The Monaro district operated a famous spectre known as the Black Horse of Sutton. This apparition was seen at intervals by a certain family, but only when disaster befell their house. The first visitation took place when the father of the house went to Goulburn to arrange a land deal to extend his large property. As he was returning home he was thrown from his horse and killed.

It was a mild summer night and the man's wife was seated on the broad-flagged verandah of the homestead when she heard the faint echo of galloping hoofs along the dusty home road. There was silence; then the sound of a gate being opened; the wheeling of a horse as though a man had turned to close the gate; the changing sound as it shut fast; then the sound galloping hoofs again. The woman stood up and walked to the top of the verandah steps to welcome her husband. ...

'It must be John. Strange - I wonder why he didn't cooee as he always does? Why - I'm trembling! Perhaps it's just - oh! his horse! John! John! Where are you? ... A riderless horse had come into view, its hoofs drumming on the drive. It crossed the lawn at breakneck speed straight towards the house. The sound was muffled, only to be taken up again at the back of the house. the riderless horse had passed through the house and disappeared into the ranges beyond. The woman watched it in the dusk petrified. she hoped was a trick of her imagination in the fast-falling evening shadows. but she knew she would wait in vain for the return of her husband. When a search was made he was found dead - his horse grazing near by.

Old identities in the district will tell you that when disaster came to that family the riderless horse was seen galloping swiftly - a messenger of death. It made its appearance when the woman's eldest son was killed at the Boer War. Again when the youngest son met his death in an accident.

The house has long been demolished and sheep graze across the country where the riderless horse comes no more.
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