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

1809: Thomas Dowlan Hanged in Sydney for Burglary at Hawkesbury

Thomas Doolan, described as an old offender who had been tried several times in the colony, was convicted of forcibly breaking into the house of John Styles at Hawkesbury. He had previously saved himself from execution by turning informant against his accomplices, some of whom were hanged on his testimony.

Doolan was hanged in Sydney on 26 August 1809. Court records from the same period reveal he had also been among those who burglariously broke into the dwelling of a settler named Thomas Harley, beating the occupants and ransacking the house, though he did not live to face that additional charge.

Motorway 1 bridge over Hawkesbury River near Sydney with traffic

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Australia Burglary Execution Hawkesbury NSW Prison Robbery Sydney

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1877: Martin Cash, the Bushranger Who Cheated the Gallows, Dies at His Farm

Martin Cash, Irish-born convict and bushranger, died on 26 August 1877 at his farm cottage in Glenorchy, Tasmania, aged 68. Twice he escaped from the supposedly escape-proof Port Arthur penal colony, the second time by swimming the shark-infested waters. On Boxing Day 1842, Cash and two companions absconded from a work party and launched an eight-month bushranging spree across Van Diemen’s Land, robbing mail coaches and homesteads before his eventual recapture. His 1870 autobiography, The Adventures of Martin Cash, ghostwritten by a fellow former convict, became a bestseller. He was one of the few bushrangers of his era to die of natural causes, cheating the gallows.

Martin Cash Author: The Bushranger of Van Diemen's Land in 1843

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Australia Bushranger Convict History Death TAS

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2016: The Chinese Jack The Ripper Serial Killer Caught After 28 Years Through a Relative’s DNA

Gao Chengyong was arrested at his grocery store in Baiyin, Gansu, in August 2016 after a DNA test on his uncle flagged a close familial match to an unidentified serial killer. The breakthrough closed a case that had haunted investigators for nearly three decades. Gao confessed to all eleven murders, committed between 1988 and 2002 across Inner Mongolia.

Known in Chinese media as the ‘Chinese Jack the Ripper’, Gao had followed victims to their homes, typically striking in daylight hours. He mutilated their bodies in a pattern that drew comparisons to the 1888 Whitechapel killings. Sentenced to death and stripped of all assets, he was executed on 3 January 2019.

Chinese death character with skull texture 3D illustration

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Asia Baiyin Baotou China Cold Case Execution Gansu Inner Mongolia Murder Serial Killer

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1973: Two Girls Vanish from Adelaide Oval in One of South Australia's Most Infamous Cold Cases

On 25 August 1973, Joanne Ratcliffe, aged 11, and Kirste Gordon, aged 4, disappeared from the Adelaide Oval during an Australian rules football match between Norwood and North Adelaide. Witnesses saw the girls in the company of a man in an Akubra hat and grey checked sports jacket. One witness, a confectionery vendor, watched the man carry Kirste in one arm while Joanne kicked and screamed at him to let her go. He dropped his reading glasses in the struggle, grabbed Joanne by the arm, and dragged her toward the southern gates. Bystanders assumed he was simply a parent.

Police believe both girls were abducted, and their disappearance has never been solved. South Australia Police and media have long linked the case to the 1966 disappearance of the Beaumont children, also from South Australia. The case remains one of the most haunting unsolved crimes in the country’s history.

Football Game at the Adelaide Oval - the ground in 1973 still had the old stands and the 1911 scoreboard seen here.

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Adelaide Australia Cold Case Kidnapping Missing Persons Murder SA Unsolved

1809: Thomas Dowlan Hanged in Sydney for Burglary at Hawkesbury

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1877: Martin Cash, the Bushranger Who Cheated the Gallows, Dies at His Farm

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2016: The Chinese Jack The Ripper Serial Killer Caught After 28 Years Through a Relative’s DNA

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1973: Two Girls Vanish from Adelaide Oval in One of South Australia's Most Infamous Cold Cases

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