Forgotten Australia

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So this Father's Day, why not give him a meaningful gift that'll keep on giving? From August the 24th to the 6th of September, AncestryDNA is available at the special Father's Day price of just $59.00. 01:17 So this Father's Day, give Dad the gift of discovery. You've got questions, we've got ancestors. 01:25 Forgotten Australia is written and produced by me, Michael Adams, AI-free, in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales, on land traditionally owned by the Darug and Gundungurra people. I pay my respect to Aboriginal elders, past and present. This podcast contains references to violent crime, including sexual assault against children. Listener discretion is advised. 01:48 It's 8.30pm on Friday the 14th of September 1928 in Malumla on the far south coast of New South Wales and the 60 or so families who live in and around this tiny hamlet have by now had their tea. 02:02 Dairymen who have to be up early have already turned in. Other people are in their kitchens doing the dishes and ironing and in their sitting rooms reading, chatting and listening to the wireless. Outside all is dark and quiet on this moonless night. 02:19 Old farmer Nathaniel Reid is immediately worried. The blast sounds like it was right outside his house, and a visitor left just moments ago. Mr. Reid hurries out to the front gate. 02:31 What he finds will put the sleepy little town of Wilumla, where nothing ever happens, on the map and in the news in the worst possible way. I'm Michael Adams, and this is Forgotten Australia. 02:48 John Mulholland, known to everybody as Jack, was the grandson of transported convicts. His people had settled on the other side of the Blue Mountains, first in Hartley, and then in Ryleston, where Jack was born in January of 1891. He was a bright lad, and when he finished school, he studied to become a teacher. 03:07 In 1910, Jack got his first posting, and this was at Dapper, a flyspec town northwest of Mudgee. 03:14 Then came stints at Boybean and Merrigan, which are also in the central northwest. 03:20 Jack was a good teacher and well-liked. At the end of 1913, he got engaged to Muriel Irene Plows. She was a mudgy native whose father was a baker. Fittingly, Muriel was a smart cookie, excelling in maths and English. 03:35 In 1907, she wrote an essay called Autumn, which was published in the Mudgee Guardian. 03:40 In rather lovely language, she described the sun-drenched colours of the bush and the glorious songs of the birds before taking the readers through the golden sunset and into the blue night. As the Mudgee Guardian noted, it was quite accomplished for a girl of 14. 04:14 A few years on from that, Muriel won a scholarship at Sydney Training School for Teachers, and by the time she met Jack, she was a beloved member of staff at Mudgee District School. 04:24 Back then, female teachers had to give up their jobs upon getting married, which Jack and Muriel did in January 1914 at Mudgee. 04:33 It was described by the Guardian as a very pretty wedding, and Muriel was said to look lovely in ivory satin carrying a bouquet of white lilac and ferns and wearing a gold bangle that the bridegroom had given her. 04:45 The paper didn't paint a word picture of Jack, but he was easy on the eye too, a tall, athletic and handsome fellow who'd later be described in one newspaper as being something of an Adonis. 04:58 Just before the Great War broke out, Jack was transferred to Bowen Park Public School near Orange. This was a fine school, and it came complete with a teacher's residence that had been recently built at the cost of more than £1,000. Jack did well at Bowen Park too, and in February 1918, the Molong Express reported that five out of six of his students had passed their qualifying certificates. Three years later, when Jack was transferred, the express lauded him as a, quote, progressive man and a splendid teacher. 05:27 But the paper did have its tongue firmly in cheek when it described his and Muriel's next destination as, quote, the exhilarating town of Bulagul. 05:35 Bullogal, in the Riverina, was another pinprick in the map, and its claim to fame was that it had been immortalised by Banjo Patterson in his 1896 poem, Hay and Hell and Bullogal. The title came from the phrase, then already about a decade old, in which the hottest places on earth known to drovers had been ranked in that order, Hay, Hell and Bullogal. 05:59 So Bullagal wasn't a place you went voluntarily, but Jack and Muriel appeared to make the most of it, having their first child, a boy, in 1921. Their next transfer, around the start of 1925, was more promising. Wallumla. 06:17 Wollum was located in the Bega Valley, which for thousands of years has been home to the Ewan Manaro Aboriginal people. 