Maitland Mercury

Starting in 1861, executions were done inside the jail rather than publicly, so everybody had to take their picnic baskets and go back home.

The following is from the Maitland Mercury written about the execution of George Waters Ward in 1849.

On Monday morning, George Waters Ward, convicted at the late Maitland Circuit Court of the murder of Richard Connolly, was executed inside the walls of the Maitland Jail in the presence of several hundred persons, including a great number of children and some women.

So apparently, even though it was inside, it was still a family gathering kind of thing.

But articles in the British Medical Journal kept coming, and there'd be hundreds of headlines in Aussie newspapers, big and small, in the years before television.

Maitland Mercury, October 1952.

Smoking Habits and Cancer.

The Herald, Melbourne, October 1952.