(MOMENTOUS COUNTRY MUSIC) (MUSIC CONTINUES) As a kid, I loved westerns ` stories of sheriffs and outlaws and stagecoach holdups and dynamite tossed with reckless abandon. But I never once thought that we had exactly the same kind of history right here. (BOOM!) We do. And one story features a gang of goldfield killers to rival any of the American West. And it all happened right here in the sprawling, brawling, gold towns of New Zealand's wild frontier. Hyah! (WHINNIES) (WHIMSICAL STRING MUSIC) New Zealand has a past filled with people who thought, 'She'll be right,' when more often than not, it wasn't. Join me as we celebrate these true stories of the history that history tried to forget. Copyright Able 2017 The great thing about a gold rush is that anyone can become filthy rich in an instant. All you need is a gold pan... (REVOLVER CLICKS) ...or a gun. (GUNSHOT) To help mine these true tales of extraordinary New Zealanders, I'm using some ordinary New Zealanders, including some nuggety mining-types that I get to run backwards and forwards quite a lot. And keep your eye out for the longest single take in the entire series as we tell the yarn from our wild west that we call The Ballad of The Burgess Gang. (UPBEAT GUITAR MUSIC PLAYS) BOTH: # Well, the Wild West had its cowboys # as bad as they could hang. # But no Sundance Kid or Jesse James could top the Burgess gang. # I'd say they've left a trail of tears, but dead men, they can't cry. # If Burgess sees ya standing there, # well, son, you're bound to die. (MEN CHATTER) Gentleman, good morning. MEN: Good morning. Thank you all for coming. The facts ` a few days ago, on the 13th of June 1866, four businessmen left Canvastown in Marlborough, bound here to Nelson to bank their gold. As you know, they haven't arrived. The general consensus now is that those four unfortunate businessmen have been cruelly murdered... to death. (CROWD GASPS) Who could've committed this terrible crime? I'm glad you asked. Suspicion has fallen upon four men. (CLATTERING, PROJECTOR WHIRRS) Gentlemen, may I introduce you to the vicious, the violent, the notorious, the bloodthirsty Burgess gang. (CROWD GASPS, CHATTERS) (THUD!) Burgess, Kelly, Levy, Sullivan. Now, I know what you're thinking, gentleman. You're thinking no one could possibly look like that. As it turns out, they do. I think you'll find they look uncannily like that, particularly Levy. Look at that! Spitting image. MAN: (SCOFFS) That's uncanny! They were in town a few days before the men's disappearances absolutely poverty-stricken. Now they're back. When the four were last in Nelson, they were so scruffy that locals described them as looking flyblown. That's not a compliment. And here they are... freshly attired, cleanly shaved and throwing money about with the gay abandon of a finance company director. Thank you. Of course, it isn't unusual to go from rags to riches in a day. There is a gold rush on, after all, and people are hitting pay dirt on a fairly regular basis. In Wellington a Mrs Selig found gold in the gizzard of a duck. While in Hokitika, gold was discovered clinging to dirt on potatoes. Unsurprising then, that within two years of gold being discovered on the West Coast, the European population went from, well, none... (RAUCOUS CHATTER) ...to 29,000. All of them desperate to make their fortune. Gentlemen, please! And most of them were men. There were a few female prospectors. The most famous of them being Biddy of the Buller. She once told her life story to a church-going lady friend, who considered it too scandalous to repeat. That might be because Biddy arrived here in the 1860s with two men. Either, neither or both could have been her husband. No one knows. The three of them lived, smoked and drank together for years, panning for gold hip-deep in freezing West Coast rivers. This must have been unpleasant for Biddy because she was only 4ft tall, which, I guess, is why she's standing on this bench so she isn't hidden behind that cabbage. This is not my favourite photograph of a New Zealand cabbage, though. That'd be... this one. Cleverly entitled The Camp, The Cook and The Cabbage. He's gonna make a fortune out of that cabbage, because they did say there was actually more money in feeding miners than there was in gold. SHOUTS: Gold! Gold! (CROWD CHATTERS EXCITEDLY) Excuse me, gotta rush. Unlike the Burgess gang, most people on the goldfields tried to make an honest go of it. This is Reuben Waite, and he's brought a boatload of prospectors to Hokitika before there's even a Hokitika to come to. And he's now busy selling them everything they need to get the gold that he claims is here. Waite told the prospectors there was gold in a nearby creek because that's where local Maori