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Downs and with Manager Lindsay Crawford out on the run, storekeeper Lockard was approached and whilst
busy talking to Nugent, horseshoes and stores were acquired and the 13 moved on to the Ord River in Western
Australia. There they asked Bob Button to provide them with a bullock and left a lot of worthless cheques with the
storekeeper, Lucanus, at Wyndham. Lucanus had been a Mounted Trooper at Yam Creek in the Northern Territory.
Also termed the ‘Saddle Strap Bushrangers’, the 13 plagued the Hall’s Creek goldfields with their petty larceny.
During the days when the ‘Ragged 13’ were busy between 1885 and 1887, Bob Anderson and Nugent returned
to the Territory and eventually set up pastoral enterprises at Tobermorey and Banka Banka. Nugent worked
for a time on the Overland Telegraph Line and got to know about Radford Springs on the early pastoral plans.
Radford Springs, probably named after Harry Readford of Corella, was the early name of a spring that Nugent
finally acquired in 1895. He called his main lease (Pastoral Lease 1704) Banka Banka, two later leases being added
in 1907. The Aborigines called the area ‘Parnkurr-Parnkurr’. He held Banka Banka for 16 years.
The Northern Territory Times and Gazette of 16 March 1900 refers to Nugent having ‘formed a nice station at
Banka Banka, a small garden at the homestead yielding an ample supply of all kinds of vegetables of remarkable
size and quality’. J A G Little of the Overland Telegraph in August 1901 referred to the ‘considerable additions to
his [Nugent’s] compact little station.’
Jack Woods of the ‘13’ paid him a visit from the Coolgardie goldfields in 1900 before going on to England.
Billy (Miller) Linklater worked there in 1902 and in 1941 wrote an account of the ‘Ragged 13’ and of the team
led by Nugent. In September 1904, Prentice had sold Renner Springs to the north and Nugent had sold all surplus
stock at Banka Banka.
In July 1911, Nugent came in from Buchanan Downs and was ill for some time at the Tennant Creek Telegraph
Station. He died there on 11 August from dropsy. He left a will in favour of his brother William to hold his Territory
assets. Two nephews and two nieces later carried on until the two nieces, Mrs P V Ambrose and Mrs D M McNamara
took over in 1919. Later Phil Ward and his wife Mary took over Banka Banka in 1941. Nugent was buried near
the Tennant Creek Telegraph Station by the Station Master, Mr Dixon, facing what was to be named the Stuart
Highway.
Nugent, like his younger colleague of ‘the 13’ Anderson, had left pastoral enterprises which atoned for earlier
indiscretions. At least two members of ‘the Ragged 13’ left a mark on the Territory’s pastoral development.
E Hill, The Territory, 1951; B Miller, ‘Unpublished True Account of the Ragged Thirteen’, 1941; various references in Northern Territory
Times and Gazette, from Debham index in State Library of the Northern Territory; V T O’Brien, Pastoral Summary of Banka Banka, 1990;
Death Certificate, T Nugent, 1911; Newcastle Waters Mortuary Return, 1911.
V T O’BRIEN, Vol 2.