Botched 1838 hanging in North Adelaide of Michael Magee, who shot the colony's first sheriff: Samuel Smart

J.M. Skipper's sketch of the 1838 handing of Michael Magee from a gum tree on Montefiore Hill, North Adelaide.
Image courtesy State Library of South Australia

South Australia’s first sheriff, Samuel Smart, appointed in May 1837, zealously pursued escaped convicts and ticket-of-leave men for Van Diemen’s Land (now Tasmania), who terrorised whole Adelaide neighbourhoods. South Australian governor John Hindmarsh appointed Smart, a solicitor from Van Diemen’s Land, mainly because he knew these convicts.

Smart himself became a target for three “Vandemonian” convicts in Adelaide when he was attacked and wounded during robbery at his hut. Two attackers were caught but a third, named Morgan, escaped to the whaling station at Encounter Bay.

Three special constables were sworn in and told to bring Morgan back dead or alive. They found Morgan asleep with a gun in his hand but they got lost in the hills of Fleurieu Peninsula while bringing him back. Morgan was left chained to a tree for four days – “tormented by flies and menaced by dogs” – while the constables went for food and help.

Another of the offenders, Michael Magee, was the first person hanged in South Australia in May 1838 near the government store on Montefiore Hill, North Adelaide.

The sheriffs was in charge of executions – and Magee’s was badly botched. Because Smart couldn’t find an executioner (or “Jack Ketch”), the South Australian Company cook (disguised by a mask and hump) was roped in.

Many people watched the hanging that turned slow and grisly. With Magee able to lift himself up on the rope, the hangman had to grab his legs until he died – causing the crowd to shout “Murder!”. The cook/hangman had to be escorted away.

Sheriffs continued to oversee South Australian executions, along with running courts and their orders. Sheriffs’ duties were extended in 1856 to being returning officers for elections and in 1870-1965 to running all gaols and the custody of all imprisoned debtors and criminals.

The Office of Sherriff, after Smart, was run by Charles Dutton (1838), Charles Burton Newenham (1839-56), William Boothby (1856-1903), Otto Schomburgk (1903-29), Harold Whittle (1929-35), Stanley Blackman (1935-50), James Allen (195065), Herbert Collins (1965-78), John Carr (1978-2000), Timothy Goodes (2000-04), Mark Stokes (1004-18), Steve Ferguson (2018-).