told him it was to be found. But after days of searching, the only thing the prospectors discover is that there is no gold to be had. A gold rush without any gold is called a 'duffer rush', and causing one is a very serious goldfield crime. The prospectors are not happy. I'm not happy. Neither am I. Some people who started duffer rushes had their heads shaved or were horsewhipped, or had their heads shaved and were horsewhipped. Gentlemen, gentleman, please. There is no need for violence. But Reuben Waite manages to calm the angry mob simply by buying back all the tools he'd sold them. The prospectors' dreams are crushed. They've wasted time and money hoping to strike it rich, and now there is nothing to do but wait for the boat to take them back to Nelson and pray they haven't missed another rush somewhere else. But just as the prospectors are about to leave... Gold! Gold! (EXCITED CHATTER) The Hokitika gold rush is back on! Turns out they'd been looking in the wrong creek. Gold! Gold! Gold! MEN: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Tools! But the miners have a problem ` no tools. Gentlemen, gentlemen. Quiet please! Circumstances have changed, but so has the price. Who cares?! Rueben Waite is only too happy to resell the men the tools he was forced to buy back from them with a hefty mark-up, of course, because on the goldfields everyone wants to get rich quick. Otago businessman Jock Graham thought he would make his fortune by helping miners fight off the constant plagues of rats. His solution ` mousetraps? No. Poison? No. He imported 100 cats. (MIAOWS) How do you even get a hundred cats ` start with two and wait? Regardless, it was a brilliant idea, or it would have been if someone hadn't beaten him to it. Which begs the question ` what do you do with 100 cats nobody wants? Cat-serole! Hot cat-serole! No, thank you. Cat-serole! Hot cat-serole! Yes, please. And because miners were starved of news and entertainment, some people made an absolute fortune by auctioning off newspapers to the highest bidder. Mr Waite, I will swap this cat for that newspaper. Nope. What if I throw in a picture of a man with a giant cabbage? Deal. There we go. (MIAOWS) Now, the sudden wealth of the Burgess gang didn't spring from cats or newspapers, so suspicions are aroused. But the government has nothing to link the gang with the murdered men. So they offer... an amnesty. And a �400 reward. The police arrest the Burgess gang, inform them of the amnesty and hope that one of them will crack. (UPBEAT BANJO MUSIC) (UPBEAT GUITAR MUSIC PLAYS) BOTH: # The gold, it brings a fever on. The gold gets in your blood. # For dreams of gold, you'll take the cold and live your life in mud. # There's gold, they say, in them there hills, gold in the riverbeds. # And any man who brings a pan # can get rich quick, they said. # Four men are missing in the hills above Nelson, and the four members of the Burgess gang are in jail, suspected of their murders. They take their name from their leader, Richard Burgess ` 5'4" of pure, unadulterated evil. Born in poverty in London, he was flogged for pickpocketing before he was even 16. He was then transported to Melbourne, where he spent 10 years in leg irons in the bottom of a rotting prison hulk. From the moment he arrived here in 1862, he was in trouble with the law. After an attempted escape from Dunedin Prison, he received 36 lashes. Enraged, he vowed to take one life for every stroke he received. And it's entirely possible he did as he lurked around the goldfields robbing and murdering men. Well... But how did he get away with it? It was simple. At the time men often travelled alone through perilous terrain. If they disappeared, no one would ever really know what exactly it was that happened to them. It was a constant fear, especially for men such as this. That is Dugdale Walmsley, and he is a gold buyer. It is one of the most dangerous jobs on the goldfield. He travels alone to isolated mining camps armed only with large amounts of cash. He then returns home with large amounts of gold. At least, that's the plan. MAN: Hands off! It doesn't help that Dugdale Walmsley is one of the unluckiest men on the Coast. (LIVELY GUITAR MUSIC) He is currently being robbed of 824oz of gold. That's 23kg. Which at today's prices is worth around about... ($)1 million. It's bad, but more embarrassingly, a few years from now a nail will punch a hole in this saddlebag, and a fortune in gold sovereigns will fall out one by one onto the track; meaning that for a short period of time the road to Greymouth, thanks to Walmsley, was literally paved with gold. But the one stroke of luck that Walmsley has is that this dastardly group of stick-up artists is not the Burgess gang. Because