William Williams and the Missing Christmas Day Goose!

  In 1845 William Williams a 37-year-old brickies labourer was charged with theft for stealing a goose, the property of hairdresser, Alfred Cooper. Williams saw the goose being cooked at Birrell’s bakery on Rundle Street.  He decided he would like to eat it and stole it.

  He then took it to the house of Henry Brooks, a bricklayer. The men and some friends dined on the goose. Cooper, missing his prized goose, suspected that Williams may have stolen it. He arrived at Brooks's house and caught the men eating it, then went to find a police officer.  Williams knew he was in trouble, and asked Brooks for a loan of 5s 6d. – enough to pay for the goose.

  The South Australian newspaper reported that Cooper “came in and saw his goose in the hands of the Philistines. He then got a policeman, who took Williams into custody”.[1] Williams offered the money he had borrowed from Brooks for a goose, but Cooper declined, and Williams was arrested and taken to the police station where he was committed for trial.

  At court the following day Birrell was asked to give testimony. He stated that on Christmas Day Williams came into his shop and asked for a light for his pipe. He went through the shop into the kitchen to get a light. On his way there, he passed through a small room where he saw Birrell’s wife stuffing a goose. Williams stated he would like to dine on the goose, as he was, ‘out for a spree’. The goose was taken into the kitchen to be baked. Williams left Birrell’s and went to the adjoining house, owned by Brooks.
 Mrs Cooper came to the shop to get her cooked Christmas goose but returned home without it. So, Mr Cooper and his wife went to Birrell’s to find their goose. They then stopped at Brooks's house and witnessed Williams and other men eating a goose.
 The men dining denied stealing the goose, but after Cooper called the police, Brooks and his wife admitted that Williams had brought the goose to their house. Williams had then offered Cooper double the value of the goose so he would not press charges against him.

 

James Birrell, the baker, stated to the court that Cooper came to his house seeking a Christmas goose but got none. He told Cooper there were more geese than one -"two gooses" - and that Williams had taken one away on a plate; leaving the tin in which it was brought behind. There was nothing else missing but the goose.
Williams and Brooks came in together whilst he was drawing the baking, and saying the goose was what he wanted, it was handed up to him.

Henry Brooks stated to the court that he went to Birrell's for his dinner and was followed by Williams. He assisted Mr Birrell in taking out the dinners, and when he left with his dinner Williams had left the shop. Afterwards, Williams came to his house with a goose on a plate and stated he had bought it overnight for six shillings. They ate the goose together. When Cooper came with the police, Williams called him into the next room, told him he had got into trouble about goose stealing, and borrowed some money from him to try to arrange payment for the goose and avoid gaol. Instead, he was then taken to the station-house.

Ellen Birrell, wife of Mr Birrell, deposed that Williams asked for one of the two geese, and took one away. A girl came and fetched the other goose. When the police arrived, she recalled Williams saying to Cooper, “I will pay you any amount you like rather than go the office.”

  The Defence argues that there had been no proof that the prisoner had taken, nor stolen the goose. Identification of the thief was insufficient.  The defence continues, ‘Mr Birrell had stated there were ‘two gooses’ at most it was only a "spree" and having seen Mrs Cooper stuffing a goose, he perhaps thought he might as well stuff it too, only in a different manner; he was sorry Mr Cooper should have been prevented dining off the goose, and also that he should have been such a goose us to lose it: it was at most only a case for the Resident Magistrate.
  Mr Cooper then argued that if Mr Fisher, the defence lawyer had lost his Christmas dinner, just as it was cooked, and he was ready to eat it, he would not have made so light of it.
  Mr Fisher then replied, “By no means! he was sorry for both him and Mrs Cooper; and would further say that if she could dress geese as well as he could hairs, they must be a very clever couple.
  The Magistrate said, he feared it would prove a serious "spree" for Williams, as he should commit him to take his trial, though he would admit him to bail.[2]

 On Monday, March 9, 1846, Mr Williams faced trial for ‘Stealing a ready cooked goose, value 5s., the property of Alfred Cooper, on 25th December 1845, at Adelaide.” A handwritten note on the side of the record indicates that Williams was found Not Guilty.[3]

 

© 2024 Allen Tiller

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[1] 'DEC. 26.', South Australian, (30 December 1845), p. 3.

[2] 'Law And Police Courts. Police Commissioner's Court.', Adelaide Observer, (27 December 1845), p. 6.

