January 1806 - On Thursday last, John Fitzgerald, a prisoner in the gaol gang, escaped from custody; and the day following the farm residence of Mr. H. Kable at Long Cove was robbed of numerous articles, among which was a quantity of wearing apparel, some provisions belonging to the labouring servants, a handsaw with the initials H K cut in the handle, and a musket. A man in a brown jacket, and in other respects answering the description of Fitzgerald was seen near the place the same day; and on Friday the house of John Harris Esq. at the Black-wattle swamp was again plundered of various articles of use and value. Vaucluse Farm was also lately robbed, as is supposed by the prisoners absconded to the woods; and on Monday night Russell and one of his accomplices rushed into the farm house of Griffith Griffiths at Seven Hills, where they staid till day-light, and then decamped with a booty. A party was next day dispatched in quest of the delinquents but returned unsuccessful.

In May 1806 - John Fitzgerald, a bush ranger returned from Newcastle; and Bartholomew Foley, his accomplice, were sentenced to 300 lashes, and to work in the gaol gang till further orders.

August 1806 - It is also necessary to require that John Fitzgerald, who absconded from the County Goal, be secured and returned to custody, and to caution all persons against harbouring or employing him likewise, on pain of the penalties aforesaid. - From recent information he is supposed to be hovering about the Hawkesbury.

March 1809 - Tried for petty larceny. Pleaded guilty and sentence deferred.

April 1809 - Notice placed in the Sydney Gazette - John Fitzgerald absconded from Public Labour

August 1811 - John Fitzgerald was indicted for stealing divers articles of wearing apparel, the property of Michael Kenny, on the 21st of March last, at Vaucluse, of which offence being found guilty,  he was sentenced to be confined four years to hard labour wheresoever it should be His Excellency the Governor's pleasure to direct.

October 1817 - In the last Gazette our attention was called to the mention of the death of John Fitzgerald, by drowning, after numerous hair breadth escapes from a different destiny. The following are the circumstances of his death:- The brig Endeavour's anchor becoming so much involved at her moorings abreast of the King's Wharf as to defeat every effort to extricate it by main strength, the deceased, who was esteemed the best diver in the Colony, was employed to go down and examine, and if possible to disengage it. In prosecution of which object he thrice descended, and re-appearing, reported that the vessel's anchor was entangled with two others. Much enfeebled by exertion, he was assisted into a boat; where, having remained a short time, he avowed a determination to accomplish the purpose in which he had been engaged, and taking the end of a rope to make fast to the vessel's own anchor, went down once more. He had been before known to remain beneath the surface for three minutes and a half as was reported, but on this occasion he had exceeded all his powers; after disappearing four minutes, he was seen to rise to the level of the water at some distance from the place he went down at, he sunk - to rise no more.

Thus terminated the existence of this extraordinary character. He was a native of Ireland, and had been in the Colony about 16 years, during the last 14 of which he has been distinguished as an incorrigible fugitive and bush ranger, and had repeatedly suffered the severity of punishment, as well for his desertion as numerous petty offences, which were chiefly committed during his periods of absence; he was never known, however, to commit any very serious offence, or personally to injure either those whom he plundered, or by whom he was afterwards apprehended. Of late years his obduracy had been only punished by confinement, when brought in from his vagrancy to the woods; and on all these occasions he was willing, tractable, and obedient, but seldom missed an opportunity to resume his wanderings, and commit some trifling depredation before he took his leave.

We select from among his numerous irregularities the following recent fact, as descriptive of his general character. Being about 18 months since brought in, and confined as usual to the prison, he attracted the commiseration of a Gentleman, who humanely attributing his irregularities rather to an imbecility of understanding than an inherent inclination to evil, imagined that an easy situation and plentiful diet would induce him to relinquish a course of life that had been a perpetual source of suffering; and determining on the experiment, obtained him as a servant to his farm a few miles from town, with instructions to work as he thought proper, or to walk about the workmen's huts to protect them while they were in the field, and directing at the same time that he should be amply furnished with provisions. In this charge he continued for a few days; when his evil genius appearing to him in the shape of the irresistible daemon, opportunity, which he had no natural inclination to resist, he called a summary muster of all the men's eatables and wearables, and leaving the huts secure from further depredation, once more betook himself to the inner recesses of the woods. He was some time after apprehended, and returned to his town habitation, the Gentleman not choosing further interference with a being, who by an act of needless and wanton ingratitude had confirmed his first opinion of the weakness of his intellect.

 He was the companion of Collins at the time he was last apprehended and shortly after executed; but had not participated in the crimes of that atrocious offender. Actuated by the momentary impulse, his depredations were instantaneously conceived and executed, without consulting consequences; and whenever apprehended, the officers of the police had no occasion to interrogate him on the subject of his exploits, as he always became his own biographer, and voluntarily narrated the particulars of his iniquities. That his head was considered as faulty as his natural bent of disposition, was perhaps little to be doubted; and to this consideration alone, it is no less probable, he was so long permitted to escape an opposite destiny to that which has at length terminated his excesses, and brought his self-created difficulties to a period.

The Lady Nelson