Coo-ee is a regular column contributed by author John Barry that tells stories about Victoria’s history and the people who called it home.
In Victoria, homicide cases have a very high clean-up rate. In more than 90 per cent of cases, someone will be charged and very likely convicted. However, there are exceptions.
In 1916, in Seymour, there was just one exception. Four soldiers from nearby Puckapunyal went to Edward O’Brien’s house in Seymour at 10am on a Sunday morning.
They were there to drink. They were already the worse for alcohol when they arrived.
They continued to drink. Later in the day, the soldiers hired a motor car and went to Tallarook for more alcohol.
About 3pm, they returned with four bottles of beer and two bottles of whiskey. They drank the rest of Sunday and Monday.
William Timothy Leahy (known as Timothy or Billy) and Edward Leahy, both born in Kilmore, were 38 and 35, respectively, just a little too old to be posted to front-line units.
The army had learnt that men of this age did not cope well with the heavy work of front-line soldiering.
Instead, the two of them were posted to the depot battalion at Puckapunyal
They arrived about 1pm that Monday at Mr O’Brien’s home, where the drinking had begun the day before.
By the evening, all of them, including Mr O’Brien, were very drunk, but Edward Leahy was no longer present.
When Mr O’Brien went to the outdoor privy of the house about 6.15am the next morning, he found Timothy’s body.
The soldiers, not believing that he was dead, tried to wake him in order to give him more drink. He could not be roused.
Eventually, the soldiers and Mr O’Brien realised that Timothy was dead.
They also stated in their evidence that they must have drunk about seven-and-a-half litres of whisky, as well as beer, in their two-day drinking binge.
Mr O’Brien told his visitors that he did not want a dead man found in his house.
So the four soldiers dragged Timothy’s body down to the banks of the Goulburn River, where they left it.
As had been agreed, Mr O’Brien was to inform the police, and the four soldiers were to make themselves scarce. The soldiers then went to the Prince of Wales Hotel.
Police found the body of Timothy Leahy beside the Goulburn River, where the soldiers had left it.
When Doctor Jensen later examined the dead soldier, he found that Timothy had died of asphyxia caused by a dislocation of a vertebra high up in his neck.
The doctor gave evidence that this injury could have been caused by a sudden jerk of the head, a straight twist of the neck, a blow on the jaw, or by the soldier trying to save himself from falling.
Or even by being dragged over rough ground. The result was the functional equivalent of Timothy Leahy being hanged.
There were no signs of violence, and his body was free of bruises.
It could well be that Timothy Leahy was alive in the morning, but Mr O’Brien and the four soldiers did not recognise this fact in their drunken stupor.
Then, as the four drunkenly dragged him to the Goulburn, they may have dislocated his vertebra in the process.
The deputy coroner, Mr J Chittick, was prepared to deliver a verdict in accordance with the doctor’s evidence.
Which was that there was not sufficient evidence of how Timothy Leahy died.
While this death might be regarded as having perhaps occurred accidentally, there was an extra twist.
Six days later after his brother’s death, the body of Edward Leahy was found floating in the Goulburn River. He had drowned.
There were no marks on his body, but no one could give evidence as to how this came to happen. The coroner returned a verdict of drowning.
No one had reported quarrels or disputes. Both men are buried in Seymour Pioneer Park.
The deputy coroner directed police to bring perjury charges against Mr O’Brien for the false evidence that he had given regarding the discovery of Timothy Leahy’s body.
– John Barry