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The Home Front Volume II

CHAPTER 20 — Camp Followers

page 1014

CHAPTER 20
Camp Followers

LEAVE activity for thousands of bored and restless men displaced from home, friends and interests was left to individual hospitality and to various volunteer-run Service clubs, which provided lounges, meals, some beds and weekend dances. But many servicemen away from their own towns were not attracted to these: liquor was the prime target of their leave time, though many also hoped for a girl. It must be remembered that bars, legally open from 9 am till 6 pm,1 were for men only, though some hotels had small rooms exclusively for women; hotel lounges were the setting for more expensive drinks, mixed company, and sometimes for pick-ups. Six o'clock closing officially prevented convivial all-male evenings, but there was widespread evasion. Reinforcing the business drive of publicans was genuine social perplexity: how else could these men pass their leave with any pleasure? An Auckland magistrate in March 1940 stated that some hotels were renting lockers in which servicemen could store mufti; at some, together catering for about 1000–1500 servicemen at weekends, at 2s for a bed and ls for each meal, drinking continued practically all night.2 Liquor was bought at hotels and taken away both during and after trading hours; the fiction of one man booking a room so that a group could continue drinking resulted sometimes in bookings quite beyond the capacity of the house; soldiers systematically stood guard to give warning should police approach a busy after-six bar.3

After hours' drinking was not of course limited to soldiers; men working overtime felt morally entitled to drink at such times, and others would simply drink whenever they could—for example, four men caught in a Kaitaia bar on Sunday claimed to be bona fide lodgers, but could produce no pyjamas or toothbrushes.4 Liquor was also sold illegally from houses and shops, and there were ‘clubs’ for servicemen where prostitutes could be encountered and over-priced page 1015 liquor bought, but where it was very difficult for the police to obtain the direct evidence needed for conviction.

Such devices, plus normal hard drinking, produced numbers of drunken, noisy soldiers about the streets at night, while church groups and responsible citizens were disturbed: not only were young men, sometimes very young and far from home, being coarsened and demoralised, but efficiency and the war effort were being dissipated. ‘Efficiency’ had been a campaigning cry of the prohibitionists in 1914–18 and, like many other things of that war, it rose again. Also, on trains the New Zealand tradition of incessant refreshment was translated into liquor-taking by the troops, to the dismay and disgust of many other travellers.

Early in the war all this led to lively concern, and regulations at the end of February 1940 (1940/39) prohibited soldiers from buying or obtaining liquor to take away from hotels, or from having liquor on trains, buses, etc.5 While there was some thought within the Department of Justice of a general overhaul of the liquor laws, the Minister of Justice having advised in 1939 that a Royal Commission should enquire into them,6 other reforms were not pressed, though meanwhile the police found special difficulty in combating sales from unlicensed premises. Japan's entry in December 1941 having postponed any general revision indefinitely, while vastly increasing the numbers of troops, the sly-grog problem was tackled by regulation on 12 February (1942/27). This provided that where sly grogging was suspected, the police might enter without a warrant and seize any liquor, while evidence of selling did not have to be as complete. Already the senior magistrate at Auckland, J. H. Luxford, had said it was time that some curtailment of liquor sales through ordinary channels was seriously considered by the competent authorities and he had no doubt they would do so; sly grogging was getting out of hand and the courts would act firmly: in future, even first offenders would go to prison.7

There were, repeatedly, scattered statements of the need for alternative, large-scale, leisure facilities for troops. The suggested solutions would demand buildings, inspired leadership, sustained energy.8 For all these, in 1942, demand exceeded supply while soldiers were transient, here today but probably gone next month. It was easier page 1016 to deplore drunkenness than to devise alternatives, and civic authorities, faced with large expenses, felt that as the State had called the men to service, the State should at least share in arrangements for their leave time.

On both sides of the Tasman, increased mobilisation multiplied drinking, sly grogging and disorder; the perturbation of the public also multiplied at seeing its uniformed defenders reeling in the streets while Malaya crumpled. Many, like the mayors of Wellington and the Hutt, saw hotel after-hours selling as the principal source, aggravated by sly-grog liquor, laced with methylated spirits.9 The New Zealand Alliance charged the licensed trade with widespread law-breaking, found February's regulations against the comparatively few unlicensed sly groggers very disappointing, pointed out that wet canteens had not, as promised, prevented city drunkenness, train drinking or sly-grog prostitution ‘joints’, and demanded a comprehensive inquiry into the whole liquor question.10 At the end of February, the Methodist Conference deplored that much shipping space had been used for intoxicants and £22 million spent on them since the war began. The Council of Christian Women with the New Zealand Alliance and other bodies interviewed the Minister of Internal Affairs, demanding reforms.11

In the Waikato, after a large meeting on 10 March, women's organisations combined to urge the Prime Minister to ensure proper observation of the licensing laws. Further, they formed an association which also advocated reducing the alcohol in beer, reducing its manufacture by one-third, and closing hotels on Saturday afternoons, and they sought support from many other organisations, including university students' associations.12 Early in June, their proposals were endorsed by a large meeting of women in Masterton.13

