Mary Ann Bugg - Infinite Women

Born: 7 May 1834, Australia
Died: 22 April 1905
Country most active: Australia
Also known as: NA

Worimi bushranger Mary Ann Bugg was one of several female bandits documented as being active in the mid-1800s. A skilled horsewoman and navigator, she is known for her partner, in crime and life, “Captain Thunderbolt” (real name Frederick Ward).
Bugg was the eldest of eight children of an English convict and a Worimi woman he called “Charlotte.” Her father sent her to Sydney for education to “elevate them above the Barbarism of her Tribe.” She learned basic literacy, math skills and housekeeping before returning to her family around age 10. Barely a month after her 14th birthday in 1848, she married an English convict; she is believed to have given birth to her first child before the relationship ended within a year or two. Her second relationship resulted in the birth of two sons in 1851 and 1853, but by 1855 she had moved on to a new relationship with an ex-soldier-turned-farmer, and had three more children with that man in 1856, 1857 and 1860.
It was while living on the farm at Cooyal that Bugg met Frederick Ward, who was a convict with a ticket of leave that allowed him more freedoms as a form of parole. When Bugg became pregnant by him, Ward took her home to her father’s farm for the delivery of their daughter in late 1861. This trip put him in breach of his ticket of leave, which was revoked and he was sent back to Cockatoo Island prison in Sydney Harbour to serve out the remainder of his 10-year sentence. He had also been accused of stealing a horse – though the owner admitted at the trial that the horse had just gone missing and he hadn’t bothered to retrieve it yet, another three years was added to Ward’s sentence for being in possession of a “stolen” horse.
While it is disputed, a popular story describes Bugg swimming across the shark-infested waters of Sydney Harbour with a file to remove his leg-irons and enabling Ward’s escape from Cockatoo Island. Flamboyantly renamed Captain Thunderbolt, he was the better-known in their subsequent bushranging partnership, but she was the “Captain’s Lady,” who scouted areas, looking after their camps and foraging for food for the group, which also included Ward’s bushranging accomplices. She was arrested three times, and reputedly avoided one arrest by pretending to go into labor.
While it was once believed that Bugg died in 1867, this story conflated her with another woman, Louisa Mason, AKA Yellow Long. Bugg and Ward separated in 1868, and Ward was shot and killed in May 1870. Bugg gave birth to a son with Ward in 1868, and returned to her second partner, going on to have several more children with him and living to age 70.