Mt Pleasant's Looney family appeared to be prodigious in the art of warring with neighbours, repeatedly appearing before the court for backyard disputes.
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Coal miner Jeremiah Looney, wife Kate and their children spent most of 1873 before the bench, in disputes with the Craigs, who twice sued them for damage to their vegetable patch. The Looneys then counter-sued for libel, without success.
The court advised the families to "sink their differences" and this advice appears to have been heeded, at least in respect of the Craigs.
The Looneys experienced a period of mourning after their seven-year-old son was killed in June 1874, when a lump of coal fell on top of him as he passed a coal shoot at Mt Keira Colliery, on his way home from school.
But Mr and Mrs Looney were back before the court in September 1876, charged by Garrett Flynn and his wife with libel, after the Looneys accused Mrs Flynn of driving away their geese and killing one of them.
Mrs Flynn said she was walking past the Looneys' home when Mrs Looney said to her, "Go back, you dreaded wretch, you drove our geese away and killed one of them."
A week later, she repeated the accusation in front of Mr Dwyer and Mrs Rowles.
"I am sorry to say the Looneys are my neighbours; I believe they have geese and fowls," she told the court.
"Mrs Looney called me a humpy-backed b----, and I called her in turn a tub of guts. I never drove her geese away, but I saw Mrs Dwyer do so, saying she was going to pound them."
Mr Garrett said he visited Mr Looney, telling him the claim against his wife was untrue. However, Mr Looney repeated the accusation and called him a "bloody liar" for saying so. Flynn told him to come out and he would "thrash his hide", to which Looney replied, "You have not the grease in your elbow to do that".
Flynn said Looney did not come out, otherwise he would have given him "a good hiding". "The Looneys are not fit to live among white people," he added.
Mrs Rowles said she heard Mrs Looney say to Mrs Flynn that she had driven away her geese, and that as one of them was lost, she supposed she had killed it. This was backed by similar evidence provided by Daniel Dwyer and his wife.
Their worships non-suited the plaintiffs, remarking that the accusation of Mrs Looney might only have inferred that the goose had been killed by accident. ■
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