From Australia lurid reports of excess, of soldiers drinking in the streets, young men decoyed into filthy sly-grog dens and young girls in rowdy night clubs, were quickly followed by news of restrictions on the sale of liquor.14

Wellington church leaders, on 10 March, declared that since the war's start the increased liquor trade had become a real menace; in an enemy raid, many soldiers would be a hindrance not a help, and page 1017 the general excess called for conscience and co-operation from the trade, the police and the community. A Roman Catholic spokesman wanted improvement in the licensing laws; to the Salvation Army a problem in New Zealand was secretive drinking in contrast to kerb-side continental cafes; Presbyterians deplored the drunkenness rampant among civilians and soldiers, pakeha and Maori, drunkenness dangerous in an emergency and lowering national and moral tone.15 At Auckland, leading churchmen were particularly concerned about drinking plus sexual immorality.16 Canon R. G. Coates,17 patrolling the streets on a Saturday afternoon and evening, found that soldiers and Maoris, though both prohibited from carrying away parcels of liquor, were openly doing so; at some hotels, cars drove up after hours to receive loads of liquor; with the gravity of war demanding the highest mental alertness from all, there was instead a ‘very alarming increase in drunkenness, brawling and disgusting behaviour’; the involvement of women was especially distasteful. Had enemy aircraft raided Auckland between 5 and 7 pm on 6 March many people might have died rescuing those too drunk to look after themselves. He argued that if hotels were closed from 4 to 7 pm, open for two hours and firmly closed at 9 pm, saturation drinking would not occur.18

The Commissioner of Police said soothingly that some reports of drinking by servicemen were ‘greatly exaggerated’, and Wellington's Superintendent added that men in uniform, intoxicated, were noticed more than others, but on the whole they were ‘a sober lot’. There was ‘quite a considerable amount of drinking but not to the extent of drunkenness. You can't stop a man from drinking so long as he is sober, and does not become a public nuisance.’ The past four months had seen 33 prosecutions against licensees, with four pending, and nine against sly-grog sellers, with nine more pending.19

To assuage Canon Coates and his vigilance committee Auckland hotel keepers, besides making promises about Maoris, tipsy servicemen and after-hours trading, cut down women's drinking. Women's bars were to be closed and in lounges no woman could be served after 5 pm.20 One licensee remarked that those frequenting women's bars were usually ‘quite respectable’, and that closing their haunts would drive them into back street places or into lounges, ‘which is page 1018 just what we have been trying to avoid’. Another said that to stop women drinking after 5 pm was not much since they could already have had more than enough, adding: ‘Many of these lounges are only dens for mixed drinking leading to an inevitable evil. Abolish lounge drinking altogether and you have solved the greater part of the problem, because the younger type of women, who consort with men in uniform would not think of drinking in the small bars set aside for women.’21 The Prime Minister commended Auckland's efforts to set its house in order and, in reply to anxious questions from Canon Coates, said that if the Japanese invaded New Zealand all liquor not needed for medicinal or other necessary purposes would be destroyed.22

Agitation continued, with the approach of sugar rationing early in 1942 a further reason, especially supported by women, for curbing the brewing industry. In Auckland's Town Hall 2000 women demanded reduction in this waste of money and manpower;23 suggestions from the Wellington Women's Service Guild included patrols by uniformed women police and appeals, to be led by Fraser, for women to cease drinking in hotels for the duration.24 When the Prime Minister visited Whangarei in 1942, a deputation from women's organisations complained about lads led astray and damaged efficiency.25 The Minister of Health, A. H. Nordmeyer, told the Women's Christian Temperance Union and other women at Dargaville that he had always been opposed to the drink traffic and thought that the majority of the community wanted some measure of reform.26 Dunedin's Licensed Victuallers' Industrial Union of Employers advocated changed hours (10.30 am to 2 pm, 4pm to 6pm, and 7.30 pm to 10.30 pm) to lessen illicit trading, hasty drinking and bottle buying, claiming also that longer working hours and staff shortages in all industry made workers and businessmen almost prohibited persons.27

The Ministers of Justice and Health were told on 2 April, by a deputation from the churches, that public opinion was rising strongly over licensing laws and their enforcement. An inevitable result of war was the unleashing to an outstanding degree of physical desires page 1019 and appetites in men and women, and they needed protection by the State; unrestrained liquor sales could undermine the war effort and defence of the country.28 The Prime Minister, pressed by Auckland churchmen to reduce the quantity of beer, its alcoholic content and hours of sale, promised that alcohol content would be lessened, saving sugar; one brewing company had already offered to do so.29 However, as he told the ladies of Whangarei a little later, if the reduction were too marked it would revive home brewing, bringing all sorts of concoctions on the market, as in the Depression.30 Liquor was one of the many targets of the Campaign for Christian Order, a six weeks' ‘spiritual blitzkrieg’, launched on 21 March by the National Council of Churches to emphasise the place of God in social, industrial and national life. ‘Awake New Zealand’,31 a movement to quicken home defence and stiffen national sinews that began in the Waikato during March, was troubled by the loss of alertness and efficiency due to liquor. On 31 March its leaders assured the Prime Minister that people would welcome reduction in drinking facilities, and one or two districts reported that their hotels were already curbing excesses by servicemen.

