In response to numerous reports of drunkenness and disorderly conduct among the miners and requests for police protection, on 21 April, 1895 a Police Station was opened at Coen. In the 1890s the township had a population of about 150, and consisted of post and telegraph offices, public house, stores, butcher shops and several residences.
The long road to Coen. Image Reference 7676 Courtesy of Pastor Roennfeldt Slides, John Oxley Library, SLQ.
The Police Station was located across the river, a quarter of a mile outside of the town proper. As the Station was located on the opposite side of the Llankelly Creek, prisoners had to be taken over the suspension bridge, during all hours of day and night including the drunk and disorderly offenders.
At the time the Station had no cell, only ‘a log to chain prisoners up to for safety’. For the most part, offenders were either committed to Cooktown or discharged. In cases with sentences under one month, the term would expire before the prisoner and the escort would even reach Cooktown.
Police Station House at Coen, 1 August 1928. Image Courtesy of the Queensland Police Museum.
On the night of the 1st February, 1932, a fire broke out in the office at the Coen Police Station, caused by the accidental overturning of a kerosene lamp by the Officer in Charge, Acting Sergeant Watson. According to his report, Watson was finishing up on his day’s work, when his arm struck the lamp and overturned it, breaking the bowl and globe of the lamp, and causing an explosion. There was little damage done to the office, but the correspondence, which was then on the table, was destroyed.
In September, 1933 a wire notified the District Inspector at Cooktown of another fire at Coen Station. A benzene tin, used by A/Sergeant Watson for sponging his clothes in the kitchen not far from the cooking fire, exploded. The building and all the property it contained were destroyed. The whole lot of Watson’s personal belongings, including all his clothes, Underwood typewriter, and two gold watches perished in the fire. He estimated his total losses to be no less than £100. The reimbursement claim he later submitted was denied. The inquest into the accident yielded no conclusive results as to how the tin was ignited, being a fair way away from the stove.
Article from The Courier-Mail, Tuesday 27th March 1934.
The Station office and living quarters were temporarily moved into a previously deserted cottage situated on the police reserve.
In September, 1937 the Station was relocated to Coen proper. Having weathered the hurricane of 1943, the Police Station was moved once again in 1945. After the final move in 1950 the station underwent a series of modernisations, such as electricity. The 1965 inspection report noted that the station was very well run, and particularly clean and tidy; while the town of Coen was very quiet and well conducted.
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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 – The Long Road to Coen” was written by Dr Anastasia Dukova, Crime and Policing Historian and Queensland Police Museum volunteer, from the best resources available at the time of writing.
Further Readings:
Dukova, Anastasia. A History of the Dublin Metropolitan Police and its Colonial Legacy, Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.