THE SIX-MILE MURDER.    –    CONLEY WELL KNOWN IN MENZIES  –   A STRANGE CAREER.

In the news of the murder at the Six-Mile, near Coolgardie, which has been published during the past two days, the name of James Conley has been brought prominently before the public. His many friends at Menzies and Niagara will scarcely credit that he is under arrest on a charge of murder, although those who knew him intimately have lately noticed a change in his mental condition which might account for any extraordinary act. Conley is a native of America, but many years ago, he left the land of his birth for South Africa, whose alluring gold prospects had an irresistible fascination for him. Fortune, however, did not deal kindly with him there, and the attractions of the dark continent weakening he set sail for Australia, and arrived at Sydney in 1891.
He soon found himself “way back,” prospecting at Mt. Browne, and when that gave out he was engaged with a Government boring party in putting down a bore on the Urisino station, a property owned by the late Sir Samuel Wilson. Later on he worked in different capacities on the Paroo, where he sojourned for a year or so until the gold fever beset him again, and he headed for West Australia.

Coolgardie Miner 5 May 1897,

With his old pioneering instinct he was soon on the furthest outskirts of settlement, and prospected the country beyond Niagara. Then he took contracts on mines, and was engaged for a considerable period on the Mignonette at Blevin’s. Taking a trip to Coolgardie about 12 months ago, he became embroiled in a street row, and received a blow on the head with a horseshoe, which inflicted a dangerous and serious wound, from which he recovered slowly. That hurt seems to have changed the whole trend of his character, and from being a quiet inoffensive man he became a daring hair-brained fellow, to whom in his cups no madness was impossible. He returned to Niagara, and an intimacy which had sprung up between him and Mediicott, the driver of the Mount Margaret mail, became a very close friendship. The result of the injury, however, was soon manifested, and one morning as he lay in bed in the same room as Mediicott, at Farran’s Hotel, at the Four-mile, near Niagara, he took up his revolver and amused himself by firing at different objects in the room, and it was with difficulty that he was forced to desist.
Firearms seemed to have a weird fascination for him, and he was never happy unless he was shooting at something. Last Easter when on his way to Coolgardie- he stayed at the Carbine Hotel, and when he was retiring took a revolver from his hip pocket and placed it under his pillow; Mr Smith, who was in the room at the time, said, Is that loaded? ” Rather” replied Conley, ” I’ll drop anybody who interferes with me again.” His friendship with Mediicott was so strong that when he heard of the latter’s arrest in connection with the Mount Margaret mail robbery he hastened to Niagara, and offering Mediicott a superb dapple-grey horse which he possessed, said, ” Take it, Charley, and get away as fast as you can.” Mediicott was overcome by the generosity of the action,  but would not accept the offer, and the horse remained in Conley’s possession right up to the time of his arrest. One of the greatest characteristics of the man was his love of gaming for high stakes.
At Coolgardie he would stand at one of the automatic poker hand machines and. bet £50 a time on the result of a turn of the machine. People who knew Conley at Coolgardie state that he has sat down to play cards and lost £1,000 at a sitting.—” Menzies Herald.”

Memorial to May Wain Coolgardie Cemetery, Western Australia

Also available from Hesperian Press:- The Six Mile Murder