 Word On Books
with Jeremy
Fenton
The True Story of Jimmy Governor
By Laurie Moore & Stephan Williams
Published by Allen &
Unwin
Australia has produced a gamut of infamous outlaws in the past 200
years.
 From Ned Kelly to Chopper Reed, certain rogues have indelibly
captured the public imagination. Somewhere in the middle of these extremes
lay the exploits of the ‘Breelong Blacks’, Jimmy Governor and his
brother, Joe.
At the beginning of the last century (during the process leading to
Federation), the Governor brothers (and initially Jack Underwood) went on
a killing spree that was shocking and brutal. Jimmy and company
killed nine people – including woman and children – during their rampage
of murder, robbery and rape.
Although details are hazy, Jimmy Governor was a
proud and intelligent man. A man who didn’t take kindly to being
patronised by white people. After all, he had married a white woman
himself, played a mean game of cricket and was known as a hard worker.
Like his father before him, Jimmy was a man who
refused to recognise the place in society that had been decreed him.
The brothers were the last proclaimed outlaws in NSW – meaning they
could be shot on sight by whoever felt brave enough. For three months Jimmy Governor stayed
at large, fairly terrorising the colony, before the manhunt (that included
over 2000 police and civilians) eventually brought him down in a shower of
lead. Unlike his brother, Jimmy survived to tell
his tale to a court before facing the hangman.
While they’re not topics covered in the book, I think it’s telling that
the Governor’s tale combines many of the same elements found in the Kelly
story. Both involved a perceived redressing of wrongs committed against
them, a central figure surrounded by family, a certain sense of humour
and, perhaps most tellingly, both taunted the police and put pen to paper
(ensuring memory of their deeds would live on).
All told, this new book on Governor proves to be strangely deflating in
its avoidance of anything that might be construed as sensationalist
writing.
There is no rule that says history has to be boring, and with a story
such as this it is hard to imagine a more emotive subject.
Still, the prose just manages to limp along to its conclusion that Jimmy was, for a brief
and misguided period, “a black man in charge of his own destiny”.
Despite the lack of narrative oomph, The True Story of Jimmy Governor is
still a comprehensive book that contains extensive newly unearthed
material. Recommended for any serious scholar on the subject – for the
rest of us there’s always the Tom Keneally classic The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith.
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