Policing East Melbourne

In 1883 the Police Department rented a house on a wide block of land in Darling St, East Melbourne. This house would become the residence of the sergeant-in-charge of the new police station.

Next door, on the undeveloped part of the land, a small two-roomed, wooden office was erected, and a separate lavatory. This was to be East Melbourne’s police station for the next 70 years.

This was a time of police on the beat, at a regular 2mph (3.2kmh), and law and order on the streets was their focus. In most instances the problems were not much different from today: footpads, vandals, vagrants and drunks were common.

A particularly sad case was recorded in 1893 when a dead baby was left on the door step of a house in Hoddle St with a note attached saying, “Please berry my poor dead baby, as I cannot myself …”

In 1926 East Melbourne police charged 70 people with driving on the wrong side of Hoddle St. Most claimed that the road was in such poor condition that they had no choice. The judge took this into consideration and only fined them 10 shillings ($1. 00) each.

Possibly the highlight of this era of East Melbourne policing occurred one night in May 1919 when the policeman on duty heard rapid gunfire close by which turned out to have come from the house on the corner of Darling and Gipps streets. Matthew Daly, an associate of Squizzy Taylor's, was the occupant. Bullets were shot through each of the Gipps St windows, skimming the beds in each room. No-one was hurt and the perpetrator escaped. This was another chapter in the ongoing feud between two rival gangs.

Embedded as he was in the heart of a residential area each sergeant-in-charge became very much part of the community. In 1909 when Sergeant Cummings retired a farewell function was given in his honour and “in appreciation of his courteous manner and genial temperament”, he was presented with a purse of sovereigns by the residents of East Melbourne.

In 1953, with the Olympic Games approaching, a new police station was built on the corner of Wellington Parade and Vale St, and the old one was decommissioned. It was not the end of the police station; however, it was trucked down to Wilsons Promontory for use as holiday home.

The land was sold, and the new owners planned to build a seven-storey block of flats, six shops and six professional suites. Luckily it was a short-lived dream. The Shell Company bought the site, pulled down the sergeant's house and the land remained vacant for many years until the construction of the two single storey houses there today.•