Auction # 56 - THE WESTPEX SALE

Queensland, 1866, Recovered from Robbed Mail (From Taroom). Magenta manuscript notation on reverse of legal size O.H.M.S. cover to the superintendent of telegraphes in Brisbane, with "Electric Telegraph Station, Taroon 11th Jany 1866" at lower left and "Vouchers" notation above, franked with 1865, 2d blue strip of four tied by "152" barred oval handstamps, reverse with "Taroon, Ja 11, 1866" origin cds, additional pencil "Recovered from robbed mail. Taroon. 1866. R. Hwatt" docketing on front; cover roughly torn open, most certainly executed by the robbers, Fine, a rare robbed mail cover, likely perpetrated by a bushranger.
Estimate; $1,500 - 2,000.

There where several bushrangers operating during this time period in Queensland. One of the closest to Taroom (and likely the perpetrator of the robbery) was James Alpin McPherson, known as the Wild Scotchman and infamous for mail robbery. In early 1866, McPherson twice held up the mail delivery between Ipswich and Nanango and in the area on March 30, 1866, McPherson was captured at Monduran Station, 13 km north of Gin Gin.