Dan Morgan (bushranger) Bushranger. History[edit] More than 2000 bushrangers are believed to have roamed the Australian countryside, beginning with the convict bolters and drawing to a close after Ned Kelly's last stand at Glenrowan.[3] 1850s: gold rush era[edit] The bushrangers' heyday was the Gold Rush years of the 1850s and 1860s as the discovery of gold gave bushrangers access to great wealth that was portable and easily converted to cash.
Their task was assisted by the isolated location of the goldfields and a police force decimated by troopers abandoning their duties to join the gold rush.[3] George Melville was hanged in front of a large crowd for robbing the McIvor gold escort near Castlemaine in 1853.[3] 1860s to 1870s[edit] Mad Dan Morgan. Like many bushrangers, John Fuller, aka Daniel Morgan, had a short but bloody career.
Morgan was first convicted in 1854 by Judge Redmond Barry, who sentenced him to 12 years in Pentridge prison for armed robbery. He emerged from jail with a fierce hatred of authority that saw him become one of the country's most feared and hated outlaws. Morgan ranged far and wide across north-east Victoria, committing crimes against society in general, and police in particular. Angry with one overseer he felt was too friendly with the police, Morgan turned up at his homestead with the intention of shooting him. Another time, Morgan held up a group of workers and, realising that some of them were Chinese, forced them to sing and dance for him.
On 8 April 1865, Morgan took over a homestead, holding the occupants hostage. The police arrived and surrounded the farmhouse to wait until morning, along with some armed civilians. Ancient Australian History. Dan Morgan was born in Campbelltown, New South Wales, in about 1830.
His mother was an Irish convict. Even as a teenager, Morgan was in trouble for attacking policemen and stealing. Dan Morgan (bushranger) John Fuller (aka Daniel Morgan; 1830 – 9 April 1865) was an Australian bushranger.
After he killed a trooper in July 1864, the government put a £1,000 bounty on his head. He was shot and killed after holding up the McPherson family at Peechelba Station the day before in Victoria. John Fuller was born in Appin,[1] New South Wales, Australia around 1830 to George Fuller and Mary Owen. At one time there was a press controversy as to Morgan's proper name, some holding that it was Moran, while others maintained that it was Owen. All are agreed that Morgan was not his real name. Daniel (Dan) Morgan. Daniel (Dan) Morgan (c.1830-1865), bushranger, was probably Jack Fuller, born at Appin, New South Wales, the illegitimate son of Mary Owen and George Fuller, and attended the Catholic school at Campbelltown.
Although he was suspected of stock theft from the late 1840s, his known criminal record began when, under the name 'John Smith', occupation jockey, he was sentenced to twelve years hard labour for highway robbery at Castlemaine, Victoria, on 10 June 1854. Released from the hulk Success on a ticket-of-leave in June 1860 for good behaviour, he failed to report to the police in the Ovens police district. Now known as 'Down-the-River Jack', he found work as a horse-breaker and station hand. In August that year he stole a prized horse belonging to the Evans family, who held the Whitfield run in the upper King River valley. Evan Evans, with fellow squatter Edmond Bond, tracked him to his camp. Between January and March 1865 Morgan seemed ubiquitous. BUSHRANGERS - Daniel Morgan - Mad Dog Morgan. The Bushranger "Mad" Dan Morgan. One of the most unpleasant bushrangers of Australia's past Who was Dan Morgan?
One of the more infamous characters from the history of the Culcairn and the surrounding districts was Dan Morgan, one of the most unpleasant bushrangers of Australia's past. Morgan was about six feet tall, with a long black bushy beard. Born in Sydney in 1833 of poor irish parents, he decided to leave Sydney and join the gold rush in 1853. However on the way he turned to a life of petty crime, from which he graduated to robbery, which earned him a 12 year sentence of hard labour. Early Australian bushrangers. McFarlane & Erskine, Gold escort attacked by bushrangers, 187-, print: lithograph.
Image courtesy of the : nla.pic-an8420450. Bushranging - living off the land and being supported by or stealing from free settlers - was either chosen as a preferred way of life by escaped or was a result of the lack of supplies in the early settlements. Australia's bushranging period spanned nearly 100 years, from the first convict bushrangers active from 1790 to the 1860s, through the of the 1860s and 1870s who were able to be shot on sight, to the shooting of the in 1880.
While many bushrangers had populist reputations for being 'Robin Hood' figures; some bushrangers were brutal and others harassed the and diggers returning from the goldfields. Australian Bushrangers.