There are many interesting untold tales
in the files held at the P.R.O., Victoria. Here is one of these, tales.
As I was looking at the Registry Book (of Correspondence for the Chief
Secretary's Office), I found this handwritten note in it. "P.Lynch,
Dookie, urges that PC Slater be awarded one of the new Valour Badges for
arresting Buchum Singh in December 1914. Note: issue of medals cannot
be made retrospectively." The story behind this note is a tale of murder,
madness and unrewarded heroism.
On December 1 1914, Butchum Singh visited
the Police Station at Katamatite. The 50-year-old fruit hawker had
been born in Punjab,India and had lived in the district for 20 years.
He told Constable Albert Fowles that he believed people were trying to
poison him. He brought with him five bottles of milk, which he wanted
tested for strychnine.
On December 13, the hawker arrived at
Youarang, where he often camped with his wagon and horses at a farm, on
which lived David Pugsley with his pregnant wife, Lucinda, and their three
children. On the afternoon of December 15, the hawker had four horses
and a foal grazing on the creek, which was a public reserve, but there
was no food for them. So Singh asked Pugsley if he could put his
horses in Pugsley's paddock. Pugsley refused, telling Singh that
he had plenty of his own horses to eat his feed. Pugsley's refusal
may have triggered the appalling events that were to follow.
The next morning at 8am, Pugsley got
up to feed his horses in a paddock about 400 metres from his house.
When he returned half an hour later, Pugsley found that his wife and their
three children were all dead. Each had been shot in the head as they
lay in their beds and Butchum Singh had disappeared, leaving his wagon.
The surrounding police stations were told to be on the lookout for him.
Constable Slater arrived at the Katamatite
railway station on the train from Dookie at 2am. James Nicholas Slater,
who was born in Pine Hills Qld, on February 21 1884, had joined the Victoria
Police Force on August 3, 1907, and had been stationed at Dookie since
1913.
Acting on information received, Slater
travelled in a gig with two other men to Mr. Albert's paddock, which was
about 31/2 miles from the railway station. On reaching the paddock,
the two men remained in the gig while Slater met John Albert. Butchum
Singh had visited Albert's farm at 11.45am asking for bread and went away.
Albert hadn't learned of the murders until 2.30pm.
Together they started searching for
the mad hawker. They found him sitting under a tree in Mitchell's
paddock, which was about 1200 metres from Albert's home, Slater cautiously
walked up to Butchum Singh, as the still loaded rifle was at the hawker's
feet. After talking to Butchum Singh for a while, Slater picked up
the Winchester Repeating rifle and handed it to Mr. Tait who fired it.
The rifle still had seven bullets in it. Then Slater arrested the
hawker. When Slater searched him, he found 32 more bullets on Butchum
Singh.
At his trial, it was revealed that Mrs
Pugsley was one of the persons who Butchum Singh believed was poisoning
him. On February 16, 1915, he was found not guilty on the grounds
of insanity and was ordered to be detained during the Govemor's pleasure.
The Victoria Police Merit Badge was
created in 1899. 84 badges were awarded up to 1930, of which 31 were retrospective
awards. The award was also known as the Valor Badge. The medal referred
to as the "new Valour Badge" in the handwritten notes in the Registry was
the Gold Valour Badge. It was a special award, which was created
in 1916, to honour nine policemen for their role in the arrest of armed
burglars at the Trades Hall in Melbourne on October 1, 1915.
The Medal is a Maltese cross, some with
a ruby in each corner. It has a circular laurel wreath inside which
is a circle with the words "Victorian Police for Bravery" on a dark blue
enamel background. In the centre is a Tudor crown. On top of
the medal is the British Lion and is rimmed with gold. The recipient's
name and number is on the reverse of the medal. Only 21 Gold Badges
were ever awarded, from 1916 to 1922.
There is an irony in the case of Constable
Slater who was refused the medal on the grounds it couldn't be awarded
retrospectively. When the last Gold Badge was awarded in 1922, it was to
the Chief Commissioner Alexander Nicholson who had been awarded the Merit
Badge for arresting an armed man after being twice wounded at Wendouree
in 1898. When he was promoted to the rank of Chief Commissioner
of Police in 1922, his Merit Badge was upgraded to the Gold Badge.
Constable Slater remained at Dookie
until 1921, and in the Victoria Police, rising to the rank of Sub Inspector
and retiring in 1944. He died in Camberwell, Victoria, on July 30
1970, at the age of 86, and was buried at the Burwood Cemetery.
Sources:-
True Blue by Shirley Hardy-Wx and Ralph
Stavely 1997
PRO File: VPRS 30 Unit 1457 File 33
The Argus
Mrs Jean Slater (photo)