UNDERCOVER OPERATION BY POLICE AT YALLOURN
The following article was published in the ‘The Argus’ and reported on the detection work of two Victorian policeman in a covert operation at Yallourn in 1923. Working undercover, the officers pretended to be workers while gathering information about the sly-grog and illegal gaming rackets in the camps at Yallourn.
Some readers may not be aware that it took about seven years for the ‘new’ town of Yallourn to acquire a hotel (1928); and with hundreds of thirsty workers, at the end of long day of ‘hard labour’, it is little wonder that sly-grog shops did a roaring trade, in those early years of settlement.
Such news articles must have fired the imagination of city people about life in the camps at Yallourn. The stories emanating from the ‘wild times’ in Yallourn and the role that police agents played in ‘busting’ the bootleggers and racketeers in the camps would have made for exciting reading and set tongues wagging.
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MARCH 23rd 1923 ‘THE ARGUS’ PAGE: 8
GAMBLING SCHOOLS RAIDED.
POLICE WORK AS LABOURERS.
Arrests at Yallourn.
Information was recently received by the police that sly grog selling and gambling were rampant among a section of the men employed at the Electricity Commission's works at Yallourn and at the Morwell brown coal field.
The men are stated to be earning high wages, some of them squander their money in gambling schools and in sly-grog shops, which have been established in various parts of the district and which do a brisk trade.
About two weeks ago two special constables were sent to Yallourn in disguise, and were given employment at the works of the Electricity Commission as labourers. They mixed freely with the men. The constables became popular and took an active part in the gambling schools and found no difficulty in obtaining supplies of liquor in the various camps and sly grog shops. Last week they completed the collection of evidence against offenders at Yallourn and suggested that the police should visit the town in motor-cars and raid certain houses and camps.
On Monday morning Senior Detective McCann and Plain-clothes Constable Cavanagh and two constables left Melbourne for Yallourn in a motor-car. They were joined at Yallourn by Constable Kennedy and five other constables. The party was separated into different sections, and several camps and houses were raided and 10 men arrested….
Footnotes.
1. The details about the workers charged with ‘illegal betting, keeping a sly grog establishment and a common gaming house’ were also published in ‘The Traralgon Record’ (30th March 1923).
2. The raid at Yallourn made national news as the story spread far and wide; the ‘Western Star and Roma Advertiser’, a newspaper which circulated in Toowoomba (Queensland), gave prominence to the police action with …
“GAMBLING SCHOOLS RAIDED-POLICE WORK AS LABOURERS…Information was recently received by the police that sly grog selling, and gambling were rampant among a section of the men employed at the Electricity Commission's works at Yallourn and at the Morwell brown coal field, Victoria. …”
3. Charges of sly-grog selling were laid against three of the men.
4. Six of the arrested workers were charged with having kept a ‘house for the purpose of betting.’
5. One man was charged with the offence of ‘having sold lottery tickets.’
6. It is documented that the men appeared before the Police Court (Petty Sessions) at Morwell on April 17th in 1923.
7. The full names of the arrested men were published and according to a report in ‘The Traralgon Record’ the men “…were allowed out on bail.”
8. According to the Old Brown Coal Museum website, Constable Kennedy, mentioned in the ‘The Argus’ newspaper report, had a strong reputation for dealing with lawbreakers…
“Constable Kennedy was the second Police Officer to be stationed at the Yallourn Western Camp. Said to be built like a ‘brick out-house’, he was fearless in dealing with any trouble makers in the camps.”
9. In those early days of the camps, the sale of sly-grog, at one shilling a bottle, was a lucrative enterprise for the ‘bootleggers.’
10. It is believed that the bottled beer was conveyed from Morwell and then sold illegally at various points throughout or near the camps at Yallourn. It is known that that one ‘racketeer’ had set up his sly grog and gambling shanty in the bush quite close to the camp huts.
11. Reports regarding police raids on sly-grog and betting shops were common in the newspapers of that period. One sensational story regarding another police raid at Yallourn in 1925 reported that …
“There was a sensational occurrence at Yallourn last night during a police raid. The raid was being conducted on premises where sly grog selling was alleged to have been carried on. Two men and one woman had been charged with sly grog selling and. a man with keeping a gaming house. An attempt was made during the raid to blow up half of the premises. A plug of gelignite was exploded and a large hole was blown in the ground but no other damage was done nor was anyone Injured.” ‘Daily Advertiser’ (Wagga Wagga) on September 8th 1925.
11. ‘Two-Up’ was the most popular form of gambling in the camps and it is documented in ‘To Yallourn with Love’ that…
“Many of hundreds of pounds changed hands, particularly on pay night …” Page: 11.
12. In 1927 an article in the ‘Perth Mirror’ stated that the men of the camps at Yallourn had raised a considerable sum of money for the local children to enjoy a seaside picnic at Mordialloc. Some £100 (pounds) had been collected by the workers by cashing in their empty beer bottles or ‘dead marines’ (as they were often called in earlier times) …
“A new use has been found for empty beer bottles at Yallourn camps. When the next battalion of dead marines go on parade the revenue from the sale will go to swell the Yallourn children's picnic fund. About £100 will be needed to give the kiddies a trip to Mordialloc. Formerly the bottles were collected by camp attendants. Now the maintenance officer has issued a mandate to the attendants that bottles must be collected as usual, but the revenue would go to the picnic fund.” December 3rd 1927.
13. The opening of the Yallourn Hotel, in October 1928 was said to have brought about the rapid demise of sly grog-running in Yallourn. The first licensee of the Yallourn Hotel was George Dixon-Brown. Mr Dixon-Brown managed the hotel for more than 30 years; and in that era, the hotel gained a fine reputation for its standard of accommodation, service and food…
“During the reign of the Dickson-Browns the hotel registered the highest sales of beer in Victoria.” ‘To Yallourn with Love’ Page:50.
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Sources:
1. “The Argus’
2. ‘The Mirror’( Perth)
3. ‘Western Star and Roma Advertiser’ (Toowoomba, Queensland).
4. ‘The Traralgon Record’
5. Old Brown Coal Mine Museum website.
6. ‘To Yallourn With Love’
7. ‘Yallourn Was’ by Prue McGoldrick.
8. National Library of Australia.
Our appreciation is extended to the Old Coal Mine Museum at Yallourn North for use of the photograph of Constable Kennedy (as mentioned above) in this story for Virtual Yallourn.
The research, writing, posting of photographs and presentation of this story was completed for the Virtual Yallourn website by Julie George and Roger Spaull in October 2015. This story is a part of a history project ‘From the Newspapers’ about Yallourn and a full list of titles in the series is available from Julie.
The above extract from ‘The Argus’ has been faithfully reproduced. The only amendments to the original copy are the font style, font size and spacing so as to enhance the article for posting on the Virtual Yallourn website.
