The Nunawading Messiah aka The Oakleigh Prophet aka James Fisher (nee) Cowley 1832 - 1913

 Unbeknownst to all of us Jesus Christ had, apparently, already made a quick stop-over in the form of a shady AF character named James Fisher.

Who managed to convince people the Son of God had descended into a crop of cabbages and HE WAS TO EAT THEM ALL TO ACQUIRE THE SPIRIT. Stir-fry?

Oddly, he managed to practice polygamy (along with the usual bigamy), having 3 sisters as his wives - WITH THE FULL BLESSING OF THE PARENTS - and broke up the marriage of the 4th sister - again, WITH THE FULL BLESSING OF THEIR PARENTS.

The whole hot mess only came to light when Fisher was taken to Court for NOT ACTUALLY BEING THE MESSIAH because a child died. 

It is valuable to see the methods used by this bloke to winkle money, women, power out of others and into his own control.

There are many well-researched papers on this person, I'm not re-inventing the wheel by repeating it all here; just holding it up, dusting it off and reminding people that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Further reading/Sources -

Australian Dictionary of Biography

Victorian Collections

Fisherite Descendants of Wickipin, WA

James Cowley Morgan (Cowley) Fisher 

New Jerusalem Settlement site 

A Messiah for The West 

The Nunawading Messiah 

The Nunawading Imposter

The Oakleigh Prophet

Bodies in The Morningstar Mine, Rushworth 1908 Unsolved True Crime

 When hoping to reopen the closed Morningstar Mine at Rushworth on 27th November 1908 some blokes got a nasty shock when decomposing matter was brought up with the mine cage; subsequent investigations discovered the very decayed bodies of a man and a woman in the water-logged mine shaft.

The woman's head was missing and never recovered despite bailing of the water from the mine and thorough searches for evidence. A scrap of newspaper sporting a bloody fingerprint, dated 28th August suggested this was the date the murders took place. Both bodies were badly broken and smashed up; so much so that the medical examiner was unable to locate any reproductive organs or much of the pelvis of the suspected female body, but owing to measurements they determined it was indeed a female.

Numerous people stated swaggies and others often camped at the site of the mine, one witness claiming he'd heard yelling at night some time earlier.

Missing friends and relatives were reported to the police but they were all safely located alive, leaving the police and coroner no answers as to the names of the couple or who had murdered them.

No truer book title!

 

Critchley Parker ; Lost In Tasmania Searching For A New Jerusalem; Poynduk 1942

 Critchley Parker, aged only 31, trekked into the Tasmanian wilderness in an effort to find suitable land for future Jewish settlements far away from the bloodshed of Europe.

He was not Jewish himself but he was infatuated with a (married) Jewish journalist named Caroline Isaacson, and was determined to help find a permanent peaceful refuge for those fleeing the violent horrors of WW2. 

During his fateful trek near Port Davey he discovered a small pond with swans, called poynduk in the local Ninene language. Critchley hoped to name the settlement Poynduk but this was not to be.

Critchley had had TB which had left his lungs and overall health in a weakened state; the weather turned suddenly and he was caught in bucketing rain for weeks that triggered pleurisy. He had planned to light a signal fire to alert the fisherman to come pick him up but he ran out of matches, ran out of food, ran out of time.

But he never ran out of plans for the future settlement of Poynduk; he wrote in his copious notes that he wished it to be based on the "principals of racial tolerance and international brotherhood", to have universities open to students of all colours, medical facilities, schools, hydro-electric power plants. 

Critchley planned for the Tasmanian Games to be hosted at Poynduk each year; the games would celebrate not just sports but poetry, plays, weaving, music and pottery.

Alas, with his early death in the wilderness Critchley's plans for Poynduk were dashed for good.

Further reading -

“Poynduk”: the Extravagant, Impossible (and Understandable) Dreams of Critchley Parker

Melbourne's Botanic Gardens Shooting Spree Norman List 23 January 1924

 Almost a century ago a young man displayed worrying mental health symptoms - paranoia, believing wireless messages were being sent to his mind to control him, to hurt his family, that people were telling lies about him and his family, that his enemies had a radio system that advertised him everywhere he went...(I'd like to know what Professor Graeme Yorston made of him).

After tramping all over the world, fighting in WW1, Norman List returned to his family home in Richmond, Victoria, where these symptoms were on full display.

This all came out after the horrific shooting spree he orchestrated at the Melbourne Botanic Gardens; in just 4 minutes four people were dead.

Their names were

Frederick McIlwaine

Miriam Podbury

Eugenie Strohhecker

John Moxham

Norman List himself was found dead by suicide at Deep Creek near Pakenham, Victoria.

Further reading - 

Massacre At The Botanic Gardens

Tracker Alec Riley 1884 - 1970

 This absolute legend worked to bring criminals to justice but also to help find and/or recover those lost in the bush.

Sidenote - the movie One Night The Moon 2001 is based on him not being allowed to set foot onto a white fella's farm to help look for a missing child.

Tracker Riley spent long, arduous hours combing the bush for evidence when tracking criminals, and in the case of Mad Mossy (Narromine Murders 1939) he spent more than 12 months tracking, tracing and gathering evidence as to the multiple murders.

Reaching the rank of Sergeant in NSW police in 1941 was a first for any Indigenous person, in 1943 he was awarded the King's Police and Fire Services Medal for Distinguished Conduct.

Tracker Riley and his family lived at the Talbragar Reserve at Dubbo.

The movie Blacktracker 1996 is based on Tracker Alec Riley's life.

Further reading - 

Tracker Alec Riley biography

Baron Joseph De Nosek 1821 - 1894

 Soldiering about, stirring insurrection, Baron Joseph De Nosek found himself in Australia after fighting in the Crimean War.

The little bit of insurrection saw him lose his hereditary estates in Poland, so he turned his hand to gold mining, then in 1869 Baron De Nosek became the President of The Victorian Miners Protection League before settling on the career of a licensed victualler (aka publican) at Campbell's Creek, Victoria.

Further reading -

Baron De Nosek buried at Campbell's Creek Cemetery, Victoria.