Royal Commission report day 50 page 14
Story of the KellyGang - the Royal Commission Report
The Royal Commission evidence for 7/9/1881
(see also introduction to day 50)
[[../../people/peN_P/nicolsonPAC.html|Ass Com Charles Hope Nicolson]] giving evidence
16902 What are the advantages of the depot?— There are not many now.
16903 What were they?— The depot was a very nice establishment, free house, and gas, and wood and water, and everything that was wanted. There were men stationed there, and horses and stabling, and a pair of blood horses for the officer to drive about the country with, and the services of a man. I do not say Mr. Hare used the men, but they could always be used by the officer in charge. It was the resort of the Chief Commissioner, who was always in communication with him, which, if he was a plausible man, gave him an opportunity of gaining favor; and he had the advantage also of living at the capital. Officers up country live as other people do up the country; but they have to travel through dreary rides year after year, in all sorts of weather-a very different life, indeed. There is not an officer who would not give up £100 a year of his pay to take charge of the depot; it was a relic of the old escort system before railways were opened, and is not necessary now; and was kept up as a place of amusement for the head of the department, and the officers with him. I refrained from any quarrel with Captain Standish , and it may appear as pusillanimity my putting up with so much; but when I was up I always showed the officers and men an example of respect to the head of the department. When I was superseded-when Captain Standish complained of my conduct afterwards, and I considered things were going to wreck; but I was relieved from responsibility, and the case was different. In my interview with Mr. Ramsay , when he happened to be in Benalla in April 1880, returning from the unveiling of the police monument at Mansfield , in company with Captain Standish , Mr. Graves , and other gentlemen, he expressed the greatest pleasure and confidence when I told him how things were going on. That was upon the 22nd April 1880 . Upon the 26th April, I received Mr. Graves 's document from the Chief Commissioner, an anonymous letter, and it was on the 3rd May I was sent for to town by Captain Standish . I had no conversation with him about a man named Foote , and he made the announcement that I was to be superseded; and I had an interview with Mr. Ramsay on account of that. Captain Standish denies that he had anything to do with my removal, but when I had that conversation with Mr. Ramsay he joined in the conversation, saying, “But you are always saying you are going to arrest them,” as if he had been the instigator of my removal, and I am of opinion yet that Mr. Ramsay was grossly misled in the matter by the head of my department. Captain Standish had shown himself incapable of devising any scheme whereby he or Superintendent Hare could catch the outlaws. He was incapable of explaining the prospects of their arrest, and he grossly misled Mr. Ramsay even in my presence before I was relieved; and Mr. Ramsay has been misled since, as see his -evidence before the Police Reward Board, question No. 7 especially, which is nearly altogether the reverse of the fact. From such a person as Captain Standish has shown himself to be, could you expect a proper and fair action in such a case? In reference to Gascoigne 's evidence, I would have been glad to have sent parties of four men had they been properly trained and knew the country, but they had not those essentials. Nearly all the local men were deficient in proper knowledge of the bush, and the reinforcements though generally consisting of picked men, were more deficient in knowledge of the country. All that takes time to acquire, and I doubt, if an outbreak occurred now, if the police are yet sufficiently prepared to cope properly with them. As to the secret service, how was Power arrested after being out two years, and costing the country £30,000, but by informers; and most of the notorious criminals have been arrested in this way. I must object to the way Mr. Graves endeavored to get evidence against this system. (See Gascoigne 's evidence.) I did not inform Mr. Hare about J. Sherritt , because I had ceased to employ him for some time before the 2nd June, and his brother Aaron was continually cautioning us about him. I maintain that my removal from the North-Eastern District after eleven months' intense anxiety, when matters were drawing to a close, was simply a second attempt (which unfortunately succeeded) at endeavoring to deprive me of the credit of the work. Why did I wish to remain, excepting to bring things to a creditable close? Was I not asking what might have been, in case of failure, my loss of office and ruin, and, even in case of success, my death? And I now assert that, had I remained in Benalla, the Kellys would have been taken without loss of life. It has been given in Mr. Hare 's evidence that D. T. came in on Thursday night before the murder, and said the outlaws “were going to do something at once.” No action was taken on this important information, although Mr. Hare has stated he had the utmost confidence in this man. I considered then, and still do, that my removal then was a great shame, not to use a stronger expression. I think I need not take more time in explaining what my system was with reference to those men. I was hearing of them very frequently. When Mr. Hare left I had just heard of them the week before, which was never done when I was up there previously; and when I was superseded I had heard of them three or four days before, authentic witnesses; and I was informed of their places where they had resorted to in the past, and where they had lived but recently. And the last information I had got from one of the agents was about their having been in a paddock for a certain time, and having abandoned it through accident. But this person, a mild, sensible, steady looking person, assured me that he was certain he would bring me to the gully where they were sleeping. I am certain-from what he told me, and my own experience-that we would have caught those men without any blood being shed, and there would have been no such shame as happened to the police force throughout this matter, and the murder of Sherritt. As to the secret system, there was no secret system versus the police-the police were simply unable to obtain certain information. In the case of Power that took place. Evidence was given by one mounted constable and another constable (Gascoigne) that the best system, he thought, would have been sending out parties of four men through the country; but he added, further down in his evidence, if they had been experienced men, and had a knowledge of the country. I would have been very glad to have adopted that, but the men in the district were all local men, and their knowledge of the country was too limited, and that of the other men, though the picked men of the colony, was more limited still.....
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