then hand the cards back to me for refiling. I did this for nearly a year. It was deadening. I would try to sneak into the darkroom to watch film being developed, but I received no encouragement. On a few occasions, I got hold of a copy of Dalton which had been left out during the lunchbreak. I read through it quickly. It was easy to follow and the fingerprint classification procedures were well illustrated. But if I was discovered with the book I was shooed away â the secrets it held were only for the initiated. However hard I tried, I could not muster any enthusiasm for my chores with the record cards. Even when the clerk went on his four weeksâ annual leave and I was allowed to enter the details myself, I still found the job boring. My wage of twenty shillings was well-earned. The man I replaced earned seventy shillings.
That year there was to be a World Scout Jamboree in Frankston, Victoria. I had kept up my scouting and was now acting as the scouter in charge of the Flinders Street Church troop. I was keen to go to Frankston but decided that I couldnât afford it on my twenty shillings a week. Then I learned that all of the Russell offspring would be going, including Mavis who was in charge of a girl guide troop. This was at a time when I could barely let her out of my sight lest some handsome prince come along and sweep her off her feet ⦠and she was now bound for ten days in far-away Victoria. I was some pounds short of the fee but I had access to scout funds which had been entrusted to me for another purpose. Against all my moral principles, I borrowed the money without consent. I was only twenty at the time, but I was put in charge of the entire Adelaide contingent of scouts: four troops. At Frankston we had a wonderful time, mixing with scouts from all over the world. My contingent put on a display of boomerang throwing before the entire jamboree. Mavis and her sisters stayed with friends in Melbourne, but journeyed to the Jamboree by train every day. I kept as close to her as I could, neglecting my scouter responsibilities. I gave no thought to my misdeed until I returned home and the realisation of what I had done sank in. I went to the person who had entrusted the money to me and ashamedly told him what I had done. He was an old friend and covered for me until I was able to replace the money. I learnt a very hard lesson which has remained with me ever since.
In the following year, April 1935, I was posted to the Police Depot at Port Adelaide for my last year as a cadet. There were forty junior constables living at the depot, receiving basic training before being sworn in at age twenty-one. By this time the creation of the rank of junior constable had replaced Commissioner Leaneâs cadet scheme. In the main, the junior constables were lads with even less education than the cadets.
We paid for our food out of our twenty shillings a week wage. One of us was appointed cook. The food was mainly edible. We sat in crowded, makeshift classrooms (former dockside sheds) and wrote down in longhand the sixteen Acts and Regulations we would be called upon to enforce after we were sworn in. These were read out aloud by one of the more senior lads. No explanations were given, no demonstrations provided. We were supposed to learn the Acts and Regulations by heart. This was training at its most primitive, but we were all glad to get it for the alternative was unemployment.
Conditions in the depot were equally primative. The kitchen was right next to the stables and hoards of flies migrated between the two buildings. As we were all poor and had to buy our own food, we bought the cheapest possible.
At the depot, we were each allocated a horse â mine was an aged chestnut gelding named Ripple. He was a friendly animal and my anxiety about sitting on his back â sometimes without stirrups â soon dissipated. I was lucky: some of the horses were anything but friendly, they would give you a quick
That year there was to be a World Scout Jamboree in Frankston, Victoria. I had kept up my scouting and was now acting as the scouter in charge of the Flinders Street Church troop. I was keen to go to Frankston but decided that I couldnât afford it on my twenty shillings a week. Then I learned that all of the Russell offspring would be going, including Mavis who was in charge of a girl guide troop. This was at a time when I could barely let her out of my sight lest some handsome prince come along and sweep her off her feet ⦠and she was now bound for ten days in far-away Victoria. I was some pounds short of the fee but I had access to scout funds which had been entrusted to me for another purpose. Against all my moral principles, I borrowed the money without consent. I was only twenty at the time, but I was put in charge of the entire Adelaide contingent of scouts: four troops. At Frankston we had a wonderful time, mixing with scouts from all over the world. My contingent put on a display of boomerang throwing before the entire jamboree. Mavis and her sisters stayed with friends in Melbourne, but journeyed to the Jamboree by train every day. I kept as close to her as I could, neglecting my scouter responsibilities. I gave no thought to my misdeed until I returned home and the realisation of what I had done sank in. I went to the person who had entrusted the money to me and ashamedly told him what I had done. He was an old friend and covered for me until I was able to replace the money. I learnt a very hard lesson which has remained with me ever since.
In the following year, April 1935, I was posted to the Police Depot at Port Adelaide for my last year as a cadet. There were forty junior constables living at the depot, receiving basic training before being sworn in at age twenty-one. By this time the creation of the rank of junior constable had replaced Commissioner Leaneâs cadet scheme. In the main, the junior constables were lads with even less education than the cadets.
We paid for our food out of our twenty shillings a week wage. One of us was appointed cook. The food was mainly edible. We sat in crowded, makeshift classrooms (former dockside sheds) and wrote down in longhand the sixteen Acts and Regulations we would be called upon to enforce after we were sworn in. These were read out aloud by one of the more senior lads. No explanations were given, no demonstrations provided. We were supposed to learn the Acts and Regulations by heart. This was training at its most primitive, but we were all glad to get it for the alternative was unemployment.
Conditions in the depot were equally primative. The kitchen was right next to the stables and hoards of flies migrated between the two buildings. As we were all poor and had to buy our own food, we bought the cheapest possible.
At the depot, we were each allocated a horse â mine was an aged chestnut gelding named Ripple. He was a friendly animal and my anxiety about sitting on his back â sometimes without stirrups â soon dissipated. I was lucky: some of the horses were anything but friendly, they would give you a quick
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