Some Farmers' Union branches urged liquor sale restrictions for the duration, to improve efficiency and conserve grain and sugar for essential uses.32 The Union's national conference in mid-July advocated restricting both production and sale during the war plus twelve months.33 On 17 July G. H. Scholefield noted in his diary: ‘The Farmers Union has unexpectedly demanded that the production and sale of liquor should be restricted for the period of the war and one year after. The 20 million gallons of beer and stout that we make in a year require 400 000 bushels of barley, 300 000 of malt and 36 000 cwt of sugar, and a glassworks is working 24 hours a day to provide a million bottles a week. Beer consumption has bounded up from 13 to 20 million gallons since 1936–37.’

The Licensed Trade's representatives, interviewing the Prime Minister on 22 April, were concerned because people not prohibitionist were associating themselves with the cry for reform; unless the government could resist the pressure, the trade would suffer, as it could not set up a counter-agitation. They admitted that there were many irresponsible barmen, but believed most difficulties could page 1020 be met by co-operation between the trade and the authorities, without restrictive legislation. Fraser, himself a non-drinker, replied that the government was responsible for the young men called to service, and that if the sale of liquor appeared detrimental to the war effort he would have no hesitation in prohibiting it.34 The trade was already trying to soothe public opinion with a lengthy series of advertisements on the beauties of moderation and the freedom to exercise it, such as:

To win this war the whole population must be cheerful and confident, ready to work and fight and make sacrifices—be ‘grim and gay’ as Mr Churchill put it. To attain that measure of cheerful confidence a reasonable use of alcoholic beverages is welcomed by a large section of our people. Both workers and fighters want and deserve relaxation and cheerful company in their hours off duty …. But in the interests of fair play and national morale, particularly at the present time, the freedom to drink should not be abused. A good thing deserves to be used moderately.35

In Wellington, Scholefield remarked on 2 April 1942: The Licensed trade is making a deplorable effort to capitalise the public indignation over its misdeeds by inaugurating a campaign in favour of liberty. The better world is the theme of its opening manifesto, which both papers publish as advertisements in their news columns. Another communicated statement says the Industry has been concerned for some time past at the difficulties that are experienced in carrying out its obligations under the law. Many impartial observers have noticed no difficulty at all. Hotels have simply ignored the existence of any such obligations and kept open house.36

On 14 April he added: ‘The Mayor of Lower Hutt (J. W. Andrews) has had the pluck to say outright that the principal offenders in sly-grog selling are the hotels. Until that is recognised there will be no reform. The liquor trade has down [done] everything possible to place the blame on private traders.’37

At the end of April the budget placed extra duties on wines and spirits, so that the duty on a bottle of whisky rose from 5s 9d to 7s 6d, and the retail price of a nip became 10d.38 The value of these page 1021 imports in 1942 was only half that in 1938, and the quantity only about 35 per cent.39 The duty on beer was also increased according to its alcoholic content, providing incentive towards lighter beer, while rationing, which cut sugar supplies by 50 per cent, also helped to make lighter if not less beer. Its proof spirit, previously about eight per cent,40 was, claimed Nordmeyer, cut by 25 per cent.41 To meet increased excise and sales taxes, the retail price rose by 4d a quart bottle, 2d a pint bottle and from 6d to 7d a 10 ounce handle;42 this would, it was hoped, lessen consumption.

On 22 June, announcing new regulations, Fraser said that government was not aiming to introduce prohibition under the guise of war emergency, but to minimise drunkenness. Bars would open an hour later, at 10 am, and on Saturdays would close between 2 and 4 pm. Hotels must keep registers of lodgers, whose orders for after-hours drinks must be signed. All drinking of intoxicants on trains, railcars, trams and buses was barred, and the existing prohibition against soldiers taking liquor away from hotels was extended to other servicemen, including Americans. It also became an offence to drink while fire-watching. Screen and radio advertisements of liquor were to cease, while newspaper advertisements were to be restricted in size (not more than 2 by 2½ inches) and must not encourage drinking by women. To check home brewers, the sale of ingredients prepared for the making of intoxicants was prohibited, and the right of the police to enter places suspected of sly grogging was reiterated.

The regulations drew varied mild comments from the press. Wellington papers were silent. The New Zealand Herald said that little exception could be taken to them, in the context of total war; it was high time that drinking on trains, which annoyed and embarrassed many travellers, was stopped. The Herald apparently was not aware that soldiers had been forbidden liquor on trains since February 1940, thereby indicating how widely this prohibition was flouted. To Dunedin's Evening Star the regulations were ‘an honest, not unreasonable, attempt to deal with admitted difficulties.’ The Auckland Star thought that all-Saturday drinking would be discouraged and the police would be helped in checking on genuine lodgers, but doubted whether the regulations would reduce drunk- page 1022 enness; a great deal was the result of drinking too much too quickly, an unedifying practice caused by six o'clock closing and likely now to increase.43 The government could reduce drinking by simply reducing the amount of beer brewed, but the government also wanted the revenue from drinking;44 from these conflicting motives had increased the minor nagging restrictions with which all drinking was surrounded. The Star hoped that in the long run these might induce sufficient people to decide that neither politicians nor prohibitionists, nor the trade should keep New Zealand from civilised drinking hours.45