[3] GRS 12820 Criminal record books, Supreme Court of South Australia

Lance Tiller: Credit Union Christmas Pageant

  

 Lance Tiller: Credit Union Christmas Pageant

Across 5 decades, and for 40 consecutive years, my uncle, Lance Tiller, rode his penny farthing bicycle in the historic John Martins Christmas Pageant, now known as the Credit Union Christmas Pageant.

 The Penny Farthing was invented in 1870 in England (also known as the High-wheel). The name Penny Farthing comes from two English coins, used to describe the bikes wheels, due to their size.

My uncles Penny Farthing once belonged to a gentleman at Middle Beach, named Samuel Temby. (as an interesting side-note, my Uncle owned the Middle Beach caravan park for several years during the late 1980’s early 1990’s, and I believe my grandfather’s pool table is still there!)

 Mr Temby’s son began to ride the bike around Middle Beach. Later he moved to Mallala, and the old bike was put in the shed, and mostly forgotten.

In the late 1950’s my uncle purchased the penny farthing from the Tenby’s and learned how to ride the bike. Its seat sat 1.5 metres in the air, and one had to run alongside the bike, and use a small step to jump up into the seat!

 It was in Gawler that Lance applied for a position in the John Martin’s Christmas Pageant. In a story shared with me by my uncle, he claims that the members of the pageant drive out to Gawler, and asked him to ride the penny farthing in traffic up and down the main street of Gawler, to prove he had control of the bicycle.

At my parents in Gawler, circa 1965

 It must’ve worked, as he rode in the pageant for many years afterwards, sometimes dressed as a clown, other times riding alongside the English bus.
 Lance only retied after a pageant in the early 2000’s in which a member of the large crowd, dressed in wolf costume, leaped from the audience and slammed into his bike, causing Lance to fall heavily from the height of the seat – an injury as a sixty something year old man at the time, he has never fully recovered from.

 The Credit Union Christmas Pageant has been one of the highlights of my Uncles life, and his face and eyes light up whenever he speaks of it, so I thought, I would share some of his story with you, before father time catches up with him, and his story is forgotten.

Perhaps, one day, I might take up a position with the Adelaide Credit Union Christmas Pageant, and continue my uncles tradition!

The Mallala Museum bought Uncle Lance’s Penny Farthing bicycle and it is still on display as an exhibit.

Mallala Museum, 2013, Penny Farthing Bicycle, Now and Then Mallala, viewed 5 Nov 2017, http://mallala.nowandthen.net.au/Penny_Farthing_Bicycle

Written by Allen Tiller  © 2017

CHRISTMAS IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA 1880

CHRISTMAS IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA 1880

Christmas Eve, tonight an excerpt from what Christmas was like in Adelaide back in 1880, taken from "The South Australian Register" - Monday 27 December 1880

Christchurch Kapunda 1895 - Christmas Eve

CHRISTMAS IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA

Englishmen are proverbially conservative, and wherever they make their home they seem inclined to retain as far as possible the customs of their native land. In these Australian colonies, however, with the sun registering 100s Fahrenheit, or thereabouts, in the Sun, it would be simple folly to attempt to keep Christmas in the old-fashioned style — to the accompaniment of the blazing Yale-log, the steaming plum pudding, and the heated wassail bowl.

Instead of families gathering around the chimney-corner with the house doors closed and a large crackling fire in every room, the majority of the people of Adelaide seem to turn out on Christmas Eve to see the street decorations to purchase presents on behalf of the good Santa Claus, and to prepare for the outdoor recreation or the religious services of the morrow.

Whatever Australians do in regard to holiday-making they always do it heartily and well. There is no wonder, therefore, that Christmas time is ever with us a time of general rejoicing Old Father Christmas may not come to us in the same garb as he does to the dwellers in England, where fancy always invests him with holly branches and mistletoe and sees him surrounded by flakes of falling snow.

 When we know that we shall be introduced to him under a blazing sun, or with the thermometer registering 90° or 100° in the shade, we prepare to meet him at picnics, excursions by land or by sea, in garden parties, or in other outdoor scenes of recreation and reunion. But Christmas is none the less welcome because he comes unattended by fogs and snow and frost. The Christmas spirit is tho tame, and will be so long as the day is honoured, and as the human heart is moved by joys and sorrows.