if it was, he'd be dead. But I think you'll agree with me, Walmsley, that when it comes to stories of the goldfields, there is one notable omission. Mm-hm. Exactly. And that is stories of the Maori. Whom it seems, Tahu, no one ever really bothers to mention. Maori knew about gold, no doubt about it, but the value was lost on them. You know, it was a shiny object. You know, find a big gold nugget, toss it to the kids, they have a bit of a play around. For them, they only had one gold, as we know it, and that was their greenstone, of course. It is a very` an oddly, sort of, European mineral, isn't it? It's not very much good for, you know` It wasn't useful. No, and you couldn't carve it and put an edge on it, you know. Try and` couldn't cut bloody butter with it, let alone chop your enemy's blinkin' head off. So as a collective, it held little value. But it didn't take them long as individuals to realize that there might be some return for this, uh, new-found taonga that was driving the Pakeha population crazy. Were there a lot of` of Maori who went out and did prospecting? Oh, sure. Look, once` Once the individuals of` that were that way inclined understood what was going on at a personal level, they, uh` many of them really got stuck in and did make a significant amount of money. Probably the most famous being Dan Ellison, um,... moving across to the far side of the Shotover River where no one else had gone. Pulling his dog out of the water and finding gold in the coat. And then, you know, walking out with pounds and pounds and pounds of gold. He was of the nature to take that and turn it into something. He went to help other people. He supported Te Whiti. He put his gold money into the village to grow Parihaka. He had children that were doctors and lawyers and All Blacks. And, so, he exposed, in some respects, a very important lesson that, um, with the resources, these things are possible regardless of who you are or where you're from. It's` It's hard to believe now that it was almost that easy ` that your dog could be covered in gold. But, I guess, the most pressing question of the moment is did the Burgess gang kill the missing men? Good question. Thank you. And it's exactly the question that the police in Nelson are currently asking. The Burgess gang have been sweating it out in the town's jail, but they're now ready to talk. We had nothing to do with those murders. Each of the gang members' stories seems oddly similar. We had nothing to do with those murders. We had nothing to do with those murders. Apart from Sullivan. They did it. And with that, Richard Burgess, William Levy and Thomas Kelly are charged with the four Maungatapu murders and put on trial. The entire town turns out to hear Burgess conduct his own defence. It all began in the West End of London. I never knew my father. I was the fruit of his betrayal. And from then, everything went downhill. Burgess holds the good people of Nelson spellbound with his lurid tales of wrongdoing. And he tried to scream, but nothing came out. His entire defence turns out to be nothing but a five-and-a-half-hour confession of violence and serial murder. Turned out it was the wrong guy. You can actually read about this in his autobiography, the Confessions of Richard Burgess ` The Maungatapu Murders and Other Grisly Tales. Well, that seems clear. A guilty plea should be a mere formality. Richard Burgess, how do you plead? (DRUM ROLL) Not guilty. (LOUD, OUTRAGED CHATTER) Yes, seriously. Whatever will happen next? (LOUD CHATTERING) You might only drive short distances to work each day. You might park securely at work. You may not drive your car to work at all. At Youi, we tailor your insurance premium to how you use or don't use your car. It could save you lots. Call: (PLAYS GUITAR) (PLAYS BANJO) BOTH: # They stand now in the courtroom. # Four murders on the charge. # Is Burgess the worst criminal that ever roamed at large? # Do Levy, Kelly, Burgess now see doom before their eyes? # Gallows stark and tall against # the blue of Nelson skies. # ALL: # The blue of Nelson skies. # (GAVEL BANGS) Order! Order! The records show it is August of 1866. The country is captivated by the trial of the Burgess gang, the alleged Maungatapu murderers. Burgess, Levy and Kelly deny all knowledge of it. But the prosecution's star witness, Sullivan, has quite a different story. They done it. (CROWD GASPS, CHATTERS) And you didn't kill anyone? Well, I did shoot the horse. MAN CRIES: Nay! Nay! (THUD!) (BANGS GAVEL) Order! Order! Burgess, Levy and Kelly, I hereby find you guilty of the four murders and sentence you to death by hanging. (PEOPLE CHATTER) Uh-uh! Not so fast, Mr Sullivan. You see, during the trial it emerged that there was a fifth