"Thunderbolt ."
By Bob Cummins
ISBN -0-9587962-0-3
Publisher R.K.Cummins
Moree, New South Wales 1988
Reviewed by Barry Sinclair Jan 2006.
Bob Cummins "novel" on the life of Thunderbolt is one of the best known of all of the books written about the life of this bushranger.
Bob is an experienced freelance print and media journalist with several books and many print articles to his credit. As a "novel" it
is very well written covering the many reasons for the extended success of bushranging in Australia. It also compares the differences between our bushrangers and
the highwaymen of England and America. Throughout the book is an excellent series of photos many of which have not occurred in other books on Thunderbolt.
Unfortunately he tends to use his journalist style as a reporter and accepts all of the stories of his predecessors as being correct. He records their stories without
checking thoroughly the records he had available. Bob makes no claims to be a historian. He does not give adequate links to his bibliography so the truth of some
of his "facts" are sometimes hard to prove. His use throughout his "novel" of the "made up title" of
"Thunderbolt & Coy." does nothing to show any responsibility as a historian. While
this title may have been used by other journalists of the time, it was never a legitimate title for "Thunderbolt" and it never appeared on Police documents. Even
as a result of the "misuse of the title" by a several journalists of the time, it should not appear in a book as a genuine title. It just gives one more
example of his poor reliance on the truth in this entire book.
Parts of his work are accurate, however there are some notable mistakes which better research would have shown. On page 3 at the end of the first paragraph
on the righthand side of the page the author states "That line between imagination, even lies and fact, has made much of the Thunderbolt story impossible to unravel and assures the legend".
This book does nothing to solve this problem and even adds many more imagination and lies for future historians to sort
through.
On page 8, 2nd paragraph he refers to the 1837 New South Wales Blue Book or census for the family of Michael Ward where
a more thorough check would have shown this to be the 1828 census, as a result later authors have repeated this same mistake. Even his own
bibliography in the rear of the book mentions the 1928 census.
In this book his glaring misuse of figures is evidence of his journalistic training rather than that of being an historian. On page 10 second column 1st paragraph he states "in 1822 for example, 169 of Maria Island's (Tasmania) prisoners received 7,000 strokes of the lash - at an average of 400 a convict". A simple mathematical calculation shows this to be an average of just over 41 each. However an even further checking of facts shows that Maria Island was not used as a haven for convicts until 1825 when Governor George Arthur sent 50 convicts there. I have been to Maria Island in Tasmania and checked these facts. As this kind of carelessness pervades his research it leaves a lot to be desired.
On page 11, centre column, near the bottom of the page, Bob Cummins claims "A lack of records about Ward's youth from 10-17 can be partially rectified by family and local traditions. One is that Michael Ward died and Frederick, with his mother, moved near Walcha where Mrs Ward married William Blake...... Also, young Fred Ward is recorded as working at Aberbaldie, Walcha, as a useful lad and visiting his mother at a nearby property." This would have been the period 1843 to 1850. A simple check of death records shows that Michael died in 1859 at his home in West Maitland (BDM Reg No 1859 3745) . Michael's wife Sophia never remarried and also died, in 1874, at their home in West Maitland (BDM Reg No 1874 5858). She had never lived in Walcha nor did her son Fred. During the time from 10-17 he worked partly on his Uncle William's farm at Lambs Valley & part time in other employment in the area and at Tocal Station, as he grew into his older teens. Throughout this book Bob makes presumptions and records many unprovable local stories and myths given to him by locals as facts but these claims were never checked by Cummins, which certainly is not the role of the historical researcher.
On page 17, regarding those being charged with the stealing of horses from Tocal in 1856 he makes the claim that "William was also charged with stealing horses....
William Ward, who alone of the defendants, was released on bail fled, probably to Queensland." A simple check of police
records shows that William was not charged. His use of the word "probably" shows his complete lack of credibility as a historian and especially as several police records
of the time show that William continued to live on, and work, his property near Patterson until the late 1860's when he became more harassed by the police looking for his nephew Fred, and his family actually lost touch with him in late 1867 when he was forced to leave the area. He moved to the Uralla/Tamworth area and became active as Thunderbolt in this area. This can be seen by several police records showing "Thunderbolt" being active in the Tamworth and Tenterfield areas at approximately the same time, again showing Cummins failure to check the available police records.
Continuously throughout this book Cummins uses words like "probably", "possibly", "perhaps", "probable", "many believe", "in all likelihood" etc as an indication of
his failure to actually research his subject fully. You can be sure, in each case these words are used, that the following statement has no basis in fact & with a little
research it can be proven to be wrong. This is a failure of his style throughout the entire book.
On page 20, Cummins on telling of the link Mary Ann has with Fred claims "(Legend asserts that Ward stole the horse to elope with Mary Ann, but the lovers were caught by the police)" . This supposed event happened in September 1861 when Fred & Mary Ann were already married and living in Stroud. They were waiting the birth of their first child & Ward was late attending muster at Mudgee. He was charged with being late for muster and with being in possession of a horse he could not prove ownership, for which he received a sentence of 3 years added to the 6 years still to be served on his previous sentence. Cummins claims he received a further 5 years added on to his 5 years remaining. Throughout this book Bob Cummins attention to historical details leaves much to be desired.