06:25 Their first recorded contact with white colonisers was in April 1797, when survivors of the shipwrecked vessel Sydney Cove walked through the area on their long, long trek back to Port Jackson. The three who survived did so with the assistance from Aboriginal people they encountered. 06:43 From the early 1830s, the Bega Valley was settled by graziers. Wallumla, 11 miles south of where Bega Township would be built, was at first used as an outstation stockyard. 06:54 One of the valley's two dairies, with butter made there, shipped in kegs to Sydney via ships from Twofold Bay. 07:01 In 1857, first class farms were for sale or lease, adds in the Sydney Morning Herald boasting quote, some of the very finest land in the colony. 07:10 These were within 24 hours by steamship from Sydney, and they were on the route to Hobart, which was a big consideration for farmers who wanted to export their produce. You could of course go to and from Wallumbla, overland by horse or in a coach, but it was a long hard trek on barely defined hilly bush roads. 07:29 By 1864, Wallumla had a post office. And the following year, a school and a pub called the Plough Inn. 07:36 In the couple of decades that followed, there'd be a general store and other shops, a school of arts, several churches, a better hotel called Schaffer's, a cheese factory and a butter factory. 07:47 In 1883, Wallumla sent a pyramid of cheese to the Calcutta International Exhibition and won a silver medal. Nice, but what locals really wanted was for the railway to come. In the 1880s, this looked likely, with most proposed routes for a far south coastline passing through Willumla. When Henry Parks came to the district in 1888, he said it was going to happen. Mr. Schaefer took him at his word, renaming Schaefer's the Willumla Railway Junction Hotel. But the joke was on him. 08:18 The train line wasn't built. 08:20 As a consolation prize, Wallamla got itself a gold rush from mid-1896, when a find was made in the low mountains less than a mile from the centre of town. 08:30 Over the next decade or so, mines would produce about 1,000 pounds of gold, and a respectable quantity of silver besides. 08:37 Wallamla's population grew, and it gained several hotels. 08:42 Though the town had been denied the railway, the Princess Highway ran through the place, and after the advent of the automobile, the town even had a service station which made it an important pit stop. 08:53 In the first half of the 1920s, Olamla made the news occasionally. There was the first snow blizzard on record, a hailstorm that smashed crops, a windstorm that blew down a school outhouse and killed a boy, and several raging bushfires that threatened the town. Sydney newspapers would carry reports on the town's gold production, both the precious metal and the delicious butter and cheese. What you wouldn't find in the newspapers were reports of crime in Wallumla. The local constable didn't have a lot to do. 09:24 When the town's little courthouse was used, it was to deal with drunks, bad drivers and dairymen who broke regulations. 09:32 By 1925, when Jack, Muriel, their son and new baby daughter arrived in Malumla, the township had a population of about 100, with 200 souls living in the surrounding district. 09:45 It wasn't much bigger than Bullagool, but it was sure prettier and had a far more pleasant climate. 09:51 The Mulholland family took up residence in the large double-fronted weatherboard cottage that had joined the Wilumna School on the Bega Road, which was in reality a stretch of the Princess Highway. Their place was some 200 yards from the shops to the south and from the police station and School of Arts to the north. Apart from the reed place across the road, the school and their house were surrounded by paddocks. 10:13 Jack Mulholland was a keen gardener. 10:15 In May 1925, the neighbouring town of Candelow's newspaper, The Southern Record, predicted he'd be giving local flower exhibitors a run for their money at upcoming shows. 10:26 Jack also continued to play tennis and golf, and he was to referee local football teams. So, as he had been at his previous postings, Jack was a good sport who made himself part of the community. So did Muriel. In addition to looking after their children, she kept busy socially and was involved in organising dances. 10:46 Everything was going well, but it looked like their stay at Wallumla would be short and sweet. In March 1926, Jack was to be transferred, this time to Chikola in the Snowy Monaro region. Walumlans were up in arms. Finding a good teacher was hard, and they liked the one they had. So they petitioned their local member, and he pleaded on their behalf to the education department. Walumla won. Jack would stay on. 11:12 He and Muriel had their third child, a daughter, at the start of 1927. 