The Press, remarking that the government was not ready for bold departures, thought that bars should be closed in the late afternoon and re-open later in the evening so that tired and hungry men returning from work should not be induced to drink too much because they could get nothing later. As magistrates and police officials had already pointed out, soldiers and those industrial war workers who could not get to the pubs before six o'clock put very great pressure on publicans to provide liquor after hours. The illegality of such traffic was not the worst of it:

Its worst features are want of control, extensive abuse, and the unreason which leaves men no chance to drink a little, within the law, and so impels them to drink more outside it. Responsible regulation of hours, more than any other factor, would regulate consumption and assist the police to maintain effective control over licensed houses.

As for liquor taken away from licensed premises, both the hours of sale and the quantity sold to individuals should have been curbed.46 For Canon Coates, who among other things wanted bars closed from 4 pm to 6 pm but open later ‘under proper conditions’ as in England, the regulations had tightened the law in a few respects, but did not make drinking more decent: ‘the Government has not dealt with the question of what is a reasonable period for decent drinking.’47

Sly-grog sellers multiplied. Early in 1942 magistrates noted their increase. In Wellington J. L. Stout said that there was far too much page 1023 drinking, the hotels made it bad enough without sly-grog shops as well. He thought that a clean-up by the police was beginning, with the small operators being tackled first.48 A Wellington defence counsel spoke of a series of sly-grog shops ‘controlled by some top key men the police can't get hold of’.49 In Auckland J. H. Luxford SM declared that fines were inadequate, sly groggers would go to gaol.50 This policy was not of total application and Luxford himself continued to fine minor offenders. Apart from other liquor transgressions such as sales after-hours or in no-licence areas, the police report for 1942 recorded 225 sly-grog prosecutions, their fines totalling £3,496, compared to 100 prosecutions and £1,900 in fines during 1941.51 In 1943 there were 403 prosecutions, fines of £2,126; in 1944, 242 prosecutions and £1,137 in fines; in 1945, 138 sly-grog prosecutions produced £656 in fines,52

With the coming of the Americans after mid-1942 the sly-grog business sprouted more vigorously. In August Truth claimed police information that sly groggers in suburbs were doing a roaring trade, with servicemen paying six shillings for a bottle of beer, up to 14 shillings for wine and £4 for so-called whisky.53 The traffic concentrated on Auckland and Wellington, which had many thousands of troops encamped about them. Distribution was highly organised, from shops, milk-bars, houses, boarding-houses, dance halls and night clubs. Cars were widely used: well loaded and with an effective watching system, they frequented military camps and would be off if police or provosts approached.54 Cars also roved the streets, in collusion with touts and droppers, men on foot, on the lookout for buyers, who carried a few bottles under coats or in bags and who left liquor at arranged places, such as parcel depots, defeating the watch kept on licensed premises. Many bottles were not labelled and, said the police, ‘when detected an offender did not readily disclose any information concerning his source of supply.’55 A signed article in the Auckland Star of 15 March 1943 stated that about 50 grog shops were operating in the city area, with touts and droppers fostering business. A taxi-driver said that there was now no need to take a taxi to a sly-grog shop, ‘it is being peddled on the page 1024 streets in sugar bags.’56 Some were very small dealers,57 some worked on a larger scale.58

The liquor varied: some was genuine, some diluted, sometimes tea, vinegar or plain water changed hands as whisky or gin.59 Some was legitimately acquired, some was stolen;60 there was ‘wild’ whisky,61 and there were some very strange mixtures called ‘wine’ or ‘cocktail’, which combined various liquors and brews derived from apples, carrots, beetroot, swede turnips, potatoes, all fortified. Much went into unlabelled bottles, but ‘empties’ bearing well-known labels fetched good prices, and even licensed establishments sold adulterated and venomous liquors.62

As it was well known that imported spirits and wine were very scarce, any sort of wine was accepted and local wine makers were pushed to produce their utmost, regardless of quality. In the 1942 season, of 48 wine makers in the Auckland and Henderson districts 32 were licensed to make up to 500 gallons, five licensed to make up to 1000 gallons and 11 were unlimited. In 1943, of 56 applicants, 16 undertook to make up to 500 gallons, 20 to make 1000 gallons and 20 were unlimited: that is, at least 100 per cent more wine was produced in response to merchants seeking anything they could get, at prices ranging up to 20 and 30 shillings a gallon, against the normal price of about 7s 6d.63 Sugar restrictions cut into wine-making prospects, and a government viticulturist warned that if growers persisted in using a large quantity of water they would not have enough sugar and the wine would be of the poorest sort, adding, ‘Fifty per cent of the wine marketed in New Zealand today would in normal conditions be unsaleable.’ Much was being sold prematurely, he said, even before fermentation ceased, so that corks were blowing out of bottles. More legal controls were needed: licenses were issued to makers who did not have vineyards, some wine was made in very unhygienic conditions, and the spirit content should be controlled.64 The government was urged by the annual conference of the Associated Clubs of New Zealand to import more wine and page 1025 spirits, so that the ‘objectionable substitutes … becoming a greater menace daily’ would have a less ready market.65