Throughout this colony, as throughout the rest of the Christian world, Christmas Day is probably the gladdest day of the year. It is the day when men felt it a duty to be happy, and when that spirit which blesses him. That gives end him that receives is most largely exercised. The general rejoicing over flows in all directions, and for one day at least in the year the inmates of our hospitals, asylums, and prisons are made to feel that they are not entirely forgotten by the great world outside. On Christmas Eve and morning rarely do no carol singers parade the streets to bid'
“Christians awake, salute the happy morn.'

 No 'waits' go from door to door, arousing sleepers, and informing them the time by the clock and the kind of weather at the time. But instead of this on Christmas Eve the Town Hall bells ring out a merry peal to welcome merry Christmas in, and all night long the main thoroughfares are crowded by men, women, and children, who promenade the streets hour after hour gazing upon one another, making purchases, or seeking to catch the inspiration of the time. All vehicle traffic was stopped from east to west in the western half of Rundle-street on Friday evening last, the tramcars being of course allowed to go out to the eastern suburbs, and to return via Grenfell-street as usual. The street decorations were as profuse as we have ever known them before, branches of pines, of gums, and of other trees being need wherever possible, either on shop fronts or on verandah-posts.
 Any one looking down one of the main streets and seeing the abundant foliage might have been pardoned for adopting Macbeth's idea, if not his precise language, and asking what woods had come- there and wherefore had the; come.
 The ornamentation of individual shops was not as conspicuously excellent or as striking as we have seen some on previous occasions, bat a few of the grocers, butchers, fruiterers, and poulterers made good displays.
  The fruit shops were especially gay with the luscious-looking fruit offered for sale, and here, and in toy shops and drapers' establishments, there were crowds of people gathered all Friday evening. Two of the hotels—the York and the Imperial— had gas illuminations in front of their premises, and Chinese lanterns and many lesser lights were to be seen at intervals all along Rundle and Hindley streets.
 The effect was very pretty, and the pedestrians seemed as if they would never tire of promenading or of watching the Lightning Calculator and other wonder-workers who engaged the attention of large crowds of people in side streets and alleys off the main thoroughfares. To the eyes of a visitor from the old country, the decorations of the streets would create great surprise. Scarcely any holly is used, and the mistletoe is rarely seen.

 Instead of these things, branches of eucalypti and other indigenous trees are used, and what the decorations lack in minuteness of detail and artistic finish they certainly make up in quantity. Cherries supply the place of holly berries and the rose takes the place of the mistletoe— for, as the Rev. Charles Clark used to say, Australian young ladies do not object to being kissed ' under the rose 'instead of beneath the mistletoe. The decorations are by no means confined to the main streets. If every house does not show its sprig of holly, every horse carries its bit of foliage, and every vehicle, from the tramcars to the perambulator, is more or less adorned by leaves, or sprigs, or branches of trees. Christmas Day is always observed as a dose holiday in Adelaide. No ordinary business is transacted, except, perhaps, by the owners of vehicles and the occupiers of public houses.

The publication of the daily newspapers even is suspended, either on Christmas or the following day and for twenty-four hours the news goes by word-of-mouth, as it did in the days before Dick Steele started his ' Tatler' and Addison began to show the follies of the society of his day. Bat Christmas Day is by no means generally observed as a day for religious worship. There are services at a few of the churches perhaps, and the South Australian Sunday-school Union assembles its children in the Town Hall for the usual Christmas morning service of song. But this begins at 9 o'clock and is over in an hour so that it shall not unduly interfere with the full enjoyment of a day of recreation.

 Mr Chief-Justice Way presided at the Sunday-school gathering in the Town Hall this year, and the Rev. W. K. Fletcher, ALA., delivered the address to the children. Special hymns were sung, as usual, each having some relation to the Natal Day of Him who was born in Bethlehem. In the evening a grand mass, composed by Mons. Meilhan was performed in the Town Hall, in the presence of a large audience.
The places of public amusement were closed on Christmas Day, but on the previous night, a new pantomime was produced at the Theatre Royal, while at the Academy of Music there were some special attractions in honour of the season. On Christmas Day, notwithstanding the intense heat, tens of thousands of people left the city either by the railways to the Bay and the Semaphore or to some of the shady nooks and glens among our ever-new and ever-beautiful Mount Lofty hills.

SA Christmas card - notice the  "West End" wheels :)

Merry Christmas Everyone!

© 2013 Allen Tiller

www.eidolonparanormal.com.au