11:19 1928's big news wasn't good news. The Princess Highway was to be diverted around Wilumla. After the railway debacle, this was the last thing that the little town needed. There was much opposition, but the bypass would eventually come to pass. Yet that hadn't happened on Friday the 14th of September 1928. 11:41 Around 7.40pm, Jack Mulholland stepped from his house and crossed the Bega Road, still then part of the Princess Highway, to visit his neighbour Nathaniel Reid. 11:51 Reid was an old farmer and carpenter, then engaged on repairs to the school buildings. And this was what the two men talked about. 11:58 At 8.30, Jack said his goodbyes to Reid and his wife. He was rolling a cigarette as he stepped out their front door and made his way to the gate. Closing it behind him, he went to light that smoke. 12:11 It's likely Jack didn't know what hit him when the shotgun blast destroyed the lower half of his face. 12:17 Instinctively, Jack reached where his mouth had been. Then his bloody hand grabbed for the fence, leaving a crimson stain as he slumped to his knees on the grass. 12:27 Startled by the blast, Mr. Reed ran outside into the dark. He heard groaning and followed the noise to the gate. There, his eyes adjusting to the darkness, he saw Jack Mulholland. There was nothing that Mr. Reed could do. Mercifully, the schoolteacher died within seconds. 12:47 Wollumla's constable, Henry Cox, was right at that moment in Bega. Summoned by telephone, he rushed back within half an hour, accompanied by Inspector Hind and the rest of Bega's small police force. 12:59 The wounds to Jack Mulholland were horrifying. No gun was found on his body or anywhere nearby, so it was obvious he hadn't killed himself. Wollumla had its first murder. 13:12 Drawn by the blast and commotion, townspeople came from their houses. 13:16 Muriel Mulholland was making her way down from her house when Constable Cox headed her off. Where was Jack, she asked. What had happened? Who was lying on the ground across the road in the glow of a parked car's headlights? Constable Cox told her to go back inside, but Muriel ran across the road. When she saw her husband dead, she threw herself on his body and screamed his name. 13:39 Police theorised that someone had waited at the southern end of Mr Reed's fence. Jack's assailant had come up on him and shot him by the light of the flame for his cigarette. It had been close range, just a few feet away. Police would conclude that the killer had used a 12 gauge shotgun loaded with a cartridge containing number 3 shot. This was what you might use for hunting larger game, such as wallabies, and it was perfect for a no-fail kill shot at close range. 14:08 The first report in Sydney's The Sun newspaper appeared the next day, Saturday, and said, The quiet little farming township on the road between Bega and Eden has been profoundly stirred by the tragedy. Nothing of the kind ever happened there before. 14:23 Bega police were up against a mystery. There wasn't a clue as to who the killer was or where he, if it was a he, had gone. 14:32 Given how quickly Mr Reed had been on the spot and how quiet it was, a car or motorbike would have been seen and heard if it had raced off on the Bega road. 14:41 But someone who knew the place would have no trouble getting away. There were open paddocks in all directions, and they led to dense bushland. As Truth newspaper would say, quote, A man who knew the country could travel hours this way without fear of being traced. 14:57 Of course, all of this pointed to the killer being a local. But why would anyone murder the schoolteacher that Walamla had fought so hard to keep? 15:07 Shooting someone like that, straight on, close range, in the face, felt personal. Yet initial theories, as far as newspaper coverage allowed, didn't follow this line of thinking. There was speculation the killer had meant to shoot Constable Cox and had simply got the wrong man. 15:25 Another story was that Jack had recently stumbled upon cattle thieves and had started talking about it, these crooks deciding that they needed to shut his mouth once and for all. 15:36 Detective Sergeant John Keogh was dispatched from Sydney's CIB. He'd joined the force around 1906 and had seen a lot in his time, investigating murders and dicing with the Razor gangs. 15:48 Jack Mulholland's funeral was held on Sunday in Malumla. 300 people turned up, most of the township, and schoolchildren marched ahead of the coffin. 15:58 Detective Sergeant Keogh arrived on the south coast on Monday. By the time he got there, local police knew enough to direct him to Bega to interview a young woman who worked in a store there. 16:10 This business girl, as the papers would call her, was 17 years old. 16:14 She lived in Wallumla and was reported to have been one of Jack's students as recently as a few months ago. 16:20 Based on what he got from her, Detective Sergeant Keogh interviewed members of her family in Wallumla that evening. Following that, he started interviewing anyone and everyone who'd known the dead man, including schoolchildren. It quickly became clear that Detective Sergeant Keogh was dealing with a sensitive issue. 