A sample of the 1943 vintage is provided by a prosecution. When a serviceman was seen buying a bottle of wine for 17s 6d in an Auckland café, 4 gallons of wine were seized there. The government analyst found that it was crude wine containing 17.9 per cent proof spirit, lower than was usual in New Zealand wine, a small amount of sediment and two flies; it had gone sour and sugar had been added to conceal this.66 In another case a salesman, with some experience in wine-making and £1,000 of accident compensation money, bought up large quantities of New Zealand wines—port, sherry, date, peach and blackberry—blended wines and cocktails. He had labels printed with his name and had intended to apply for a wine-maker's licence, but he began mixing and selling bottles of cocktail without this preliminary.67

Other prosecutions serve as examples casting stray gleams of light on the sly-grog scene. At the home of a 45-year-old woman in the Auckland city area, 30 servicemen were found drinking, with 50 bottles of beer and 60 of wine, mostly unlabelled, on the premises, and the lady went to prison for a month.68 The same penalty was imposed on a dropper, carrying three bottles of wine, who sold one to a serviceman in the street.69 A Marine, working with the New Zealand police, asked a man in the street for liquor and was given a note to ‘Peter’, a milk-bar proprietor. He presented the note and for £2 obtained a lemonade bottle full of whisky which proved to be 40 per cent water. The note-giver was fined £10, the milk-bar man, who had a previous conviction, went to prison for a month.70 On a Sunday evening at his home, a man who worked for a wine and spirit merchant sold a bottle of burgundy for £3. He admitted that his profit was 37s 6d and he served 14 days in prison.71

Illicit distilling flourished, producing some rough and dangerous drinks and earning stiffer penalties than did other sly-grog trading.72 Prosecutions were more numerous in 1944 than earlier: a judge in Auckland remarked in May 1944 that scarcity of spirits together with high profits had increased the manufacture of and traffic in page 1026 illegal spirituous liquor.73 A man with a sly-grog record was sentenced to a year in prison for having possession of 12 unlabelled bottles and a letter which stated: ‘the stuff has improved quite a lot. It is clearer and no one could tell it from the real stuff.’74 Some distillers made considerable quantities: in the Hutt Valley a refrigerating engineer, selling whisky at £5 a bottle, was found with eight 70lb bags of sugar and 65 empty bags.75

The law, as some magistrates openly stated, was out of touch with reality and the unreality gave the sly groggers scope for quite large profits.76 Fines could be regarded merely as a licence fee, so from early 1942 it was quite usual for those caught to be sent to prison for terms ranging from a fortnight to three months. The scale of some operators was fairly substantial: in a Grey's Avenue room where a dozen servicemen had called in one hour of a Monday evening, 119 unlabelled bottles of wine were found.77 At the house of another seller, who was gaoled for three months, 57 taxis called between 7 and 9.45 one evening. Counsel claimed that his client was blamed for much sly grogging in his neighbourhood, but that a lot of ‘sea-gulls’ worked the area, waylaying American sailors headed for his client's place and selling their wares for what they could get, whereas the charges of the accused were reasonable.78 Criticism of the law, which made most leave-time drinking illegal while there were no adequate alternative entertainments, was underlined by the American authorities. At first they co-operated with the New Zealand police in detecting sly groggers, but later withdrew this co-operation on the grounds that the law was unreasonable, and that there should be facilities for supplying liquor during closed hours to men on leave.79

Police powers against sly-grog were consolidated and extended by more regulations (1943/122) on 28 July 1943. These prohibited wholesalers and brewers from making the minimum two gallon sales to the public during the closed hours on Saturday and also prevented liquor leaving licensed premises during closed hours, no matter when it had been purchased. After 30 September no one might sell the ‘produce of grapes, apples, pears or any other fruits grown in New page 1027 Zealand’ in lots of two gallons or more to any person at one time if not for consumption on the premises, except under various licences, such as publican's, wholesaler's, wine maker's or club charter, or a permit issued under the regulation. Such a permit would be issued yearly by a magistrate if the applicant and his premises were approved by the police; the holder could sell his wine, etc, not less than two gallons to a person at a time, from one specified place only, but not at times when bars were closed. Any person who kept intoxicating liquor for sale without authority was liable, on first offence, to a fine of up to £50 or a month in prison. No one, ‘in any place whether a building or not’, could supply a member of the armed forces with intoxicating liquor not for consumption on the spot. Police powers were increased to arrest, and to enter ‘upon any place, whether a building or not’, including cars which they could stop and search.

