1853: Sentenced to Hang in Launceston, a Convicted Stabber Learned He Had Inherited a Fortune
A drunken brawl at a Launceston public house turned deadly when William Brown, also known as Stockton, drew a knife and stabbed a man named James Stephens. Read more →
1853: "I Would Finish You Now": Hanged in Melbourne for the Murder of His Mistress
Michael Finnessy spent the afternoon of 26 September 1853 swinging between tenderness and menace, handing a neighbour his pistol and knife and then asking for them back, as he tried to win over Elizabeth Finnessy, the woman he lived with in a house off Little Bourke Street near the Queen's Theatre in Melbourne. Read more →
1853: The Young Witness Testifies: Alexander Ram Hanged in Melbourne for Murdering Kitty Hennessy
Kitty Hennessy lived in a tent at Prahran, outside Melbourne, with Alexander Ram, and her young son shared their bed. Read more →
1883: Hanged in Perth, Each Still Blaming the Other to the End
James Watson, a pig dealer known locally as 'Jimmy the pigman', met two sandalwood cutters, John Maroney and William Watkins, on a bush track near Kojonup, Western Australia, on 1 May 1883. Read more →
1885: Hanged in Brisbane After a Feverish Stockman Shot the Manager Who Denied Him Hospital
Walter Edward Gordon was a woolshed hand on Darr River Downs station near Muttaburra when fever took hold of him in 1885. Read more →
1888: Mutiny on the Brisbane River: the Captain Who Threatened to Turn His Guns on Parliament
Captain Henry Townley Wright refused to hand command of the gunboat Gayundah to his second officer, Lieutenant Francis Taylor, and had him arrested instead, declaring the vessel under Royal Navy authority rather than the Queensland government. Read more →
1926: The Gold He Took to His Grave: Two Men Hanged in Fremantle for Killing Two Police Officers
William Coulter and Phillip Treffene were illegal gold buyers on the Kalgoorlie goldfields, trading in stolen bullion. Read more →
1957: The Lord High Executioner of Murder Inc Gunned Down in a Barbers Chair
Albert Anastasia had spent two decades building a reputation as the most feared man in organised crime, running Murder, Inc., the Mafia's contract-killing squad blamed for thousands of unsolved deaths, which earned him the nickname the Lord High Executioner. Read more →
2003: Framed for a Killing He Did Not Commit: Carl Williams Ordered This Melbourne Hit
Michael Marshall was gunned down outside his luxury home in South Yarra, shot four times in the head in front of his five-year-old son on this day in 2003. Read more →
2006: The Gainesville Ripper, Danny Rolling, Executed in Florida for a Weekend of Campus Murders
Danny Rolling earned the name the Gainesville Ripper after a four day rampage through student housing near the University of Florida in August 1990 left five young people dead. Read more →
