![Public Record Office Victoria](/media/collectors/52f2d90c9821f4163875a43d/collector-avatar/56282da02162f10f48032e33/collector-avatar-fit-250x70.png)
Report, 12 December 1854,26 November 1854
Other items from this collection
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Public Record Office Victoria
Letter (item) - Mr Cleal’s Letter to the Chief Commissioner of Police
In October 1901, Mr B. Cleal wrote to the Chief Commissioner of Police complaining about the large number of effeminate young men using ‘various conveniences’ for ‘an evil of the most terrible description’. Mr Cleal’s letter is part of a remarkable collection of documents held by Public Record Office Victoria that are valuable to LGBTIQ+ history and heritage in providing unparalleled insight into where and how beats operated in and around the city at that time. By ‘conveniences’ Cleal meant public toilets, and he listed the busiest of them: the corner of Rathdowne and Victoria streets; Lansdowne Street, East Melbourne; under the viaduct opposite the Customs House in Flinders Street; at the rear of the old City Court in Little Collins Street; and under the viaduct at the foot of King Street. Cleal described in detail how these beats worked: ‘One cannot enter but two or three of the above fellows rush in and on pretence of using same will pass some disgusting remark concerning one’s person etc’. The Chief Commissioner despatched one of his officers, Sergeant Canty, to investigate. Canty’s report provides further detail and description of who he encountered at the public toilets. He reported that men ‘known by the term “Pufters” [sic], are generally well dressed, sober, quiet in their manner and some of them very well connected’. Canty further noted about these men: 'it is often very difficult for the police to catch them offending, and if they do at any time make filthy or indecent overtures to any man, they believe him to be similarly inclined, but should they make a mistake the man insulted never thinks of giving any of them in charge [complaining to the police], but sometimes gives the offender a well-deserved blow or kick instead, of which the recipient never complains.' Sergeant Canty admitted that the problem had existed for some time. But, he added, ‘I don’t think the evil complained of is as great as said in attached [Cleal’s letter]’. In reviewing the file, Canty’s supervisor noted that Cleal, ‘appears to have given these resorts considerable attention’. Much of the evidence for same-sex activity in Melbourne in the early twentieth century comes from court cases and sensationalist news reports. With their eyewitness accounts of the use of local beats, these documents in the collection of Public Record Office Victoria provide a more detailed, understated account, making them some of the more unusual and historically significant records in Melbourne’s queer history. Quoted from "A History of LGBTIQ+ Victoria in 100 Places and Objects" by Graham Willett, Angela Bailey, Timothy W. Jones and Sarah Rood.
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Public Record Office Victoria
Document (item) - The prison letters of George Bateson
In Victoria’s State archives there is a remarkable cache of letters written by George Bateson, who was arrested and convicted of sodomy in late 1860. There are some 200 letters addressed to notable Victorians including the governor, premier, inspector-general of penal establishments, members of parliament, and lawyers. These rare documents provide powerful evidence of homosexual life and the impacts of mid-nineteenth century laws relating to sodomy. The story begins on an evening in November 1860, when 19-year-old William Gardner went to the police to complain that the previous evening, when he was staying at a city hotel with George Bateson, he had been subjected to Bateson’s sexual advances. The police asked Gardner to meet with Bateson again the following evening and when their sexual connection was sufficiently advanced, Gardner should cough twice. He agreed to the plan, and when Gardner coughed the police emerged from a closet in the hallway, catching the two men in the act. Bateson was convicted of sodomy in 1860, but his death sentence was recorded rather than pronounced. In due course the Governor of Victoria commuted the sentence, as was usual for the crime, and instead sentenced Bateson to 15 years’ hard labour, with the first three years to be spent in chains. In 1871, Bateson was released, having spent four years less in prison than his original sentence. During and after his time in prison, Bateson wrote letters to the authorities to assert that he was innocent, falsely accused and the victim of a conspiracy. He demanded that this terrible miscarriage of justice should be reversed and a pardon granted to him. Bateson was not the first man in Victoria to be convicted and sentenced in this way; nor was he the first to petition for redress. But the extent of his letters and the scope of the issues raised in them offer a remarkable insight into homosexual life in the mid-nineteenth century, such as how men might meet each other, and approaches to police and punish homosexual behaviour. Bateson’s letters provide crucial evidence to expand our understanding of Victoria’s queer past. Quoted from "A History of LGBTIQ+ Victoria in 100 Places and Objects" by Graham Willett, Angela Bailey, Timothy W. Jones and Sarah Rood.
