Thomas Whitton.

Bushranger Whitton haunts Goulburn's performance venue

A grave matter could turn up a new dimension to work on Goulburn’s new performing arts facility.

A convicted arsonist and murderer, Thomas Whitton, may be buried underneath the McDermott Centre, which is being converted for the venue.

Then again, Mr Whitton, hung for his life of “villainy” on March 19, 1840, could be under the Post Office, council general manager Warwick Bennett told a meeting on Tuesday. 

An archaeological report has identified the possibility that Whitton, one of 19 prisoners executed at the old Goulburn Jail, behind the McDermott Centre, is buried somewhere in the vicinity. He was the only one not interred in consecrated ground, according to the report.

http://www.goulburnpost.com.au/story/4456874/notorious-bushranger-comes-back-to-haunt/

Bushrangers.

Over 2,000 bushrangers are estimated to have roamed the Australian countryside, beginning with the convict bolters and drawing to a close after Ned Kelly's last stand at Glenrowan.

Bushrangers were originally escaped convicts who had the survival skills necessary to use the Australian bush as a refuge to hide from the authorities. By the 1820s, the term "bushranger" had evolved to refer to those who abandoned social rights and privileges to take up "robbery under arms" as a way of life, using the bush as their base.

Bushranging thrived during the gold rush years of the 1850s and 1860s when the likes of Ben Hall, Frank Gardiner and John Gilbert led notorious gangs in the country districts of New South Wales. These Wild Colonial Boys typically robbed small-town banks and coach services.

In other infamous cases, such as that of Dan Morgan, the Clarke brothers, and Australia's best-known bushranger, Ned Kelly, numerous policemen were murdered.

The number of bushrangers declined due to better policing and improvements in rail transport and communication technology, such as telegraphy. Kelly's capture and execution in 1880 effectively represented the end of the bushranging era.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushranger

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