Evidence Type: Newspaper Report
25 July 1828
In the course of Saturday last an old constable, who had seen three score winters or thereabouts, and who bears the name of BUTCHER,* lodged a sad complaint before Major INNES, the Superintendent of Police at Parramatta.
The constable complained that on the Thursday evening previously, as he was on duty outside of the factory wall, whilst he was making a fire to warm his shivering limbs, being without great coat or sentry box to protect him in any way from the raw night air, on a sudden he was saluted with a bucket of cold water, which a Dulcinea discharged from the factory wall, bawling out at the same time that it was according to orders, and which drenched the poor old constable to the skin. This was unkind treatment and so the Magistrate, and so the sufferer considered it; but the one could offer no remedy, and the other was fain to make the best of the damage.
It is not 4 weeks since an Inquest was holden upon the body of a Parramatta constable,** whose illness and death were attributed to a cold, contracted during some night’s close watching outside of the factory walls, without a great coat. We like fair play, and love to hear arguments pro and con. A Correspondent writes us,
“I think it very hard that the Parramatta constables should not be provided with great coats, as well as those of Sydney. It is a great pity that constables should be stationed on duty at the factory, where they are not wanted, instead of being on duty in the town, where they are much wanted, in order to protect the inhabitants’ property.”
* JOHN BUTCHER
CITATION
Female Factory Online (femalefactoryonline.org), “Coronial Inquest: JOHN MURPHY,” https://femalefactoryonline.org/female-factory-reports/r18280725/, accessed [insert current date].
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