| Notes |
- Robert Boyd had touches of heroism. In August 1857, when the river came up and the boat kept for such emergencies was lost, Boyd stepped into the breach. Camden, said the Herald, was "greatly indebted" tohim "for the skilled and brave manner in which he crossed the river on a sheet of bark, formed in the shape of a canoe, to get the Sydney mails." The making and managing of bark canoes must have been learnt from the Aborigines. Boyd was also apparently a cricketer, defending the honour of his native place against foreign teams. In later years, when his babies died and his wife was incapacitated, he became irritable and unsteady, even a little mad. He kept a bottle of brandy in the house and he used to take some often. He was rough with Augusta, but at the same time he seemed anxious about the state of her health. He was even more violent with her sister May Jane Wright,the overseer's wife.
At lunchtime on 5 January 1872, while a number of his friends and relations were togethr at the home-farm, Boyd grabbed a butcher's knife and took after Wright, his brother-in-law, shouting "I'll do for you!" George Mills, the sawyer, who had seen Boyd come in from the Village, had thought him wild at the time. It later transpired that he had taken a drink at the Plough and Harrow, but he now looked mad rather than drunk. Mills had told James Stewart, the clerk and storekeeper, that he thought Boyd wanted to kill himself. "There is no fear of that', said Steware, 'he has more sense.' Now Stewart - a young gentleman, a squatter's son not long on the place - went for his horse, intending to get Sir William Macarthur to restore order. Boyd turned from his original quarry and met Stewart. He remarked, 'You are a bloody nice young fellow', and darted the knife at his chest. It entered on the left side and penetrated the heart.'
There was a lot of shouting and somebody else slipped off to find Sir William. The master arrived, having ridden as fast as possible from the big house, and asked where Boyd was. He got no useful answer for a while, but finally someone said that he was at the cottage of William Avery, the coachman, a hundred yards away. Macarthur, 71 years old but assertive still in mind and body, set out to calm his maniacal servant. When he was nearly at Avery's a shout came that Boyd had cut his own throat. The poor man was with Avery, his drinking mate, his head on Avery's knee Macarthur faltered and instead of going forward himself, he told two men to bring Boyd to him.
He died on the store veranda, and was buried with his children in the churchyard. Church law forbade the burial of a suicide in consecrataed ground but Arthur Onslow prevailed on the rector to let the family rest together.
Boyd had mde his final fatal move in his own cottage, alone with his bedridden wife. He had gone to Avery's afterwards. Since she was illiterate and voiceless, Augusta could provide no detail for her neighbours or for posterity, but his blood was all over her clothes. In Sydney, as usual, public opinion found its voice in its newspaper reporters. For them the double crime was sensational, and 'considering all circumstances...without a parallel in the history of the colony.' Stewart's murder was diabolical. The suicide was a different matter; readers were advised to see it as a blessing - 'The earth is well rid of such a monster.'
However, considering all the circumstances, there is more justice in Augusta's silence.
(Medical):Robert committed suicide by cutting hisown throat after murdering a storekeeper named Stewart.
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Our Family
1826 - 1872 (45 years)