16:38 Jack Mulholland's murder had been shocking. Now investigations were revealing what was shaping up to be a small town sex scandal. So, while locals no doubt knew much, and reporters would have uncovered some of this information, newspapers were to preserve reputations by keeping names out of their pages. but they'd provide plenty of hints and hearsay so readers could envisage the sordid goings-on on the south coast. 17:04 Reporters had learned there'd been bad blood between Jack and a local man, and an arrest was expected at any moment. The so-called unwritten law was expected to be invoked. While not an actual legal defence, the unwritten law referred to a killing that arose out of passion or heartbreak. The newspapers had also learned that while Jack had left his home between 7.30 and 7.45, he hadn't got to the Reeds place just across the road until 8pm. The Sun reported, quote, The theory in Willamala is that on his way to Reeds, he saw somebody, probably a woman, and that the meeting was witnessed by a third person, who followed Mulholland to Reeds' house, then waited until Mulholland came out again. 17:48 Papers reported that many townspeople believed several people had been involved in the crime or covering it up. 17:54 The Sun would report, quote, "...inquiries are being made into certain incidents in Mulholland's life in Wallumla, including his relations with some of the women residents." Despite all of this scuttlebutt which reporters were getting, the police came up against a blank wall during official interviews. Locals either clammed up entirely or gave information so useless it appeared they were covering. Detective Frank Matthews arrived from Sydney to assist Detective Sergeant Keogh. 18:26 On Thursday the 20th, they questioned an unidentified girl. What they learned was that the late Mr Muller-Holland had been in the habit of placing notes in the cleft of a post near the school for this student. She used to use the drop to reply to him. When a parent saw this, he took his daughter from the school. Reports in the papers didn't make it clear whether the girl taken from classes was the same as the one who'd been exchanging secret notes with her teacher. or if it was the same Bega business girl first interviewed by Detective Sergeant Keogh. 18:57 A local woman told Troops reporter that she'd seen these note drop-offs. This was why she believed a woman or a girl was the murderer. Quote, she thinks that some other lady may have discovered something from the letters and has done something about it. Jack Mulholland had also apparently been threatened. He told a Wollumla resident, quote, how would you feel if you were going to be shot? 19:21 The Sun's reporter questioned a school inspector who said there'd been no complaints against Mr Mulholland. Of course, that didn't mean that parents hadn't complained about him. The education department may just have ignored them. On Friday the 21st, the detectives again spent hours questioning the Bega business girl. She told them of certain letters, which the police then examined. 19:43 Based on what they learned, they went to Angledale, six miles from Bega, to speak with a farm worker. This man was said to have been in Malumla on the night of the murder. Other Angledale people were also questioned, quote, about the movements of certain persons. 19:59 It seemed that Detectives Keough and Matthews had a lot of names, but what they really needed was the gun. They were back in Malumla looking for it on Saturday the 22nd. In the town, life appeared to be going on as normal. Cows were milked and cans delivered to the creamery. Pigs were fed, meals were cooked, books read and prayers said. But, as The Sun reported, quote, "...under this placid exterior stir strange currents of fear and of hate." Wallumla, it said, was living in the shadow of the gunman. 20:32 Who had pulled the trigger? Who was covering up for him or for her? Such a small population meant a very small pool of suspects. Smaller still when you eliminated men who worked during the week in the mountains and didn't get back to Wallumla until 9 o'clock on Friday nights. That was after Mulholland had been murdered. Many other people were also easily ruled out. That left about 20 suspects at most, with a core group of a dozen. Truth newspaper, always more than ready to engage with the sordid side of a story, said that in Malumla there was agitation, rumour and counter-rumour, an atmosphere of haziness from which things were beginning slowly to be dragged to light. 21:14 What seemed clear to truth was that, quote, if John Mulholland had not had attachments outside his family, he would be alive today. 