It was realised in many quarters that servicemen resorted to sly-grog dens and night clubs because there was no acceptable alternative entertainment, and because hotel hours made the prized pleasure of even moderate social drinking impossible for them. Some magistrates, while insisting that the law must be upheld, openly declared that it was unrealistic in the circumstances. In Blenheim a magistrate, agreeing with the police that it was ‘pretty hard’ that well-behaved soldiers could not get a drink except after hours, reduced several fines he had already imposed from 10s to 5s.80 At Christchurch, E. C. Levvey SM, imposing minimal penalties on a group of servicemen and girls, said, ‘There is nothing for these young people to do and nowhere to go. If they want to have a decent quiet evening out they have to go to a hotel. I myself have seen many … roaming around the streets, as they are told they cannot go here and must not go there’.81 On the other hand, H. P. Lawry SM warned Wairarapa licensees that he would deal severely with any infringements; there was a dangerous enemy at the doors, it was essential for soldiers to be one hundred per cent efficient, and the military authorities had purposely restricted leave from camp until after 6 o'clock.82

Early in 1943, J. H. Luxford SM, in the midst of Auckland's sly-grog traffic, said robustly, ‘our liquor laws are crazy’, adding that they must nevertheless be enforced until the powers that be brought them into harmony with present-day conditions.83 Two months later, on 14 April, he was still more explicit: the negative attitude of the authorities to the sale of liquor to servicemen page 1028 is one of the most inimical phases of our war effort and it is to be hoped that the public will demand that this attitude be changed…. The average healthy normal man in times of peace hates unnecessary restriction upon the way he spends his leisure hours, but that hate is nothing to the hate of the same class when they become soldiers in time of war…. No organisations catering for men of the United Nations services could lawfully provide facilities where men could procure liquor after 6 p.m. The men resented that restriction and properly so.

Adulterated liquor was already a ‘baleful result’, and if the restricttions continued he was certain that ‘poisonous alcohol’ would appear. The police had done splendid work against sly-grog, but the more it was driven underground the more pernicious and evil would be] its effects. Those who opposed some reasonable reform in the law incurred grave responsibility. How many servicemen would patronise a sly-grog shop if they could drink with their companions in properly conducted clubs or canteens, with the profits going to patriotic funds?84

The Press approved: Luxford had courageously ‘expressed what almost everyone thinks’. The liquor laws, full of anomalies and stupidities, were like a house built on no plan, added to and altered, patched and repaired, neither useful nor convenient but a constant annoyance to those who had to live within its unstable walls. The present hotel hours invited the sly grogger and the illicit distiller to practice their anti-social trades, and the publicans to break the law. The Press repeated that reasonable hours more than any other factor would regulate drinking. ‘The real difficulty is slight. What magnifies it is political reluctance to face the wrath of militant minorities.’85

Luxford's views, which had been advanced by the Auckland Star eight months earlier, on 20 August 1942, were approved in Australia by some clergy and by the president of the Australian ex-servicemen's association86 and probably influenced a current Auckland conference, representing the armed forces and social and religious organisations, called to consider the problems of illicit grog. This conference approved Mayor Allum's proposal to seek government sanction for a central canteen selling both soft drinks and ale under military supervision to men in uniform between 6 pm and 11 pm.87 There were several letters critical of this ‘wet canteen’ proposal, some advocating vastly extended non-liquored facilities for men who did page 1029 not want to sit about or to dance, with games of all sorts—billiards, table tennis, badminton, deck tennis, quoits, bowls, archery, skating.88 But such facilities would be expensive and it was felt that sick and overseas servicemen had better claim for patriotic funds.89 The war was changing, there were recurrent hopes that it might be over soon, and what had been gone without for so long could be gone without for a little longer. New Zealand's home forces were much reduced during 1943, and by the end of that year the Americans were leaving. The New Zealand Herald on 8 July 1943 reported that the government had not yet indicated its attitude to the plan for a central wet canteen, and the public heard no more of it.

As the Press had remarked in June 1942, the government was not ready for bold departures. Six o'clock closing, established in the earlier war, was woodenly maintained, and the drive of servicemen towards liquor was beset with irritating but more or less ineffective restrictions—as for instance, that a soldier, sailor or airman might not buy a bottle of beer at a bottlestore but the girl with him could do so without question, provided he was not so rash or gallant as to carry the parcel. One way and another servicemen continued to drink, though probably less than if hours had been lengthened, and dissatisfaction with the whole liquor question was widespread. In April 1943 Sidney Holland, declaring that drastic overhaul was needed, announced that the National party would set up a Royal Commission to investigate all aspects of the trade.90 To the chagrin of that party,91 which forgot that in 1939 the Justice Department had recommended such a step, Fraser matched the promise before the 1943 elections. A very competent Commission was appointed in January 1945, and sat for 18 months all over the country, producing a massive report.92 But though the wartime regulations were repealed in 1948, some two decades were to pass without any notable change in New Zealand's drinking habits.

