Historian Carol Liston suggested this may have been due to a nasty and expensive legal battle fought that year against Sir Henry Parkes.

Webb had accused the Premier of a host of scams; Sir Henry sued.

In the courtroom showdown that followed, the jury failed to reach a verdict and the case was dismissed.

But it was too late: the Herald was now in other hands.

By 1887 it was owned by John Kidd of Blair Athol. (He was a local state MP and maybe his political activities were favourably reported as a result – but few copies survive to give a clear picture.)

We do know that William Webb refused to go quietly.

He immediately launched a new paper, the Campbelltown Liberal, in opposition to his old paper.

Also in 1885, he sent his brother, Edward, south to found two new papers, the Picton Argus (a weekender) and the Picton Penny Post (published midweek).

In Camden, Joseph Doust died so the Camden Times was bought by William Sidman in 1892.

Sidman (pictured below) had not only worked as a printer and journalist in Britain, but was in Paris in 1870 when the Franco- Prussian War broke out – and the government confiscated the newspaper’s lead to make bullets.

Migrating to Australia in 1888, Sidman bought land at North Cawdor. He decided to buy the Camden Times and give it a new lease of life.

He also gave it a new name: by 1895 it was the Camden News.

That is the name that many generations of Camdenities came to rely on and trust.

A savage economic depression hit the local area in the 1890s and many businesses went broke. The Camden News weathered the storm well, but in Campbelltown the downturn forced a drastic reality check. Both rival papers had to join forces to survive.

The new masthead was called the Campbelltown Herald – but included the words ‘‘incorporating the Campbelltown Liberal.’’

William Webb wasn’t at the helm anymore. His media mogul days were now over and although he continued as a district correspondent, Webb turned his hand to fruit farming at Wedderburn and mining at Yerranderie before his death in 1910.

The new owner of the Campbelltown paper became Joseph McGlynn, who arrived in town with his young cousin, Frederick Sheather, as a news reporter.

They were a dynamic duo, producing a hard-hitting paper that was the undisputed voice of Campbelltown in the Federation era.

In Picton, the two papers founded in 1885 by the Webbs had been sold to different rival interests.

The tangle of changing owners is hard to track, but historian Jan Ross said the Picton Argus was renamed and repackaged as the Picton Advocate by Alfred Turner.

The Picton Penny Post was held by Joseph McGlynn and Frederick Sheather from Campbelltown – and both papers became bitter competitors.

Jan Ross said: ‘‘Each was quick to criticise the other for misquoting a person, misreporting or misrepresenting a situation.’’

But both papers simply couldn’t survive in such a small market and by January 1898 they had merged into one – the Picton Advocate and Picton Penny Post.

What a mouthful.

In 1907, new owner F.J. Skurray streamlined its name to simply the Picton Post – a very familiar name to many generations of Wollondilly readers.