21:23 On Wednesday the 26th of September, 12 days after the murder, an unidentified police officer told the Sun newspaper, Now an imminent arrest was not being predicted. That wall of silence was unbreakable. Yet if no one was saying much of anything, how was it police had known in the first instance about Mulholland's extracurricular activities? 21:50 Turned out the information was coming from inside the house, his house, although it would be a little longer before this was publicly revealed. 21:59 When Truce Reporter went to see the grieving widow, they were met at the door by her mother, Sarah Plows, who'd been staying in the house at the time of the murder. Mrs. Plough said of her daughter, quote, "...she will not see anybody but the police. She has not slept since it happened." But right then Muriel came to her side. True said she was, quote, "...a comely, self-possessed matron of 35 or so, with a crown of raven black hair, strikingly contrasting with the death-like pallor of her face." Muriel behaved as if in a trance, staring vacantly as she said, I'm sorry, I cannot speak to anyone. 22:35 I can stand speaking no longer. Then, like a sleepwalker, she drifted back into the shadows of the house. 22:43 Truth reported that her dead husband was, quote, believed to have been friendly with that 17-year-old former student. What the paper added to the mix now, though, was that on the night Jack had died, his home hadn't just been occupied by his wife, their three children, and his mother-in-law. A man named Andy Summers had been there too. He was a young fellow from Bega and a, quote, friend of the family. 23:07 But whose friend? And what sort of friend? Truth reported Andy was, quote, engaged by the deceased to drive his wife to the beach on afternoons when Mulholland would remain in Malumla playing tennis. 23:20 This young man, Andy Summers, had also taken Muriel Mulholland to dances. 23:26 Truth didn't need to spell out for its readers just how curious this arrangement was. 23:31 The paper's chats with locals had revealed that Jack had been popular in a reticent sort of way. 23:37 He was one of the few educated men about the place, and he gave of his brains generously to those less favoured. He made out income tax returns for the villagers and spent the midnight oil too in preparing applications for pensions and child endowment. Though rather more above them than of them, he helped and advised them at all times without fear or reward. For this reason, Trish said, the Lumlands, despite what they knew about him, would not now speak against Jack Mulholland. Despite any residual affection or admiration, though, they were even less likely to tell the police anything they knew about his murder. 24:14 Truth explained the Small Town Code. The New South Wales state government thought that perhaps 200 pounds... 24:36 would remove those fingers, loosen those lips. 24:40 It announced this reward would be officially offered after the inquest, and it had come with a pardon for anyone not directly involved in the murder. That inquest was held on Monday the 1st of October in Malumla's little courtroom. As Truth said, it was, quote, "...the first time in its history that a story of violence has echoed from the walls. Never before, indeed, has anything more serious than a charge of drunkenness been heard there." Mr H.M. Blomfield, Bega solicitor and deputy coroner, presided, while Inspector Hind of Bega police, aided by Detective Sergeant Keogh and Detective Matthews, presented what the Crown knew of the murder. 25:18 Nathaniel Reid testified about the blast and finding the dying man. Constable Cox gave evidence about the body and said that no gun had been found. He also said that Mulholland had not talked to him about being threatened. 25:32 Now, when Muriel Mulholland testified, the public learned how the police knew some of what had been hinted at in the papers. Wearing mourning clothes, she told of the hours before Jack's death. On that Friday, she said, her husband had taught until 3.30pm and then he'd come home. Andy Summers and Constable Cox had been in the house. 25:52 Andy was cleaning the car. Cox stayed for a while and then headed into Bega on business. 25:58 In the early evening, Jack had tea first and then went into the room they called the den to put on the wireless. Muriel had tea with her mother and with Andy. 26:08 Afterwards, Andy and her mother washed up while Muriel put the children to bed. 26:12 Her mother asked Andy to post a parcel at 7.10, and he went to the post office and was back by 7.30 or 7.40. 