the first two years to work in
chains.
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