Patrick Quilkan

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Wendy Smith on 6th October 2020

Newspaper report in Australasian Chronicle (Sydney) dated Tuesday 19 September 1839 page 1 under heading of Local Intelligence - Execution - Peter Quilkin, convicted of the wilful murder of his fellow assigned servant, at one of the Australian Agricultural Company's station, expiated his crime upon the scaffold on Friday morning. This unhappy young man displayed a great deal of hardihood and tact in conducting his defence upon his trial, but on approaching the awful preparations for the ignominious termination of his short career of crime, he appeared humble and contrite. He did not speak a work from the time he was conducted from the Press-room, until he was launched into eternity. PLEASE note that various newspaper reports change or alter spellings of names. The Australasian Chronicle cites the wrong first name, Peter instead of Patrick, and spelling for both the victim and murderer are spelt as MacLaren instead of McLaren and Quilkin instead of Quilkan.

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Wendy Smith on 6th October 2020

Newspaper report in the Sydney Monitor and Commercial Advertiser, Wednesday 7 August 1839, page 2 states under the heading supreme Court - Saturday 3 August before Sir James Dowling and a military Jury that 'Patrick Quilkin, late an assigned convict in the service of the Australian Agricultural Company, stood trial for the wilful murder of Wm (William) Maclaren a fellow convict servant at Gloucester, on 11 December, 1838. Joseph Burbridge, alias Bretion, a ticket of leave holder in the service of the Australian Agricultural Company, deposed tht he served his term of transportation with the Company, and was promoted to the situation of overseer after he had obtained his ticket, eight years ago. William Maclaren was a watchman, about two miles from his station; he was a convict, about tow or three and twenty years of age, and five feet five inches in height. The prisoner was employed at witness's station. The prisoner once said, on witness telling him what Maclaren had said of him, that 'if he had wished to rob his hut, he had plenty of opportunities, and it was not Maclaren that would prevent him, for he could have easily knocked his brains out and thrown him in the creek'. Has heard prisoner threaten different people at times, but not MacLaren. MacLaren stopped by himself in a hut in the day-time, at night he stopped near his hurdles; there are there shepherds and one watchman at MacLaren's stations (D..try, Baker and B...; MacLaren was the responsible watchman at that station; it was the duty of the these men to go out in the morning with their sheep and MacLaren's business was to ... There is a long report following the above comments but the printing is much faded and difficult to read. Another newspaper report Colonist (Sydney) Wednesday 7 August 1839 page 2 states under the heading Supreme Court - Criminal Side Saturday 3 August that before the Chief Justice and a military Jury that Patrick Quilkin was indicted for the wilful murder of William Maclaren, by beating him in the head with a stone, cutting him with a knife and striking him with a tomahawk, at Gloucester on 11 December. The prisoner and deceased were both employed to the Australian Agricultural Company and were at a remote sheep station near the head of the Manning River - Quilkin was a watchman, and was removed from that berth on the complaint of Maclaren, who said he had attempted to rob him. A short time afterwards when the shepherds returned home, they found MacLaren, who had been appointed watchman, was murdered. He was lying in the garden with his head literally smashed by a large stone, weighing thirty pounds, and his throat cut. The prisoner was than at a station two miles and a half from the station at which MacLaren was murdered. The principal circumstances to connect the prisoner with the murder were - he was at variances with the deceased, that the morning was committed, he went out with a blue shirt on, and when he came back, he had on a duck frock and his shirt was never seen afterwards; that when he was taken his knife had been very carefully washed, and the inside of the handle cleaned; that there was a track near the murdered man which the prisoner's shoes exactly fitted; that on the morning of the murder the prisoner took out his tomahawk with him, which he was not in the habit of doing, and that a few days after the murder, this tomahawk with some blood upon it was found lying in the grass, near the place where the murder was committed; that the prisoner when he took his sheep out, instead of taking the Port Macquarie Road, as he ought to have done, took them in a different direction, which brought him to MacLaren's station. From the position of the body, it would appear that the unfortunate man was planting out tobacco plants, and was kneeling down making a hole when he received a blow from behind at tree. The prisoner's defence was a suggestion that the murder was committed either by the blacks or bushrangers. The jury returned a verdict of Guilty, and his Honor passed sentence of death upon the prisoner.

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Wendy Smith on 4th October 2020

The convict indentures state that Patrick Quilkan was 21 years old. He could read; status single; Religion Roman Catholic and a native of Country Leitrim. His trade was a butcher and labourer. Patrick was convicted of cow stealing at Dublin on 26 October 1835 and sentenced to life. He had no prior convictions. Physical attributes: Height 5 feet 6 inches; complexion pale and freckled; hair brown and eyes grey. Transport number 106. Prisoner number 36-1909. Entrance Book, Sydney in 1839 Patrick Quilkin aged 26, native of Cosh..., Ship Waterloo; condition bond; religion Catholic; trade butcher; Arrived January 3 1839 in Sydney; Trial, Sentence Death. executed 6 September 1839