Bush Law

The early settlers found there was great wealth to be had in felling the indigenous forest, more, they believed, than was to be found in the goldfields! The work was skilled, strenuous and dangerous, so it was a different type of man that could survive in the forest environment. Small towns were springing up throughout the country and they were hungry for timber, which made the timbermen and merchants rich. The timbermen lived in camps, clearings in the bush, primitive, and wild, temporary villages. In one such camp, beyond Inagahua, the men were as hard as the work they performed, some might call them, ‘roughnecks’.  They were kept in control by Jake, the boss who made up laws based on his version of the Ten Commandments. Everyone in the camp knew his rules and minor misdemeanours were sorted with Jake’s club-like fists but for the real lawbreakers, he became judge with a jury of a dozen or less men, he chose randomly.

Two men drifted into the camp, but they didn’t want work and Jake eyed them as untrustworthy intruders, not wanted in the camp unless they contributed, and to Jake they seemed unwilling. Nobody asked, but everyone assumed they came from America, because of their drawl, but they didn’t let on and nobody was interested enough to ask. They had plenty of money, at least for booze because most of the time, the effects were plain! Nobody laid a hand on them because if there was the slightest tension, they always backed down.

Sooner or later, if you aren’t earning, there comes a day of reckoning, when there’s nothing jangling in the pockets! Nobody in the camp was aware that the two were broke, but cash-redeemable items began to go missing! All the while the two were in a constant state of inebriation. Most of the rag-tag bunch in the camp wouldn’t be above the acquisition of other peoples’ property, so although one or two may have had suspicions, nobody had reason to finger the American men.

One day when the drunken pair could find nothing to into turn into cash, they found their way into Odd Briggs’ cabin. The called him Odd, because of his nature, probably caused by a head blow his father administered when he was but six years old. He wasn’t all that odd, just slow to react, even so, he was an expert axeman. Odd had to tell himself what to do before he could actually perform the task. Well, it was bad luck for the Americans because Odd arrived at the cabin while the pair were ransacking it! Odd just looked at them, and they looked back at him, because he stood in the doorway, blocking their only means of escape.

The cogs turned over in Odd’s head and it dawned on him what was going on! He took the shorter of the two by the shoulders, picked him up and threw him outside. The other tried to sneak past but Odd was quick enough to toe him in the backside, sending him, plop, on top of his mate, breaking his collar-bone! Well that set up a ruckus and Jake was just close enough to hear it. He appeared on the scene and quickly figured out what had happened. Just as quickly, he figured out how to get rid of the pair!   

Jake called his men, and told them there was going to be a court sitting and he chose a ten man jury. He saw it as an open and shut case, a case that would soon be over!  Jake told the court that the two Americans were caught red-handed in Odd Briggs’ cabin, obviously without Odd’s permission and that they were either looking for booze or items to sell to buy booze. The accused with hands spread open, to profess innocence, said that they were just looking of more Stockholm’s.

The revelation puzzled Jake because the only Stockholm that he and the timbermen knew was Stockholm tar, which was in common use throughout the camp. Used to treat skin conditions, as a protection against infection in wounds to man or beast, as soap, to protect rope against the weather. Everyone in the camp knew where they could get their hands on Stockholm tar, so that seemed a flimsy excuse for being in Odd’s cabin. Jake said so. The Americans shook their heads to correct Jake, they were looking for gin, Stockholm’s gin, a well-know brand of booze from where they hailed from! Jake didn’t give a toss, as far as he was concerned it was an admission of guilt!

Jake had heard enough, and he raised his hand for silence. He told the jury that he reckoned the Americans were guilty of breaking and entering for the purpose of stealing. The jury nodded in agreement. Jake, grinning ear to ear, when sentencing the pair, he instructed the jury that because the Americans were so fond of Stockholm’s, they should have it! He ordered the jury to administer Stockholm tar to the Americans and added that they should not forget the feathers!

Jake got his way, the pair were never seen in the camp again! This was probably the last ever case of ‘tarring and feathering’.