26:21 Her husband had left for Nathaniel Reid's place about five minutes later, saying he wouldn't be long. Muriel's testimony continued, quote, I was ironing in the kitchen. My mother was sewing at the other end of the table. Andy Summers was sitting nearby. I heard the shot about 8.30 or 8.45. I remarked that it sounded like someone trying to shoot themselves and laughed. Andy had wondered whether it was somebody shooting possums, but it was far too dark outside for that. Muriel said the noise reminded her of when boys had given her a bad fright by letting off crackers in a tin at the Greeley's. 26:55 Muriel told the court that she, her mother and Andy had stayed in the kitchen until about nine o'clock. Hearing noises outside, Andy had gone to investigate. When he didn't return, she saw lights and activity across at Reed's. Quote, We could see a lot of people about, and Constable Cox's car. I stood at our front gate wondering what had happened. I saw a man bending over what I took to be a man. Another car pulled up, and by the car lights I could see a man on the ground, and I remarked to my mother that the hand was all red. 27:28 Then she got worried. Constable Cox came and told her to go back into the house, but Muriel didn't. She'd gone to Jack, thrown herself on his body, and called out his name. 27:39 In the courtroom, remembering this, Muriel wept for several minutes before she could go on. 27:45 When she recovered, she said that no one had left the house after Andy had come back from the post office. 27:52 What came next at the inquest was quite delicate. Newspaper reports didn't record the questions that Muriel was asked by the coroner and by the police, but her answers give us a good idea. She said there was no gun in the house. Jack had not owned a gun. His life was insured for £100, so not a huge amount. Her husband, she said, had never complained of being threatened. She and Jack had known Andy for two or three years, and they'd both been friends with him. Auntie Summers was not her lover, and he used to take her out at her husband's request. 28:27 What of her husband's activities then? Muriel replied, quote, Muriel's mother, Sarah Plows, also testified, and she shone more light on some of these domestic quarrels. 28:48 In February 1926, she said she'd been in Malumla keeping house for Jack while Muriel was back home up at Mudgee. 28:56 One afternoon, Sarah had been walking by the schoolhouse when she heard voices in a little room off the veranda. It was Jack, and he was inside with the girl. 29:06 Sarah had knocked on the door and asked him to open it. She said, "'I know you're in there, Jack. Let the girl out.'" Though she didn't mention the girl's name in open court, Sarah said she knew who it was. Jack hadn't answered her, so she told him again, let the girl out, for the sake of his wife and their children. Now Jack said no. 29:28 Then Sarah had seen Constable Cox coming along the road. She told Jack this and threatened him with exposure. jack said there was no girl inside with him yet he wouldn't open the door sarah said she was serious about telling constable cox now jack admitted there was a girl he said that if sarah went back to the house he'd let the girl out mulholland opened the door stepped out took sarah by the hand led her back to the house, and then he returned to the school. 29:57 The next morning, Sarah told the court, the girl had come to the house and said she wanted to explain things. Quote, Sarah put this incident at February 1926, so 18 months or so before the murder. 30:16 How had things been more recently? 30:19 Since I have been there, Mr. and Mrs. Mulholland lived happily. I have not seen a happier couple, especially during the last few weeks. 30:27 But everything hadn't been entirely rosy. Quote, But Muriel's mother said there had been no ill feeling between the couple because of this. Obviously, the police had heard differently. In response to her question, she replied, Quote, Sarah Plough said that she had never fired a gun and neither had her daughter. 31:01 She had not seen a shotgun in the house. She had not seen Andy with a shotgun. Nothing untoward had been happening between her daughter and Andy Summers. Sarah said she had not quarrelled with her son-in-law and she had not heard him say that anyone was going to shoot him. Clearly the police had also heard that Muriel and Jack had argued on the day of his death, but she responded to a question, quote, It is not a fact that Mr. and Mrs. Holland had a quarrel on the day of his death. He made a sharp remark when he came in, and she would not have her lunch. 31:32 It upset her. It was a frivolous remark. She said it was hot working, and he said something. I think it was he said he was working too. After their little quarrels, they always made it up again. Andy Summers was described by the Bombala Times as a quote... boyish stylishly dressed man he usually worked as a laborer but had been out of employment for about 10 weeks testifying in the courtroom he corroborated the evidence that no one had left the house after jack he said back in january 1928 he'd been at the house when Jack was in Sydney, but it had only been to help Muriel organise a dance. 