Dark Stories: On This Day In True Crime History - Dark Stories True Crime Tours

1853: John Smith Hanged at Melbourne Gaol for the Murder of a Miner at Fryer's Creek

In 1853, John Smith and Henry Turner forced their way into the hut of John Warren at Fryer’s Creek, demanding gold. When Warren could not produce it, the pair shot him in the eye with a revolver at close range. Warren was found blind and bleeding, groping through the bush. He died shortly after, the bullet having shattered a fragment of his temporal bone into the brain.

Both men were tried, convicted, and hanged at Melbourne Gaol on 23 August 1853, before a large crowd assembled outside the walls.

Smith, attended by Catholic priests in his final days, was brought to acknowledge that the sentence he was about to suffer was just and merited.

View from below of historical gallows in Tombstone Arizona

⬅ See all events from 23 August

Australia Execution Fryers Creek Gold Rush Crime Melbourne Murder Robbery VIC

Spread the word on your favourite platform!

1895: The Wild Scotchman: Death of Queensland Bushranger James Macpherson

James Alpin Macpherson, known as the Wild Scotchman, was one of Queensland’s most notorious bushrangers before his capture and imprisonment. Released from prison in 1874, he lived out the remainder of his days quietly, working as a stockman and station overseer far from his outlaw past.

Macpherson died on 23 August 1895 at Burketown, Queensland, aged 53, after falling from a horse. The man who had once terrorised the bush met his end not in a blaze of gunfire, but in an ordinary accident on the land he had spent his later years working.

Portrait of bushranger James MacPherson 1866

⬅ See all events from 23 August

Accident Australia Burketown Bushranger Death QLD

Spread the word on your favourite platform!

1962: De Gaulle Survives a Hail of Bullets at Petit-Clamart

On the evening of 22 August 1962, Lieutenant-Colonel Jean Bastien-Thiry led a carefully planned ambush on the presidential motorcade at Petit-Clamart, south of Paris. Acting under the banner of the Organisation armee secrete (OAS), his team opened fire with automatic weapons as de Gaulle’s car passed, riddling the vehicle with bullets. The president and his wife escaped without injury.

The attack, code-named Operation Charlotte Corday, triggered a massive manhunt that swept up nearly all participants within months. Bastien-Thiry was brought before a military court, where he justified the attempt by declaring de Gaulle a tyrant who had betrayed French Algeria. He was sentenced to death and executed by firing squad in March 1963, the last person to die by that method in France.

Historical firing squad execution scene

⬅ See all events from 22 August

Assassination Europe Execution France Political Crime Terrorism Trial

Spread the word on your favourite platform!

1854: Hanged at Brisbane Gaol for the Killing of a Station Manager

In March 1852, Adolphus Henry Trevethan, a station manager at Rawbell in the Burnett District, was killed during a tense confrontation with a large group of armed men on his property. He had gone out to negotiate and was returning with tobacco and pipes when he came running back, hand pressed to his chest, crying ‘I’m a dead man’ before dying of multiple stab wounds within hours.

The accused was tried at the Brisbane Circuit Court, where witness James Carney testified against the accused. Found guilty and sentenced to death, the condemned man walked to the scaffold on 22 August 1854, ascending it without resistance and dying without a struggle.

Noose at historic Tombstone courthouse courtyard, Arizona

⬅ See all events from 22 August

Australia Brisbane Burnett District Execution Murder QLD Trial

1853: John Smith Hanged at Melbourne Gaol for the Murder of a Miner at Fryer's Creek

Spread the word on your favourite platform!

1895: The Wild Scotchman: Death of Queensland Bushranger James Macpherson

Spread the word on your favourite platform!

1962: De Gaulle Survives a Hail of Bullets at Petit-Clamart

Spread the word on your favourite platform!

1854: Hanged at Brisbane Gaol for the Killing of a Station Manager

Spread the word on your favourite platform!

Subscribe to Dark Stories