Charles Ross was of that great Australian breed, the Overlanders. Arriving on the Ashburton in the early 1890s from the Kimberley and further east, he was a successful prospector.

A run-in with a powerful pastoralist had him stripped of all his assets, jailed for nearly six months and undergoing three trials, two of which had hung juries and the third setting him free.

He was accused of precisely what that pastoralist himself was infamous for. It is an example of what happened to many in conflict with the robber barons of the bush, and continues today.

The Supreme Court files have been

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