The failed 'highway' robbery - Grave Story 74

At a dip in the road called Mystery Creek, a shot rang out.
Two bank officers were transporting a large amount of cash. It was sale day in the Hamilton area, and banks often sent officers to other areas carrying bundles of money.
Leslie Ray Jordan, 26, ledger-keeper for the Bank of New Zealand and William Fox Langley Ward, the Hamilton manager of the Bank of Australia were heading to Ohaupo in a single horse buggy on February 8, 1910.
Ward was driving when they went through the dip called Mystery Creek about 11am when the shot was fired from the bushes.
The shot hit Jordan in the head, neck and shoulder with great force. The horse tried to bolt but with great presence of mind, Ward controlled the horse and pulled his own revolver.
He saw nothing however and took Jordan to a nearby house and then to hospital and even went on to deliver the money to the respective banks.
It was later found that Jordan had been hit by 85 pellets from a shotgun. He also lost his false teeth which were blown out of his mouth.
For the local police the hunt was on. There was a great deal of local outrage and people came forward. Quite a number had seen John Mintern Paull with a gun.
Paull was born February 18, 1891 in Christchurch. He was the fifth of eight children to Robert John Paull and Annie Mary Mintern.
Paull had been seen by people both before and after the robbery attempt with a gun.
He had hired a horse at a stable and told the stable master he was going to Te Rapa to get a gun mended there.
Jordan himself knew Paull on sight. Paull was 19 at the time and employed as a junior clerk by a local firm of grain merchants.
It did not take him long to be arrested.
He told police a group of Māori had told him they were going to rob the men and he had to help them on pain of death.
He blamed them for firing on the bank officials.
Paull was charged with attempted murder and after a preliminary hearing pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court on March 1, 1910 and was sentenced to seven years by Justice Edwards.
It seems to have been his one brush with serious crime.
A doctor said Jordan was shot in the face and some of the shot was still embedded, leaving him with a facial paralysis.
Paull died in Marlborough on November 30, 1967 and is buried in Wakapuaka Cemetery.