Some referred to him as the "demon bushranger" or "The Terror of Van Diemen's Land".
But Michael Howe referred to himself as a "gentleman forester", and later, as "Lieutenant Governor of the Woods" — having struck up a combative rivalry with Tasmania's "useless, drunk" second governor.
Howe would eventually suffer his own downfall, but before that he saw the man tasked with squashing him, governor Thomas Davey, sent packing from the colony.
Author Georgina Stones says the descriptions in newspapers at the time of Michael Howe — a "man of low intelligence [with] a sort of animal cunning, utterly devoid of any sentiment of humanity" — never sat well with her.
"The real Michael Howe was nowhere near as callous or brutal as has been portrayed," she says.
"I wanted to know if there was more to him, so I started to research. I read witness accounts, dispatches, newspaper articles and I was really shocked at how different the real Michael Howe was."
One example of his true character, Stones says, was the "journal of dreams" — said to be a book "of kangaroo skin, written in kangaroo blood" according an 1818 account by Thomas E Wells.
It sounded gruesome, but in actual fact contained Howe's thoughts and musings, including memories of his sister, as well as "lists of fruit trees, flowers, vegetables and plants", Stones said.
The journal, captured when Howe had to abandon a knapsack during a raid by pursuers, has not survived — but to Stones is a testament to Howe being more than the "demon bushranger" he became known as.
Howe's reign as leader of a band of outlaws would terrorise the free settlers of Van Diemen's Land — Tasmania — for a brief but intense period, long enough to send the man given the job of squashing him packing.
For a brief but intense time in the early 1800s, Howe reigned as a leader of a band of outlaws, terrorising the free settlers of Van Diemen's Land.
The colony during that time was an especially brutal place for the law-breakers of Britain to be sent.
For those who came to the far away island willingly, it wasn't much better — but it did offer opportunities for enrichment, by any means.
"I didn't call my book Corruption and Skulduggery for nothing," another author, historian Alison Alexander, laughs.
Everyone was just trying to get ahead, it would seem. If that meant operating outside of the law, so be it.
"I wouldn't put anything past anyone, having done the research," she says.
The drunken governor arrives
It was this environment of crime, bribery and sadism Thomas Davey sailed into in 1813, after his political connections helped secure him the position of Van Diemen's Land second governor.
If the thinking was Davey would bring about an end to the corruption, maladministration, thievery — and monstering of the colony by bushrangers — it was mistaken.
In 1813, "[Davey and wife Margaret] were on their way up the River Derwent to make his entry as governor when he poured port all over her best hat," Alexander says.
Davey was "useless, drunk, weak, just the sort of people they send out to a colony they didn't care about," she says.
"He was regarded as a drunken buffoon … he had several accidents; he fell off his horse, he fell through the verandah at Government House, he fell through the floor of a boat.
"His only claim to respectability was having a respectable wife."
As for the escaped convicts turned bushrangers, whom Davey was supposed to bring to heel, historian Charles White said the following in 1900:
"His doings smacked of a brutal thirst for vengeance, not only on his former gaolers, but on all, white and black alike, who were less fiendish than himself."
The task would prove too much for Davey, with one man mostly responsible.
Howe, like Edward 'Ned' Kelly four decades after him, had a flair for theatrics.
"The first we hear of his bushranger exploits is in 1814, when Howe is the captain of a gang who call themselves the 'Gentlemen Foresters'," Stones says.
"Davey issues a proclamation that if they deliver themselves to Hobart Town, all charges would be dropped and they would be reassigned to other landowners."
But Howe, like fellow outlaw John Whitehead, had no stomach for being the property of another, so bolts from his keeper and returns to ranging.
Several historical accounts have it that on Whitehead being shot during an ambush, the wounded man pleaded with Howe to "take my watch" — meaning to cut off his head, so a reward cannot be claimed by the captors — a task that Howe completes.
'I am in charge': Howe wrote letters to governor
Howe formed another gang and declared himself "Lieutenant Governor of the Woods", at one point raiding Davey's own homestead north of Hobart Town.
"Howe wrote letters to Davey saying 'I am in charge, not you'… and in sense he was," Dr Stefan Petrow, emeritus professor of History at the University of Tasmania, says.
"Davey didn't have enough men or armaments. He felt so hopeless that he couldn't do anything about this, so he introduced martial law, without support from [NSW governor Lachlan] Macquarie.
"Some respected colonists supported Davey and said: 'You've acted wisely and humanely', and agreed they did need protection from 'these detestable monsters' who murdered settlers and plundered stock and grain.
"But it didn't really work, the number of people being attacked went down, but only six were convicted, two of those reprieved," Dr Petrow says.
"Davey hoped this extreme measure could remain in force until he could control bushranging, but it was far too ambitious an aim."
By 1817, after a long campaign by Macquarie to oust Davey, the decision was finally made to remove him.
