Thomas H Cabban. Const. Gundagai

Just been speaking to Dad and he said he will write up a couple of stories about Tiapan Tom and if you are out and about in Mittagong today be carful you dont get pulled over by his Son.

Trevor

Geez did they allow him to breed?? > :'(

If its any comfort, none of his sons ever joined the force.

The funny part of it is he had a brother, a real likeable bloke, who drove trucks, Doug I think, and he reckoned he was a basket.

As for his brother, yes he was a truckie, name of Peter Cabban.
He gave it up after his (I think?) last run.

Had already stood the semi on its nose/and/or run off the road to avoid 'elephants' that turned out were not there after all.
So when another presented itself on the road, he decided 'not again' and kept going.
"Pity" he "forgot none of the preceeding elephants had a madly waving human beside it."

Think it hit the headlines at the time?

Took up air conditioner installation and made far more than trucking can. loved never needing to use a no doze ever again.

Notice no one has mentioned Tom was a trucki himself before he joined the force, I know that as a sureity, he worked for my dad. Loved nothing more than behind the wheel of a BIG rig. The bigger the better.

Figured after the Kokoda Trail being a traffic patroler was the quiet life.

Do you chaps know how he ended up in Gundagai?

Hadnt even had the chance to dry clean his new uniform yet when he spotted a speeder on the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
Upon pulling him over learned the driver was non other than the then Commissioner of Police. NO he did not evade his well earned ticket. Tom's reasoning, (as he explained it to dad) "who else knew the law better than the Commisioner who should be setting the example?"

For some odd reason he was transferred to Gundigai that week. Although since that found him his wife what better stroke of good luck could that be eh?

Well that how he saw it, again heard, yarning with my dad.

He actually joined the force to become a mountie, eg Mounted Police force. Made the mistake of passing his bike training without a hitch over the obstacle course first go. I remember well that day. Lamenting if he had only known would have fallen the bike all over the course.

His most famous run, was eluding the coppers by realising if he stuck to the road going down to the ferry he would miss the ferry, so went straight down through the bush instead to catch the Tom Ugleys ferry before it pulled out. He said it was almost on the other side before they got to the bottom by the road. TAKES ONE TO CATCH one folks..

gee chaps, consideriring some of the stories ive heard, theres thousands of them.

I can put one of HIS.

Think its safe too?

He is out cruising , forget where in same cream station waggon mentioned, and yes it was beyond immaculate.

(off duty)

In front of him is a fully laden cattle truck, ahead is a mighty steep hill with a shorter one before it. Chap hits the top of the smaller hill and sets her alight to get up some decent speed and revs for the big one.

although he was over the limit by about 11 k or so, tom sees the merit in his plan all right.

Except, it turns out there was a third party watching.

Next thing the chap is halfway up the big one and fast losing reves when on comes a siren and tom's overtaken by a patrol car and instead of waiting till the poor chap gets to the top, makes him pull over halfway up. (tom's words, not mine'

Not sure of why he did it, but tom. pulls over and parks behind the truck.
Patrol car I think must have been in front. Either way Toms got a ringside seat to what comes next.

Out hops the constable, notepad in hand. Gives the driver a good dressing down for speeding, goes all over it for defects........then books him.. then?

What does tom hear.
This chap then say, "Im TOM CABBAN AND DON'T YOU FORGET IT."

For years Tom has heard truckie's say they were booked by him at places he knew he had never been at that time, as noted above he had a pretty good memory. Had until then put it down to a truckie wanting to say he had been one of the taipan's catches and thus part of that group swapping tiapan stories.

Waited for the truck to leave and little snot to be alone.
Didn't tell me what he said to him, wish he had.
Doubt it was friendly and an unfriendly Tom wasnt pleasant, cannont ever recall hear him use a swear word, but he didnt need to anyway, he could make 'hullo' sound petrifying if he was not happy with you.

He was a Sergeant by the time I met him .....

Didn't complain about this one even though it was a stitchup - he owed me one from something I'd got away with a while before.

Tom Cabban NEVER made sargent, he deliberately avoided/evaded every sargents test they sent him to do. Absolute fact. He would travel to Sydney for the test and spend the day with his sister and her kids instead.

He retired Constable Tom Cabban, he would rather die than become a Sargent stuck behind a desk.

come to think of it, considering the price on his head at times it's amazing no one collected, I well remember the night dad came home white faced, his hands were shaking so bad he could hardly dial the phone to warn Tom there was a road block he had just been invited to attend by his fellow truckers, they knew Tom was travelling to sydney and the route, they intended crushing him between two trucks and dad was invited to help and share the reward.

Think the usual trick though was when he had been on the patrol bikes was wait till he was beside the door, shove it open with the idea of either knocking him off the bike or the road.
He even pointed out to me one day a spot where the truckie was so intent on shoving him off the road he forgot to watch where he was going and went off instead.

I will never understand why he so loved being a patrolman.
I wonder? Just occurred to me, far less dangerous than avoiding nip bullets or knives. I remember him telling dad, if one of you went to sleep during the night odds were neither you or your partner you were sitting back to back for the night watching out for each other would see the dawn if one dozed off it was usually a given both would be found with their throats cut.

Thanks Mate for the insight of the other side of the man .

Thats magic Asal, thanks for putting that up! Who knows, eh, what goes into making someone who he is.
Would have been a very interesting bloke to have a beer with, thats for sure....Wish I had.
Cheers n ta,
Richard

g'day all .. thanks asal for the heads up on the more personal side of the man....there is always two sides to a coin....cheers

Been doing a bit of googlin'......

Apparently one of the trucking mags did a feature on him when he retired about 1986 and another after he died on March 7th 2006.

Anyone able to check their old Truckin' Life collection and see of it's there please?


As an aside, I've seen other references to highway patrol blokes pretending to be the Taipan but surely truck drivers are smart enough to look at the signature on the ticket!

I know this is a Cabban thread but any of you guys come up against 1080 (Brian Caughey) Jack Lambert and John Burke?

Brian got the nickname 1080, as in poison, because he was deadly, John Burke was called "Scareface" I think, had a big scar down the side of one cheek. Don't know any nicknames for Jack.

These guys worked out of Benalla TOG back in the days of the "Candy Cars" XB Falcons.

Maybe another thread idea there for some with stories to tell (not me)????????????

1080 mainly worked the back road didn't he - heard about him never came across him

1080 worked out of Mansfield for a long time before being shipped of to Shepparton to harass the poor buggers over there