Meanwhile in 1944, with far fewer servicemen, both local and American, about and increased police vigilance, sly grogging waned to normal proportions.93

Night clubs were a related problem, particularly in Auckland in the American era, and gave the godly and the police much concern. page 1030 As the latter put it: ‘Almost nightly several thousand servicemen were seeking recreational facilities in Auckland city alone, a situation which was exploited by an unscrupulous class of people, some of whom already had criminal histories, who set up so-called “Night Clubs” for the entertainment of servicemen and their partners with a total disregard of all moral nicety.’94 Admittance charges were high, up to 12s 6d a couple; beer, often a light sort that did not come within the scope of the Licensing Act, was 2s 6d a bottle; a light supper could cost 15s a head; on a busy night 400 to 500 persons visited some of them.95

Police regularly visited dance halls to check, among other things, the non-liquor restriction but they were denied access to some of these places on the grounds that they were not dance halls but private clubs. It was difficult for the police to enter in the guise of patrons, and though some of the newly appointed women police did this, they could do no more than secure a conviction for unlawful sale or consumption of liquor, fines for which were of no account against the takings.96

There were, of course, well run night clubs and cabarets which did not promote promiscuity and where liquor was discreetly managed, offering dancing and entertainment with at least a touch of elegance. Patrons brought their own liquor in modest quantities, and whisked it into pockets, handbags, girls' wraps, etc, if the police appeared, leaving only soft drink bottles in sight. Sometimes police visits were cursory, sometimes torches were shone under tables and into corners. There was some feeling that it was unwise to prosecute such places for allowing liquor on the premises, lest drinking be driven into more obscure and seedy places.97

Several clergymen who felt it their duty, about July and August 1942, to probe Auckland's night life chose the latter sort and were predictably alarmed. The Rev C. W. Chandler98 found an atmosphere of liquor and lust in these ‘dens of iniquity’; young girls, the products of New Zealand's godless education and from homes where God was mentioned only in blasphemy, were being treated with disrespect by young men with the same inheritance.99 A Methodist group told of dark, smoky rooms almost awash with beer, of stupefied girls in the arms of unsteady men, of gambling, of loose women page 1031 and Maori girls ‘selling their bodies’.100 These clerical visitors clearly saw the liquor and general atmosphere of these places as preludes to the ‘gross immorality’ they observed in dark lanes and corners.

This probing drew counter-charges of excessive alarm,101 including the suggestion that the form of dancing known as jitter-bugging could give the impression that everyone was drunk.102 A full-column article in the Auckland Star held that most of the night clubs were well run and that until the authorities provided a large-scale, comfortable base for servicemen's entertainment and relaxation, free from drinking-hours restrictions, there would be demand for night clubs and it was better not to drive them underground. As for the goings-on in parks and doorways, cases of what might be called indiscreet conduct were numerous. ‘“Cuddling” in doorways is not necessarily an indication of loose morals but it does show a tendency that way, and it has led to considerable misinterpretation by some people. In dark back streets, in the parks and in other places, there are happenings (though their frequency is exaggerated by people depending on hearsay) of which no city could be proud and for which not even the most tolerant could find excuse.’103 Apart from observed embraces, used sheaths left in parks, doorways, even telephone boxes, were seen by many, talked about by more. That such litter also indicated precautions against conception and venereal disease was overlooked.

At Auckland's Town Hall on 23 August, under the slogan ‘We accuse’, 3500 people heard ministers of several churches attack the ‘liquor business’ as the source of widespread evil and sabotage of the war effort. In particular, many night spots were ‘festering sores’ from which taxis carried intoxicated girls to houses of ill fame or sly-grog shops. Night clubs, cabarets, and dance halls tainted with liquor should be closed; on Saturdays hotel bars should close at midday; home-life and discipline should be re-asserted, and there was the familiar call for civic authorities to provide for more healthy recreation.104 The New Zealand Herald commented that the size of the meeting showed widespread disquiet, and despite exaggeration and distortion it was plain that every day, and especially at weekends, there were more servicemen about than existing desirable entertainment could cope with. The problem was aggravated because among a section of the city's young people, normal standards had gone by the board. The task was too big for those facing it locally and, while the meeting had called on civic authorities for adequate page 1032 facilities, the Herald thought that the State should play a larger part.105

The initial excitement over night clubs died down, and although churches continued to complain existing laws could not check their sleasy but profitable course through 1943.

Early in 1944 there was renewed comment in the press. In January, the New Zealand Herald reported that Auckland's less desirable night clubs were, save for minor details, all the same, with smoke-blue, foetid air, steady drinking, unsteady girls and very expensive refreshments.106 Six weeks later, conditions appeared if anything worse: there was the same dank smell, the same girls and women whose ‘tired faces bore the unmistakeable stamp of fast living, endless late nights and complete boredom, with the general scheme of which they were a part’; bands played but few danced, and very few New Zealand servicemen were present.107 Meanwhile, the Auckland Inter-Church Council on Public Affairs urged that local authorities be asked to make reforms in cabarets and night clubs, with the government giving them any legal powers necessary;108 the Police Commissioner complained of the present laws' hopeless inadequacy.109

Ultimately, by regulations passed on 3 May (1944/72), the police could close down places of entertainment if there was liquor, drunkenness, disorderly conduct or demoralising entertainment on the premises, or if persons of ill repute were present at or concerned with running the place. By this time, as the Americans were thinning out, some of the clubs had closed and the rest ‘quickly modified their conduct to a satisfactory degree’.110 The formidable regulations were not invoked. Instead the magistrate J. H. Luxford decided, on 4 May, that their membership cover was futile and that they were in fact public dance halls, subject to licensing on the standards of public safety, which often called for considerable renovations.111 It also followed that they were subject to normal police visits.112 The boom was over, and the survivors acquired dance hall licences.

