The story of Thomas Peters’ encounter with bushrangers was recorded by his grandson, Joshua John Hayes. Joshua was born in 1842, three years after Thomas died. Joshua’s account was compiled from notes made by his father, John Hayes, who had married Louisa Peters. It is said that the bushranger Matthew Brady’s popular repute as a man who used violence only in self-defence is supported by a host of stories. This story would appear to be one of these. As Brady was executed on 4th May 1826 the incident on which this story was based must have occurred before that date. It is likely to have arisen from the activities of the bushrangers in the Bagdad area in 1825. 

This is one of the accounts that fed the myth that Thomas Peters had been a soldier. Before moving to Bagdad Thomas Peters had run ‘the Duke of York’ in Elizabeth St. Hobart Town. He doubtless served many in his capacity as licensee of ‘the Duke of York’, but he certainly never served with the Duke of York’s regiment! http://dunlops.onthe.net.au/familytree/mcdonald/text/AfewDegreesRemovedEd1.pdf

“The amazing result of the forgetting process was that by the late 1920s and 1930s, the general population did not know that anyone, or hardly anyone, was descended from convicts – even though most of them were themselves.” p. 167, Tasmania’s Convicts: How Felons Built a Free Society, Alison Alexander (2010)