Australia's Most Infamous Criminals by Graham Seal

Author:Graham Seal [Seal, Graham]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Published: 2023-08-14T00:00:00+00:00

CLAIRVOYANT CRIMES

Although sitting at the less serious end of the wrongdoing spectrum, obtaining money by telling fortunes has a long criminal history. In Britain it was associated with witchcraft and vagrancy, and treated in a similar way in the Australian colonies, which later became states and territories. From early in the twentieth century, the commonplace ‘gypsy’ fortune tellers at the showground, astrologers and amateur readers of tea-leaves and cards began to be seen in a harsher light.

Fortune tellers were linked to social paranoias about white slavery and abortions. The rise of Spiritualism and its claims to connect the living and the dead also contributed to the growing perception that fortune telling was a form of fraud. Those who provided divination services, often women looking to provide for their children, were increasingly arrested and prosecuted. One of those making a very good living from clients anxious to know their fates was Mary Scales, said by one newspaper to be ‘one of the most remarkable figures in the legal history of the state’.

Born in Tasmania, Mary Scales had few advantages in her early life. She was illiterate and worked in menial positions until she began faith healing and seeing the future in company with her husband, George. He welcomed the clients into their business premises, a massage shop, and took their money. They were then ushered into a darkened back room where Mary read their fortunes, usually after providing a massage. It was a nice little business.

Husband and wife were at the Darlinghurst Quarter Sessions in 1903, charged with telling the fortune of George Hamilton the previous December. A reporter from the Evening News published the inside story, noting that the prosecutor soft-pedalled the charges, arguing that anyone foolish enough to believe that the future might be foretold ‘deserved to lose their half-crowns [2 shillings and 6 pence], or whatever they paid for the privilege of being fooled’. He went on to say, ‘But fools should be protected sometimes, and for that reason these prosecutions had been taken.’

As the case proceeded, George Hamilton—actually Constable Hamilton working undercover in an operation to entrap Mary and George—gave evidence of his session with Mary. He had to give George three shillings before going into the room where Mary sat with the secrets of his fate at her fingertips. He was beckoned to sit at a round table opposite Mary and to place his palms downwards. Then, as readers of the Evening News were informed, the seer began:

‘You were born under the sixty planet, and are very unlucky’ … ‘I was born under the same planet,’ was the next information. ‘Your planet has been reigning for the past 11 years.’ The constable was told that there was a change in store for him, and that he would never do any good until he took a water journey. He was also told that two women had entered his life about seven years ago, and that one of them was between colours. That was explained to mean a half-caste.

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