Charles Gibson a early inmate of Dunedin’s first gaol.

 

Charles Gibson was a very early inmate of the first gaol in Dunedin. Previously Dunedin’s wrong doers were held in a tent borrowed from a local lawyer or chained to lamp posts.

Little is known about him. He was first mentioned as arriving at 5pm on the 6^th September 1851 being drunk and disorderly. Monson, the gaoler, states that he was a young man of a weak mind and very stubborn will. There is no mention of how long a sentence he received. Often the sentence was 24 hours, or at least until the person had sobered up.

The next mention is 30 January 1852 where he was brought in after stealing sundry articles of clothing from an unnamed French man. He was sentenced to six months hard labour. The following day fellow inmates accused him of masturbation in his cell and although he denied the charge he was put on bread and water for three days and threatened with a flogging if he did it again. Monson said he was sullen and very disobedient during this time.

On the 16^th April he was involved in a scuffle with one of the police on duty. He was placed in the dark cell as punishment.

16^th June he was accused of stealing money from one of the policemen. Monson who expanded his description to still being of weak mind but now ‘very treacherous and unscrupulous to the highest degree’, tried to force a confession out of him by locking him in his cell for 18 hours, to no avail. The money was found in a flax bush, and it was assumed that Charles hid it for when he was allowed out to work.

Hard labour was usually undertaken outside the prison, as it was very small and there was little that the inmates could do inside the walls. Most of the men sentenced to hard labour were tasked with working on roads (forming or cleaning) cutting firewood for the gaol or the hospital or other public works. Gibson however, perhaps given his ‘weak mind’ had been used by the police as a servant. He cleaned their shoes and clothes, tidied their rooms and even cooked for them. He also cleaned the rooms of government officials. Gibson was also tasked with cleaning the courthouse for church services (it was given to the Anglican and methodists for Sunday services). he was, therefore, possibly outside of the prison more than other inmates.

After yet another run in with Corporal McKain, from whom he had stolen money, Gibson refused to do anymore tasks, stating he was ill used by the police. He was becoming quite a handful.

He also was costing Monson money. In this early period funding for items such as tools for the prisoners to use, items for the building (such as hinges for the doors) and clothes for the prisoners was hard to obtain and often Monson had to pay for these items himself and hope (sometimes in vain) that he would be reimbursed. Gibson entered gaol with only one pair of trousers and during the time he was in prison Monson had to supply him with 5 shirts (one was brand new) a coat, a blue shirt and shoes (and one assumes more trousers). Other hard labour men often could not go outside to work as their clothes had fallen apart, so although Gibson wasn’t given any special treatment as he was one of the longer sentenced men, he required more clothes than normal.

 

Charles Gibson does not reappear in Monson’s records after his release. What happened to him? Did he remain in Dunedin, or maybe he found a job outside of town. When did he arrive and from where? Did he come alone or was he part of a family?

Another question is how ‘weak minded' was he really? The people administering the selection of immigrants to Otago would be unlikely to accept someone who was unable to be a useful member of society, so one assumes that if he did come as a single man he really wasn’t as impaired as Monson insists.

We may never really know Charles Gibson. The details we do have come from the diary of Henry Monson, held by the Hocken Collections, Dunedin (and forms the content of Elsie Locke’s book ‘The Gaoler’). Monson does not record, details such as age, place of birth or occupation, which are recorded in later police gazettes, so its impossible to find him in other records.  

The newspaper of the time, the Otago Witness is also mute on court proceedings and sentencing, so Charles’ background and remaining life remains a mystery.

Interesting item from papers past

 

This interesting item was found in the Otago Witness 17 March 1898.  It was reprinted from Otago's VERY FIRST newspaper, the Otago News and was the first editorial of that 'paper dated 13 December 1848.  

Update on Mary Hall

Mary indeed was plucky and strong. In an age when even a minor injury could cause infection and death, she lived a long life. She married John Beckett in 1884 in Winton. The couple adopted three children. She owned her own business - a millinery shop in Invercargill. It is possible that John ended his days in Seacliff Lunatic asylum, (yet to be confirmed). She died in 1938 and is buried in the Jewish section of the Invercargill cemetery. What a battler!