After agitating for a bigger allocation of property to be given to him post-governorship, Davey would try and fail at making a go of it on the land, before eventually deciding to return to England, without his wife and daughter.
"Probably, his wife wanted to stay," says Alison Alexander. "They were quite warmly welcomed by the local community."
Davey was on a ship to England in 1821. He was dead by 1823.
"'Mad Tom' never really made it as a settler, he drank his way undone," Dr Petrow says.
"You can't help but say he was incompetent, but you also feel a little bit sad his life developed the way it did."
The 1864 English and Australian Cookery Book lists the recipe for Davey's Blow My Skull cocktail, "named and drank by an eccentric governor, who had a stronger head than most of his subordinates".
Today, the street named after Thomas Davey is one of Hobart's busiest roads, with four lanes of one-way traffic running uphill past the picturesque Constitution Dock and the nightclub district of Salamanca.
Less than 100 metres away, with one-way traffic heading downhill in the opposite direction, is the street named after Lachlan Macquarie.
"I wonder if people think about that, tying the two together? Maybe there should be some kind of information panel," Dr Petrow says.
Macquarie, who had been so scathing of Davey, had meanwhile drawn the ire of many in the colony and back in England for allowing freed convicts to occupy positions of authority after their sentences were served.
He was subjected to a damaging inquiry, relieved of his position and died in London in 1824 while still answering the criticisms of his policies.
New governor puts the pressure on Howe
The man who replaced Davey, William Sorell, was "better than Davey", Alison Alexander says.
"He was not a drunk, he was serious, but he didn't do anything to rein in corruption. He also brought out his mistress and put her in Government House, which was not well received."
One thing Sorell did do, which Davey could not, was bring an end to Howe's bushranging, by offering a reward — along with incentives of a pardon and free passage back to one's country of origin for anyone bringing in the head of the outlaw.
Howe's gang had along the way gathered two Aboriginal women into their party, one of them called Black Mary.
"She taught them tracking, the use of animal skins and navigating the bush," Georgina Stones says.
But during a confrontation, Mary was shot — with some accounts saying Howe fired at her deliberately, others saying she was caught in the crossfire.
Mary was captured, later agreeing to help the authorities track down Howe and his gang.
Soon enough, Howe was on his own, his gang members caught, surrendered or killed, with him "forced to rely on supplies and ammunition" taken in raids on stock keeper properties, Georgina Stones says.
Howe would eventually be lured to a trap — a hut where he was told supplies would be, along with ammunition.
"If Michael had not been so desperate for supplies, there is a good chance he would have left," Georgina Stones says.
Inside were two men, William Pugh and Thomas Worrall, whose account of the confrontation was noted by Charles White in 1900.
"Howe slowly entered the hut, his gun presented and cocked. The instant he espied us he cried out 'is that your game?" and immediately fired, but Pugh's activity prevented the shot from taking effect, for he knocked the gun aside.
"Howe ran off like a wolf. I fired but missed. Pugh then halted and took aim at him, but also missed. I immediately flung away the gun and ran after Howe; Pugh also pursued."
"I ran very fast; so did Howe; and if he had not fallen down an unexpected bank, I should not have been fleet enough for him … we were then about fifteen yards from each other ... he stared at me with astonishment.
"To tell you the truth, I was a little astonished at him, for he was covered with patches of kangaroo skins, and wore a black beard … I wore my beard also as I do now, and a curious pair we looked.
"After a moment's pause he cried out 'black beard against grey beard for a million!" and fired; I slapped at him, and I believe hit him, for he staggered, but rallied again and was clearing the bank between him and me when Pugh ran up and with the butt-end of his firelock knocked him down, jumped after him and battered his brains out just as he was opening a clasp knife to defend himself."
For their work, Pugh was rewarded £50; Worrell £40 and to their co-conspirator Robert Warburton, who had lured Howe to his death, £15.
Howe's head was put on display to the public outside the old Hobart penitentiary in 1818, on the intersection of Brisbane and Campbell streets, which today sits opposite a car yard on one corner and office supplier on the other.
The sight of the decapitated head helped make "those who had feared him felt safe at last", Charles White wrote.
A collapsed old shack in Bothwell is thought to be the site of Howe's final showdown.
Georgina Stones would like there to be a "marker near the place where he fell".
"I would like to see his life commemorated … I'm writing a book on Michael, it's important people learn the truth of these men because there are lessons to be learned from their lives."
As for Black Mary, her pairing with Howe became the fodder for fiction writers.
One 1950s article, subtitled "a historical love story", described Howe as a "squat gorilla-like cut-throat, with his cruel little eyes and wealth of black beard, so enslaved the native girl Mary that she followed him unquestioningly with slavish devotion, risking her life to become his partner-in-crime".
Mary died in 1819, one year after Howe, with the local newspaper reporting "a complication of disorders, which had been long gaining ground upon her, terminating at last in pulmonic affection, put an end to her life".
The truth about her relationship with Howe — and if he shot her deliberately — will likely never be known.