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Public Record Office Victoria
Legal record (item) - Divorce Papers for Frank Paice and Florence Paice (otherwise Cox)
A file previously held in the collection of the Supreme Court of Victoria and now in Public Record Office Victoria contains records of the annulment of the marriage of Florence Cox in 1919. As the earliest known record of a person with intersex variations in Victorian history, Cox’s story – and this record – are of unique historical significance to the LGBTIQ+ history of the State. Florence Cox (1887–1950) had a middle-class upbringing in Melbourne. In 1914 she travelled to Bengal to marry her fiancé Frank Paice and to join him in his missionary work for the Baptist church. The couple returned to Melbourne in 1918 and the following year the Supreme Court of Victoria, at Paice’s request, annulled their marriage. The Supreme Court file reveals that Paice declared he had been unable to consummate the marriage, due to ‘a malformation frigidity or other defect of the parts of generation’ of his wife. Both Paice and Cox were subject to medical examination, which established that Cox had what is recognised today as the intersex condition complete androgen insensitivity syndrome. The court determined that marital intercourse, as it was understood at the time, was impossible for Paice and Cox, and granted the request for an annulment. Paice remarried, fathered children and led a successful professional and civic life, serving a period as Mayor of Nunawading, in the middle- class eastern suburbs of Melbourne. Cox’s life was very different. It is unlikely that anyone in her life would have known what had prompted the end of the marriage, but gossip would certainly have focussed on her part in it. She never remarried and, although she remained connected to her family, her story was rarely discussed. Cox was admitted to Mont Park Mental Hospital in Melbourne’s northern suburbs in 1945, where she died five years later. The Supreme Court file preserves one of the most detailed medical descriptions of a person with intersex variations from that period. It is particularly striking that following the court case, the file was closed ‘forever’. This indicates how seriously the court took the case, and its determination to protect Cox and Paice from public scrutiny. It speaks loudly to the thinking of the time on a matter that was rarely, if ever, raised in public. In 1997, Cox’s great-nephew Ian Richardson set out to investigate the secrecy surrounding his great-aunt Florrie. Following a relentless, two-year campaign by Richardson and other descendants of Cox and Paice, the Supreme Court file was finally opened to the public. Richardson’s book, God’s Triangle, recounts his quest and brings Cox’s story out of the archives and into the light. Quoted from "A History of LGBTIQ+ Victoria in 100 Places and Objects" by Graham Willett, Angela Bailey, Timothy W. Jones and Sarah Rood.
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Public Record Office Victoria
Document (item) - The 'Monster' Women’s Suffrage Petition
It took just six weeks in the spring of 1891 to collect nearly 30,000 signatures on the ‘Monster Petition’ for women’s suffrage. Dedicated suffragists collected an average of 5,000 signatures a week (over 700 per day) before the petition was presented to the Victorian Parliament in September 1891. The six-week drive proved the determination of the suffragists, and was one of first major steps along the road to 1908 and the achievement of women’s franchise. Now a prized possession of the State of Victoria, the petition itself was truly a ‘monster’, running 20 centimetres across and 260 metres in length. Several men were required to carry it into Parliament. Its sheer size and unique shape make it a marvel; a stack of paper with an equal number of signatures would not be nearly as impressive as the huge, winding roll presented to Premier James Munro. Quoted from the article ‘The “Monster Petition” and the Women of Davis Street’ by Brienne Callahan, in Provenance: The Journal of Public Record Office Victoria, issue no. 7.
