Picture a two man station in the 1950’s, policed by one cranky Sergeant and one busy Constable. A letter written by Sergeant Gilbert Barwick, Officer in Charge of the New South Wales Mungindi Police Station, to his newly appointed Constable who only knew of the hustle and bustle of Darlinghurst, Sydney must have come as a surprise. The Sergeant thoughtfully provided the following; “Allow me to congratulate you on your appointment to this ‘Garden City of the Never Never’, situated on the beautiful Barwon River adjacent to the lovely Darling Downs of Queensland, on the greatest black soil that sticks to you through all adversity, through hot summer nights, cold windy wet winters and at all times…”
Next the Sergeant provides 15 advantages of the country posting. The first few give a thoughtful overview of the township, geography, fauna and flora. From viewpoint 6 Sergeant Barwick describes flies, mosquitos, hornets, scorpions, stinging ants, snakes, tarantulas, and fever, the plague and cattle duffers. His education continues; “Number 14. Police duties here are somewhat lighter than in the metropolitan area and you will only be required to work 17 hours a day seven days a week. You will only be called out during the week the average number of times. Last year we had 400 charges. The Constable put in 397 and I managed to lock up the other three. We have all types of offences from the lowest to the highest and have even had one man charged for deserting his ship.
Number 15. There are 400 unmarried girls without families in the district and some have even offered me a small sum of money for the first introduction. There has never been a Constable come to Mungindi and leave single since the station was erected. Those who didn’t die got married. The Constable you are replacing came here as a single man and has now been transferred back to Sydney. In his two years here, this particular Constable acquired a considerable amount of money, a brand new Austin car, an expensive wardrobe, was a member of the golf club, bowls club, football club and domino club, and he left with a very handsome woman and two children.”
Number 8 gave a solemn reminder of the inevitable; “Many young and brilliant Constables have been transferred to Mungindi in past decades and records reveal that three years is the longest any have survived. Some of them are even buried in the police paddock, covered with autumn leaves of green and gold lying peacefully below with their thoughts of colleagues of the dim and distant past.”
Mungindi Police Station and Court House on the New South Wales side of the river, during the flood of 1921
Image No. PM1283 Courtesy of the Queensland Police Museum
The town of Mungindi straddles the Queensland, New South Wales border, and police from both states shared law enforcement duties on their respective sides of Barwon River. Next week’s FROM the VAULT will provide correspondence from the Queensland Police in Mungindi reporting on conditions in the town after the flood of 1921. This letter, to the Queensland Police Commissioner, shows the close working relationship the police from both states shared.
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This information has been supplied by the Queensland Police Museum from the best resources available at the time of writing. The letter was written by Sergeant Gilbert Barwick, OIC of N.S.W. Mungindi Police Station.
The Police Museum is open 9am to 4pm Monday to Thursday and 10am to 3pm on the last Sunday of the month (Feb-Nov) and is located on the Ground Floor of Police Headquarters at 200 Roma Street, Brisbane. Contact: E: museum@police.qld.gov.au
“FROM the VAULT- Mungindi, a Sergeant’s perspective” by the Queensland Police Service is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (BY) 2.5 Australia Licence. Permissions may be available beyond the scope of this licence. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5/au/legalcode