On page 25, 3rd paragraph, Cummins claims "Ward recounted grim prison life, ...........Mounted on a thoroughbred, blind in one eye, and armed to the teeth with pistols and revolvers in belts and pockets he was a most impressive sight with his black beard flowing in the wind." All this shows his vivid imagination as a simple check of police records shows that Thunderbolt usually only carried 2 revolvers and there is absolutely no evidence that Fred was "blind in one eye". The Police Gazette of 14/10/1863, p. 307 shows Fred Ward has "light brown hair". This description is nothing like the description given above by Cummins and yet again shows his inability to correctly check facts. This carelessness happens throughout this book.
On page 68, Chapter 23, titled "Violence in Old New England" is typical of the poor research done by Cummins. The chapter starts with the words "Violence was never far from Thunderbolt." This chapter of 3 pages goes on to claim how Thunderbolt together with Simmons raided the Ollera store near Guyra, Simmons was caught & jailed. A more careful study of police documents shows that Thunderbolt was not involved in this crime at all, the crime was committed by Simmons on his own accord. There is further reason for Thunderbolt not touching the Ollera store as his Aunt, George Ward's widow Charotte (Nixon), lived nearby and a further checking of facts shows that Fred never raided places near where his family lived. During the whole of Thunderbolts career violence appears far from his makeup. This whole chapter is just another evidence of the poor quality of Cummins historical research. If you total up the number of crimes he blames on Thunderbolt throughout his book you reach a number far in excess of the total number of crimes committed by both Thunderbolts.
In Chapter 29, page 84, titled "Infidelity" Cummins discusses Thunderbolts life with Mary Ann. On page 86, he makes the claim ".....Ward eloped with Mrs Louisa Jane Mason. The wife of "Cranky" Bob Mason, a Segenhoe shepherd, Louisa Jane was a half-caste and has been romanticised by fiction as Yellow Long". Again a more thorough check of police records of the time shows that Louisa Mason was a name often used by Mary Ann. It was certainly used by her during the time she was working in Sydney preparing for the escape of Ward from Cockatoo Island. Also Yellow Long was a "family name" used by her tribe and was a favored name of endearment used by Fred Ward. Also on page 85 the caption of the photo of a girl and 2 boys "Many believe these are the three children of Ward and Mary Ann - but there is no definite proof." A simple checking of records shows that at that time the three children of Fred Ward and Mary Ann were Marina Emily, Elizabeth Ann, and Mary Ann, so definitely not the photo of Fred Ward's children. On page 60 he made the claim that their third child born in 1866 and was Frederick Wordsworth Ward whereas, in fact, it was Mary Ann, Fred Jnr was born a year later in August 1867
On page 94, chapter 32 centre column, he claims "Thunderbolt had shot Constables Lang, Aggett and fired at Robert Simpson...." Whereas a check of police records shows that it was Patrick Kelly, Ward's associate, who shot Lang, there is no record of the shooting of Aggett and a closer check shows "An employee of Richard (not Robert) Simpson was shot by a boy with the bushranger", again definitely not shot by Fred Ward.
For the final shoot out between Ward & Walker, Cummins claims on page 115 centre column 3rd paragraph " The chase was coming to a conclusion after seven hectic miles......" For anyone who has walked the distance the chase was for less than 4 Kms , indicating yet again the tendency of the author to exaggerate in all things. His whole story of the death of Thunderbolt does not hold with the facts. He makes the claim that Thunderbolt after being taken out of the water by Walker crawled 100 yards & was still alive the next morning when found by Walker. The death of Thunderbolt happened within 30 seconds after the shooting according to a Report of Dr Oettle, Former Director of the Division of Forensic Medicine in the Department of Health of New South Wales - dated December 4th, 2003. On page 118 on summing up the inquest Cummins makes the claim "there was a scalp wound and small fracture consistent with Walker's testimony that he struck Thunderbolt with his pistol." Yet the autopsy report does not mention any head wounds or scull fracture and one of the photos taken by Cunningham 2 days after the shooting, and shown on page 121 of this book, fails to show any sign of head wounds.
In conclusion, I have only commented on some of the more glaring errors in this book which can be found in every chapter throughout the book. If I kept commenting on the mistakes in this book, my review would be longer than the book itself. In one case I even found he added several words to a police document to alter it to suit his own thoughts. I have copies of the original police document, as well as his altered version. Surely this is totally unacceptable from a supposed historian. As a "novel" this is an excellent read, giving a good summary of peoples attitudes to Bushranging in the later half of the 19th century, however as an historical account of the life of Frederick Ward, known as Captain Thunderbolt, this book gives a totally false story of Thunderbolt's life. He has not researched his basic provable facts and continuously, in nearly every chapter, exaggerates the position of all concerned. He accepts as gospel many of the myths that have been generated by locals over the years. As a result many later authors, on using his book as an authority, instead of doing their own research, have continued to accept the many provable mistakes recorded by Bob Cummins. He has done nothing to clear up the "Myths of the life of Captain Thunderbolt" but has done much to add more falsehoods & distortions to the stories on the life of this bushranger.
Prepared by Barry Sinclair
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Copyright ©
2006 Barry Sinclair