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Public Record Office Victoria
Legal record (item) - Criminal Trial Brief for Harry Bruin and Benjamin Morris
This collection of approximately 20 letters between Melbourne men Ben Morris and Harry Bruin, covering a period of several months in 1919, consists of original letters handwritten by Morris and carbon copies of Bruin’s replies. Love letters between men from this period are extremely rare in an Australian context, and globally. They were seized by police from Bruin’s home in Harcourt Street, Auburn in October 1919. The police were investigating a report that Bruin and Morris were conducting an intimate affair. The relationship came to light when the mother of one of Morris’ friends, having failed in her attempt to blackmail Bruin, went to the police. Blackmail was an ever-present danger to homosexual men at that time. Homosexual sex was against the law and even gossip alone could ruin reputations, careers and social standing. In refusing the demands of his attempted blackmailer, Bruin took an enormous risk. However, Morris and Bruin were lucky that their letters contained no descriptions of sex acts. It was not illegal to express love for a person of the same sex and when the matter came before the court, the police had no choice but to let the matter drop without laying charges. Letters like these are rare as potentially incriminating correspondence between men was usually destroyed by the writers or the recipients, to prevent it falling into the hands of the authorities, blackmailers, or disapproving third parties. These letters survived only because they were seized by the authorities for the purpose of prosecution. Morris and Bruin’s letters are also important because, together with the statements taken from the two men and others involved in the case by police prosecutors, they provide insight into the development of the liaison over an extended period. The emotional letters provide rare evidence of a deep romantic affection between two men in their own words. Quoted from "A History of LGBTIQ+ Victoria in 100 Places and Objects" by Graham Willett, Angela Bailey, Timothy W. Jones and Sarah Rood.
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Public Record Office Victoria
Transcript, 19 January 1855
The Argus
Eureka Stockade:The Trial of Arthur Akehurst
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Poster, 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Bakery Hill Meeting Poster
trial, bakery hill
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Public Record Office Victoria
Letter, 1 December 1854
VA 856 Colonial Secretary's Office
Eureka Stockade:Hotham's reply to Rede's report 30th November
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 16 January 1855
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions VPRS 5527/P Unit 2, Item 9
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 26 January 1855
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions VPRS 5527/P Unit 2, Item 8
trial, circus
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Public Record Office Victoria
Brief for the Prosecution, 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Brief for the Prosecution, Case no.16, Criminal Sessions Melbourne
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 1855
VA 2825 Attorney-General\'s Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Summary of the Trials of the thirteen Eureka prisoners charged with high treason
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Letter, 4 October 1855
The Argus
Eureka Stockade:Peter Lalor's Narrative
charles hotham, peter lalor
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Public Record Office Victoria
Petition, 1855
VA 856 Colonial Secretary's Office
Eureka Stockade:Petition to Lieutenant-Governor Hotham from concerned citizens of Melbourne 1855
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Public Record Office Victoria
Letter, 30 November 1854
VA 466 Governor (including Lieutenant Governor 1851-1855 and Governor's Office)
Eureka Stockade:Letter from Patrick Smyth to Hotham requesting temporary suspension of licence fee to avoid bloodshed
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 30 November 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions taken against William Bryan for Breach of the Peace charge/Gravel Pits Riot
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Court Record, 17 January 1855
VA 475 Chief Secretary's Department
Eureka Stockade:Proceedings of the Supreme Court in the matter of Queen v. Hayes and others
trial, supreme court, eureka, eureka stockade
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Public Record Office Victoria
Resolution, 13 March 1855
VA 466 Governor (including Lieutenant Governor 1851-1855 and Governor's Office)
Eureka Stockade:Bendigo Reform League call for the abandonment of the State Trial
trial, robert benson
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Public Record Office Victoria
Letter, 22 October 1854
VA 856 Colonial Secretary's Office
Eureka Stockade:Commissioner Rede reports arrest of 2 men concerned in the latest outrage
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Report, 2 December 1854
VA 856 Colonial Secretary's Office
Eureka Stockade:Resident Commsisioner Rede’s description of the stockade (written on the day before the attack)
robert rede, attack
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 30 November 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions taken against Donald Campbell for Breach of the Peace charge/Gravel Pits Riot
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 21 October 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions taken against Andrew McIntyre for Rioting at Bentley's Hotel
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 27 October 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions taken against Henry Westerby for Rioting at Bentley's Hotel
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 9 December 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions VPRS 5527/P Unit 2, Item 7
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 27 October 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions taken against Albert Hurd for Rioting at Bentley's Hotel
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 8 December 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions VPRS 5527/P Unit 2, Item 4
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 8 December 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions VPRS 5527/P Unit 2, Item 3
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 30 November 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions taken against George Goddard for Breach of the Peace charge/Gravel Pits Riot
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 30 November 1854
VA 283 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions taken against Benjamin Ewins for Breach of the Peace charge/Gravel Pits Riot
trial
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Public Record Office Victoria
Deposition, 8 December 1854
VA 2825 Attorney-General's Department (previously known as the Law Department)
Eureka Stockade:Depositions VPRS 5527/P Unit 2, Item 2
trial