Sam Poo

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Sam Poo was a Chinese bushranger in Australia who was active in the Coonabarabran region of New South Wales during 1865.

Poo was a Chinese emigrant to Australia during the Gold Rush, but instead took to highway robbery on the road between Gulgong and Mudgee. He was a skilled and elusive bushman, and evaded capture from the authorities for several weeks, however early in 1865 he raped the son of a settler, and shot and killed Senior Constable John Ward of the New South Wales Police Force. He was finally shot and captured several weeks later, and when he recovered he was tried and hanged in Sydney.

However, with respect to the rape of the settlers' son, it would be wise to note that there are inconsistent theories as to whether it actually occurred. Historians have depicted this allegation with varying degrees of accuracy and with not enough detailed research in histories past. For example, the boy's name is never mentioned, sometimes he is alone, other times he is with a friend, he initially wants the friend, not the son, he is always on a road side never in his home, yet he initially approaches him in a hut and the level of violence varies. All this presumably determined by the prevailing socio-political mood at the time of these changeable publications.

[edit] References

• Noonan, Rodney. The Journal of Australian Studies. "Wild Cathay Boys: Chinese Bushrangers in Australian History and Litereture."