killing ` the murder of an old flax-cutter by the name of Jamie Battle. And because it was a murder about which nobody previously knew anything, there was thus no amnesty. Who could possibly have killed poor old Jamie Battle? ALL: He done it. Based solely on the evidence of the condemned men, the court makes its decision. Thomas Sullivan, for the murder of Jamie Battle, I find you guilty, and I sentence you to death by hanging. But this is a bit awkward. You see, the Crown doesn't want a prosecution witness hung, so they commute his sentence to life imprisonment. It's OK, though; he gets let out in seven years. Don't worry, though, gentlemen. He goes to Australia, where he's known as the New Zealand murderer. He lives in poverty. No one'll sell him anything. No one will buy anything from him, and because fate has a strange kind of poetry, he eventually dies at a place called Hanging Rock. (BELL TOLLS) It's the morning of the execution of the Burgess gang. Richard Burgess whistles jauntily and congratulates the police on a job well done. Nice one, mate. Thanks for the soup. In the dawn's early light, the crowd waits in eager anticipation, unaware of the fact they are about to hear some of the greatest last words in New Zealand's history. I go to the drop as cheerfully as I would my own wedding. (SIGHS) What do you make of the noose-kissing, Nigel? It's a bit theat` Like, it's a bit over the top. Like, it's all` it's done for effect. I'm just not sure that I buy it, you know? A man who knows` He's building his own legend. Yeah, well, it has that, sort of, 'I'm on a stage, and the spotlight's on me'. He just hasn't quite worked out that, actually, it's a gallows. I get a sense of, sort of, a real narcissism about him. Yeah, I think if you were to test him, you'd find he rated really highly for things like those callous unemotional traits, so a lack of empathy for other people. I would imagine fairly narcissistic as well, kind of, 'The world sh` The world revolves around me.' Um, and pretty low on self-control, because he was a criminal, but not a very good one. You know, like, he kept doing crimes, but he kept getting caught. If this was America, you know, he would be, I suppose, our Jesse James, our Billy the Kid. There'd be movies about him. There'd be books about him. You'd go to the stage show. Here nobody knows anything about him. Ironically, that's part of what he wanted. Like, he wanted to create this idea that he was this, sort of, bush rangering-type, heroic figure, when really he was just a` a murdering thug, really. The biggest serial killer that we've had? Yeah I think he was a really, really bad man. He` He` I mean, he` He` Despite the fact that he portrays himself as this articulate guy and he wrote this very, sort of, flowery autobiography, he is basically just a murdering murderer going around murdering people. Like, he made a career out of it. He just` He offed a bunch of people. He was a` He was a very bad man. 5'4" of pure, unadulterated evil. He pretty much was. Yeah, he pretty much was. Oh, look! Here they come. You'd think the hangman would be a professional, but actually, he's just a fellow prisoner called Clark. For his services, Clark will receive his freedom, a small cash payment... That is a nice tie. ...and the clothes of the condemned men. Don't choke me! He actually said that. (CROWD CHATTERS) The crowd falls silent; the only sound, the footsteps of the executioner as he walks across the wooden platform to the lever. (LEVER GRINDS) ALL: Ooh! Burgess falls and is killed. (LEVER GRINDS) ALL: Ahh! Levy falls and is killed. (LEVER GRINDS) Kelly falls, and his body begins to twitch and dance at the end of the rope, and he twitches and dances for such an inordinately long period of time that everyone becomes quite uncomfortable. (RETCHING) Eventually, the hangman jumps up onto the body, and he bounces up and down on it for several minutes until eventually movement stopped, and justice is seen to be done. (BELL TOLLS) SOFTLY: Right. Half an hour later, they cut down the bodies, shave their heads and beards and make these plaster casts. (SOLEMN MUSIC) Behold the death masks of Burgess, Levy and Kelly ` the notorious Burgess gang. I can only imagine they did this because it's Nelson, and, boy, do they love pottery. (SOLEMN MUSIC CONTINUES) Those death masks and a monument to the murdered men are all that remain of the Burgess gang. Well, that and a story to rival any from the Wild West. C'mon horse, let's go! All right, well, pretty much go at your own pace, if you like. Down this way. No, this way. Yeah, we're going this way. Tally-ho! (WHINNIES) Yeah... I mean, u-u-unless you wanna go the other way. Go there, come on. (CLICKS TONGUE) There we go. Good boy.