The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-09-20
THE MOUNTAIN MYSTERY.
The Story of Frank Buffers Crimes in
 New South Wales.

Readers of the newspapers will have observed, among other items of cable graphic news, paragraph from Syd- ney, New South Wales, announcing the conviction and sentencing to death for murder, and later, on July 16, the exc cution of the notorious Frank Butler, whose surrender to colonial jurisdic tion by process of extradition was made by the San Francisco authorities in February last. The criminal jurisdic- tion in Sydney had considerable num- Der of aliases from which to choose, as this fellow in careering round the world, sometimes as soldier, some times as a sailor frequently as Q de- serter, once as a West Australian po- liceman, and always as a scoundrel. was in the habit of taking a new depar- ture in nomenclature at all times when prompted either by the exigencies of a career wholly criminal, or, as might be, in an occasional spirit of bravado or ca price. He was indifferently Frank Butler, Frank Harwood, Simpson, Clare, Newman, Richard Ashe. Lee Weller Burgess-a list which is probably far from exhaustive. Lee Weller" and DQl SSSS llS lSllpol aI fly boii icNSN from two of his victims respectively so called.
 The events crowded into this paper cover little more than the concluding six months, and are, in short merely the finishing fringe of blood-stained career. Our immediate concern with Butler falls between the dates of Au- gust, 1896, and April 1897. What is left unrevealed may be not inaptly inferred from remark made by him in mo- ment of unsophistication to Detective Roche on the voyage from San Fran cisco to Sydney: T ought rightly to have been hung fifteen years ago." Be fore his execution he had, however, confessed to four murders.
 | About November of last year rumors were heard In Sydney of persons who had mysteriously disappeared from all knowledge whether of relations | or friends. One of these was | young fellow named Arthur Preston, of respectable percentage and ire proachable antecedents. Another was l Captain Lee Weller, sea-captain by l profession and more or less of world rover by choice; but in all respects a man of worth, held in good repute by those who knew him. Yet another was a man named Burgess. As rumor be- gan to congeal it got to be remembered that both Preston and the real Lee 1 Weller had been met with, not as one party but separately, in the company of the person subsequently, identified as Butler, in the neighborhood of Glen brook, in the Blue Mountains, some where about forty to forty-five miles from Sydney. In camping In the ranges, the professed object as effu- sively explained by Butler to chance wayfarers, was that of prospecting for gold.
 About mid-October Butler, under the alias of Clare, had put up for about a week at the Railway Dining-rooms George street, Sydney, the proprietor ol which, Mir F. Thompson subsequently, remembered having had his attention directed to an advertisement Wanted a mate for prospecting trip in 'equa shares bait which, as subsequently, appeared, was the one systematically used by Butler for the entrapment ol his victims in the first instance. From I MT. Thompsons evidence given a Preston's inquest--if for the momen events may be slightly anticipated-i | would seem that Preston must have re sponded to Buffers (alias Clare's) ad vertsement as on october 10 last tho two set out together for Glenbrook Thompson being their accidental fel low-passenger as far as Emu Plains, { point on the railway line about fivt miles short of the ultimate destination Three days later, on the night of Octo Der 22, Preston and Butler were seer together by one George Campbell, a the head of gully near "Numanita.' '
 From that date poor young Preston disappears from human ken until thu afternoon of December 3d, when his fes tering remains were discovered by { search-party aided by back-tracker which for severel days had been pa tiently although not very hopefully in vestigating the forest recesses in a yer! rugged line of country, on the chance o
 being able to rescue the missing youtl if in need or alternately of discovering any possible trace of him. In gull!
 between the Numanita and Lindei
 platforms of the western main line o
 railway. and about ten miles higher Ill
 the line than Glenbrook, mound o
 freshly turned earth under a rock. ledge attracted attention. On this be
 ing upturned the party, which included
 several police officers, came upon wha
 was left upon the worlds surface O
 Arthur Preston, with a shot-wount
 through the skull, from which death, il
 the language of a professional witness
 who gave evidence before the coroner
 must have been practically instantane
 ous. Notwithstanding the processes o
 decay, the features were clearly dehne' as in life, and the identification of tn
 victim was complete.
 The murder of Captain Lee Weller 1
 but little more than a repeat of that o
 Preston. From the laying of the ad
 vertising bait until the discovery of tn
 remains, the means used were almos
 identical, and the short interval be
 tween the two events indicated a ne
 farious activity suggestive of a deter
 imitation to get through as much wor
 as possible before flying the country
 Lee Weller, well-set-up figure in tn
 prime of his days, was last seen aliv
 and in Buffers company on October 31
 His dead body, in quite a horrifying at
 titude, was found on Sunday, Decembe i6, in a deserted gully little more thal mile from the Glenbrook railway sta
 ton. The grave was about three fee
 long, and the visual effect of the com
 pression necessary to insure conceal l s., Lz