32:11 Andy said he had taken her to dances without her husband and also to the beach. But he said when he drove Muriel around, there was always someone else in the car. 32:21 After adjourning to hear medical evidence, the inquest was done and dusted, with the deputy coroner having no choice but to record that Jack Mulholland had been willfully murdered by a person or persons unknown. 32:35 On the 9th of October, Detective Sergeant Keogh was back in Sydney. 32:39 While the reward was still on offer, it didn't seem likely the mystery would ever be solved. 32:45 Detective Sergeant Keogh told reporters he thought that the killer had laid his plans very carefully. Candelow's Southern Record and advertising newspaper would shortly report, quote, The Wallumla murder mystery is still a deeper mystery as ever. The prospects of its solution seem to be now remote. 33:04 Suspicion remained that locals held the key to the mystery. 33:08 But W.A. Smith, editor of Bega's District News, wanted the world to know that that just wasn't true. The stigma that had been cast on all Wilumlins, he said, was entirely without justification. He wrote, quote, I know all of these people personally and have had many conversations with them since the tragedy. I am convinced that it is as much a mystery to them as to the detectives and everybody else and they are just as anxious to have the matter cleared up. They feel that suspicion rests upon them all and they have readily given all information possible. 33:43 Mr. Smith wrote that he had complete confidence that everyone had told everything they knew. 33:49 But that just couldn't be true, of at least one person, and probably more. It seemed that Truth Newspaper had gotten it right early on. If Mulholland hadn't been playing with fire, then he wouldn't have been killed. Playing with fire, and perhaps, or even probably, committing crimes. 34:08 That's because we don't know the ages of the girls he was friendly with. The age of consent in New South Wales at that time was 16. The business girl was said to be 17. That's possible, but it's also rather old for a student who'd reportedly only left Wilumna school a few months earlier. 34:27 For instance, one of Mulholland's recent educational successes had been a 15-year-old boy who got a scholarship and graduated Tobiga High School. Even this boy was at the older age range. So if Mulholland was having sex with female students, there's a strong chance they were children. So that was rape. The circumstances that his mother-in-law had witnessed were certainly suggestive of coercion and perhaps even force. Mulholland hadn't let the girl out. 34:55 We can only guess how many times other girls had been subjected to such treatment. Had Mulholland been shot by a father or a brother, or maybe even an enraged mother or sister? 35:07 Clearly, this was an avenue police had been pursuing before running into that wall of silence. Yet the inquest also showed they'd considered Muriel, Sarah and Andy as potential suspects. They'd heard from someone that Jack's wife had been enraged at his continuing behaviour and had pointed a shotgun at him. 35:27 Yet with another wall, this one of corroborative denial from all three witnesses, the police couldn't go any further with this line of inquiry either. How hard had Detective Sergeant Keogh pushed? It's doubtful he would have let this go, even if he thought that Mulholland had been asking for it. Clearing a murder like this one wasn't just his job, it was also a stepping stone to a promotion in the CIB. 35:52 I think that Keough and co probably did know who was involved. But with those walls of silence and denial between them and a witness and the murder weapon, they had nothing. Nothing they could charge anyone with. Nothing that would stand up in court. 36:08 By mid-November 1928, John Mulholland's estate, valued at £281, was granted to his widow. 36:15 The reward lapsed after three months without being claimed. 36:19 Muriel Mulholland wasn't to remarry. She'd end up living on Sydney's North Shore, keeping close ties with Mudgee and passing away in 1986 at the age of 93. 36:30 A year after John Mulholland was murdered, the stock market crashed, the Great Depression began and there were plenty more horrific homicides to keep Detective Sergeant Keogh and other police in Sydney and New South Wales very busy indeed. The shooting of the school teacher was soon forgotten by just about everyone, except the people of Wallumla and the Bega Valley. These days, they don't agree with what Bega News editor Mr Smith wrote close on a century ago. They say that someone had to have known something, and they took that secret to the grave. 37:02 I'm Michael Adams, and you've been listening to Forgotten Australia. As always, thanks for listening, and thanks for supporting.