 

The plucky Mary Hall

Mary Hall was 15 when she and her family left Oxfordshire and boarded the Scimitar, bound for Port Chalmers, Otago. The family arrived in March 1874 and quickly moved to Invercargill, where Mary gained employment as a domestic at the Harp of Erin Hotel, Dee Street.

One of the seamen on board the ship was John Brennan, aka Roach, from London. He was 45 and left the ship, taking on a job as cook in the same hotel for a while. He had intended to leave the region and left to board the City of Dublin. Something made him change his mind and he returned and became a lodger at the hotel.

John had been in the Royal Navy as an ordinary seaman and served on at least three ships. However, he was also recorded as being imprisoned in the Naval Prison as well as two other prisons and the Wandsworth House of Correction. I have yet to locate any prison records for him to uncover his activities before coming to New Zealand.

Certainly, drink was a problem for him. Only a few days after the ship arrived in Port Chalmers he was arrested for drunkenness. His ‘defence’ was that he must have been drunk as he awoke to find all his money had gone.

On the 15^th June, he attacked Mary with a Tomahawk, hitting her twice on the head.  The reason for the attack was never clearly explained. Speculation from newspapers was rife and Brennan himself gave several conflicting accounts.

An early reason he gave was that she would not give him a drink (he was reported as saying a sixpence would have saved her life). Mrs Anne Connell, the housekeeper, recalled that she overheard Mary saying, ‘Mind your own business’ when she was serving in the dining room, to which Brennan replied, ‘I’d think no more of cutting your throat than a young suckling pig’s’.

Mary herself stated that she herself was unaware of why he attacked her. She had gone to the theatre with him once, but that she had not encouraged anything. Brennan had attempted to take liberties with her which she refused.

 

Whatever the cause he followed Mary into the kitchen and hit her while her back was turned and then calmly walked out into the dining room and announced he had killed her. He told Ann Connell to look after her as his life depended on Mary. He told others to go for the police ad he would wait. Did he attack her in a fit of madness or passion and then regret it immediately afterwards??  It seems likely. When the landlord Mr McCarthy and another man entered the kitchen and lifted a lifeless Mary up, Brennan hugged and kissed her

Mary was attended to by doctors and her parents sent for. Her recovery was thought unlikely. While Southland newspapers only mentioned the seriousness of the wounds, The Lake County Press explained graphically that her brains were protruding for the holes in her head.

However, plucky Mary did recover and after 8 days on lying unconscious awoke and gave evidence. Unbelievably Brennan was present at her bedside to hear her evidence (this was common practice at the time) and after Mary said she forgave him, she was quoted as saying,  ‘God Bless you’.

After he was arrested Mary’s father came to visit him, to understand why he had committed the crime, he said he wanted a drink and she refused, but also, he had wanted to do her good but she has stopped speaking to him for a few weeks. ‘I loved the girl better than my life and I must have been mad at the time’.

 

Mary was still hovering between life and death. Pieces of her brain continued to come away for a number of days and she was paralysed down the left side. For many weeks she was unbale to see or hear and could barely swallow and suffered a number of convulsions.  Slowly, however she began to regain her facilities, even being able to move around her room and speak distinctly. After being paralysed she later felt acute pain in her legs and head (not surprisingly). By December, however she was well enough to attend the supreme court hearing and give evidence.

 

We hear nothing more of Mary and hope that she did indeed make as full a recovery as she could after the horrific physical and emotional attack. Her family remained in the area, so perhaps someone knows what happened to her..

Brennan’s story is more easily uncovered. The case was straightforward, he did not deny attacking her. In his summing up the Judge said: ‘Never in the course of my legal experience have I met with a more cruel, barbarous or revolting crime. To have done to a cat or dog what you have done to a helpless girls would have been the mark of a cruel and depraved mind’. He assumed that Brennan, a heavy drinker had had his mind been disordered and corrupted by alcohol. However, his actions could not be excused, and he was sentenced to life in prison

Brennan was sent to Dunedin prison soon after his sentencing and began working on Bell Hill. On 2 September 1879 his life sentenced ended when he died from inflammation of the left lung. Some early reports suggested he died of heart issues and certainly in the 1883 inquiry into the Dunedin prison, one prison, Charles Coleman said that Brennan had been sent out to work when he was unfit and died three days later.

Brennan is buried in Dunedin’s Northern Cemetery