Lorraine Neate is working on a book for the Illawarra Historical Society, which covers the more strange, quirky, unusual - and even farty - history of the Illawarra through to World War I.

Called Scandal, Slander and Interfering with our Neighbours, it’s a history that involves ordinary people rather than Premiers, Prime Ministers and kings and queens.

There’s the tale of the man who copped 50 lashes after farting - though he denied the flatulence was his - as well as stories of femme fatales, moonshine, punch-ups at a wedding and conmen ripping off the gentry.

‘‘One of my favourites is the crooked coroner,’’ Neate says of a tale from the Illawarra of the 1860s.

‘‘This man was a solicitor by background, he came here from England and got himself in the position of the  coroner.

‘‘He was a real rogue and ended up ripping off a number of the gentry by getting them to give him money to invest and at the very end he ended up being struck off as a solicitor and declared himself bankrupt.’’

These aren’t tales handed down from parents to children, or found in some sort of oral history. Neate has spent hours trawling through newspapers, court records and other documents to find them. So, while some of the stories may seem unbelievable, Neate says they’re very much grounded in fact.

‘‘One of the criteria for these stories is there has to be some documentation, it’s not just ‘grandma said’,’’ Neate says.

‘‘There has to be some sort of document, whether it be a contemporary newspaper report, a colonial secretary’s letter, whether in be an inquest, a bankruptcy. There has to be a source document.

‘‘It is a history so we’re looking at primary documents from the time.’’

One thing that has kept her flicking through those documents is that the stories are so entertaining.

‘‘Every now and again I laugh out loud,’’ she says.

‘‘I guess some people would say I have a funny sense of humour. There are two reactions I’ve had to the title of the book - a very raised eyebrow and a laugh out loud.’’

Also, she is drawn to the lives of the ordinary Illawarra resident, those whose names and antics would otherwise go largely forgotten.

‘‘The stories of everyday people are very interesting to me,’’ she says.

‘‘When I think about family history I don’t just think about putting names and dates on a family tree and that’s that. It’s about who their social interactions were with and who are the people they knew, who were the families that their families married into.’’

This isn’t the first history Neate has written. She also penned Paulsgrove Illawarra, which is about James Spearing - the man who secured the first land grant in the  foothills of Mt Keira.

It was during the research for that book that she realised there would be more than enough 19th century scandal and scuttlebutt to fill a 200-page book.

That research also gave her the title of the book - which came before she’d even written the first story.

She had discovered the diary of Edward Smith and was drawn to the entry for January 26, 1834, and a reference to a sermon from the Reverend Wilkinson.

‘‘In that diary was the expression ‘Scandaling, slandering and interfering with our neighbours’,  as a title of a sermon this fellow went to hear at a church,’’ Neate says.

‘‘The minister had only been in the Illawarra for a few months and it seems his sermon was geared at the people who were going to be in the congregation. So he’d made some assessments about who these people were and what they were up to.’’

For Neate, some of the shenanigans that will be featured in the book come very close to home, such as the tale of extended family bickering over money after the patriarch died.

‘‘I’m not excluding my own family from this - in case people think I’m having a go at everybody else, it’s not true,’’ she says.

‘‘I’ve got a few stories from my own family history, and one of those is about the much-married Mr Ritchie. His family ended up in a huge dispute in the equity court when he died because of his multiple children and step children.’’

Neate is looking for stories from other people to include in the book, which is due to be published in October 2016, with the help of a NSW Government cultural grant.

As well as the need for documentary evidence, there are two other criteria for the stories. They cannot involve people who are still alive and the events have to have happened prior to World War I.

If you know a story and can back it up with evidence, you can contact Neate at  kenneate@ihug.com.au or 42681578. 

David Keenan’s farting led to a rather harsh penalty - 50 lashes.

Keenan had been found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to transportation, arriving in 1836.

According to the Illawarra bench book of December 21, 1836, Robert Young of Dapto was speaking to a servant when he heard something he didn’t like.

‘‘While I was speaking I heard a fart in the men’s hunt close by,’’ Young said.

‘‘I went into it and the prisoner was very insolent to me and told me I had not blood enough to strike him and upon a former occasion he told me that he did not care a fart for me.’’

In his defence, Keenan - the prisoner - did not appear to deny dealing it, but declared he was the victim.

‘‘My master put his fist to my nose and I was not insolent to him.’’

But his claims fell on deaf ears and he was sentenced to receive 50 lashes.

Strangely, the farting incidents seemed to have been forgotten because two years later Young gave his servant a letter of support in his efforts to get his wife and children to Australia.

‘‘...His conduct has been particularly good. I have always found him a very quiet, hardworking, industrious man,’’ the letter read.

Keenan’s efforts were rejected by the NSW Governor and it seems his family never came to Australia. Keenan married Bridget O’Meally in Wollongong in 1850.

The couple ran a general store in Albion Park until his death in 1875.

The superstitious might have viewed the 39th Regiment as cursed with two soldiers taking their own lives a few years apart.

But it wasn’t spirits that were to blame - but a mysterious woman.

In 1828, the regiment arrived to set up base in Wollongong, designated the ‘‘capital’’ of the Illawarra.

The following year the troops were concerned for Private William French.

Some said he suffered a ‘‘depression of spirits’’ while police constable Edward Corrigan preferred to class it as ‘‘mental derangement.’’

The wife of  Sergeant Chick told him to pull himself together because he was becoming a laughing stock.

But Private French didn’t care, and soon after ran into the ocean and drowned himself, despite a rescue attempt from a local.

Three years later another soldier, Timothy Crowley, suffered a ‘‘derangement of his mental faculties’’ and drowned himself in the ocean.

Some years later, in 1894, the Illawarra Mercury interviewed Alexander Stewart - the Illawarra’s oldest inhabitant at the time - for a series of articles.

Stewart was the convict servant of Constable Corrigan and was likely privy to many goings-on.

This included the stories behind the suicides of French and Crowley.

Stewart’s recollection was that both men were suitors of a mystery woman who visited the camp at Wollongong. But this woman would not look upon them favourably, leaving both men so distraught they took their own lives.

Emily Echlin was a woman who had a lot of familiarity with the colony’s law courts.

And her husband Christopher, a veteran of the battle of Waterloo, wasn’t exactly a pillar of the community either.

The couple arrived in Wollongong in the 1820s, with Christopher acting as clerk of the court in 1826.

After only a month, he had drawn the ire of Lieutenant James Fitzgerald Butler of the 39th Regiment.

‘‘He is by no means qualified for the situation,’’ the lieutenant complained.

‘‘He spells wretchedly, writes very badly and is too slow for the business of this court.’’

Emily became the business of a few courts in her time in NSW.

In 1832, she accused a freed convict John Hunter of rape, claiming he held her captive for two hours.

Hunter was arrested but, on the day of the hearing at Campbelltown Quarter Sessions, she did not turn up and the case was dismissed.

A few weeks later, she was charged with assaulting her neighbour Daniel McKay.

She must have given him a good thrashing for she was released on her own recognisance to behave, lest she pay a 10 pound fine, quite a sum in those days.

Christopher died in 1865 and a Mercury obituary was more favourable than Lieutenant Butler, calling him ‘‘a quiet, unassuming and respectable man’’.

Emily again found herself in a courtroom after his death, this time charged with stealing property.

She was found guilty and, at the age of 81, spent the night in Wollongong jail.