In New Zealand, as elsewhere, among both civilians and servicemen venereal diseases increased. The Services had their own efficient page 1033 system of protection, detection and cure; beginning in 1939–40 arrangements for civilians were improved. At that time an increase in syphilis was noticed, beginning in Wellington, where it was attributed to the 1940 Centennial Exhibition, and later extending to Auckland and Christchurch. Medical officers in charge of VD clinics in the four main cities were made assistant inspectors of hospitals, visiting smaller towns to make sure that their treatment facilities were adequate and to advise medical staffs, while private practitioners could seek their help. Articles in the New Zealand Medical Journal and discussion at a conference gave much needed information.113

Those with venereal disease were excluded from free treatment by private doctors under the Social Security scheme, allegedly to ensure that they would attend public hospital clinics which alone, in the view of the Health Department, were competent to deal with syphilis. Many with gonorrhoea were treated by their own doctors with drugs of the sulphonamide group, available since shortly before the war. Figures from the four main clinics, the only ones available, showed that new gonorrhoea patients decreased from 1702 in 1938 to 1523 in 1939, 1487 in 1940, and 1511 in 1941.114 A few private practitioners were recognised experts for both gonorrhoea and syphilis but treatment for the latter could take many months, and generally clinical treatment was necessary.

Clinics were not welcoming places: efficiency was seasoned with censure and, apart from ignorance, there was much reluctance to go or to be seen going to them. There were arrangements with the forces whereby women who servicemen believed to be infected were reported to the Health Department, which tried to trace and treat them. In rounding up these and other suspects, Health Department powers were inadequate, though clinics showed substantial increases in syphilis, from 156 new cases in 1938, to 192 in 1939, 285 in 1940 and 403 in 1941.115 Strengthening regulations were passed in December 1941.

Already, under the Social Hygiene Act 1917, it was an offence worth a year in gaol, a £100 fine, or both, to do an act likely to infect another person with VD. Under the new regulations (1941/230), persons suspected could now be required, within a given time, to produce a medical clearance, otherwise they could be sent to hospital for tests and if necessary detained for up to six weeks for treatment; if the disease were still in a communicable form this page 1034 period could be extended by further stretches of up to six weeks at a time. Medical tests were made more stringent both for the initial investigation and before a patient could be considered cured.116 Those not deemed promiscuous, who would attend voluntarily and regularly for treatment, were not detained though they were prohibited from working with food or with young children, and they could be prosecuted for lapsing from the course.117 The clinics and doctors treating privately both had to notify the Health Department if a patient missed two successive treatments, doctors receiving 3s 6d for each such communication. There was provision, where there was exceptional difficulty in attending a clinic, for free treatment to be given by doctors, and/or free travel warrants.

After a few months some hospitals were complaining that their venereal disease facilities were over-taxed. At Hamilton it was decided to erect a temporary building for £1,000 and to ask the government to pay for 75 per cent of it,118 while Auckland found demands for beds for these cases excessive.119

There were prosecutions for being idle and disorderly against women who lived promiscuously, and they were checked for venereal disease. On 19 June 1942, sentencing to three months' gaol such a woman who avowedly did not know that she was infected, Luxford cast away reticence. New Zealand was proud that it had stamped out public prostitution, but worse evils had arisen in a great crop of amateur prostitutes and an alarming amount of venereal disease. There had been 13 similar cases recently. Women pursuing this vocation surreptitiously, as they must in New Zealand, should be put away at least temporarily, where they could not contaminate. The new regulations were helpful but were not enough; the police needed extraordinary power against this ‘sixth column’. ‘We must stamp out this dreadful disease.’120 A few weeks later he declared that the need for a separate centre for girl delinquents, especially those diseased, was of ‘compelling urgency’.121

It was recognised that here, as with many sexual problems, ignorance was a large factor. Nordmeyer, on 30 July 1942, told an anxious deputation led by the Mayor of Wellington, that the Health Department favoured an open and realistic attitude and was giving page 1035 lectures to factory girls and others,122 whereas some newspapers were still referring to a ‘certain disease’. To avoid the fear of being seen at clinics, which contributed to keeping people away from treatment, it was suggested that normal social security payment should be extended to doctors treating venereal disease. Nordmeyer said that he would recommend this for doctors deemed competent and who could be relied on to notify the Department if a patient broke off treatment;123 the Press on 28 October noted that this proposal had not materialised.

For wider publicity, in October 1942, the film ‘No Greater Sin’ was welcomed by Nordmeyer, and Luxford said that in telling the story of syphilis with such force and artistry an important step had been taken towards eradicating the scourge.124 There also appeared in 1942 a 46-page booklet, Venereal Disease: the Shadow over New Zealand, published in Wellington by the Progressive Publishing Company and selling for 1s, describing both the diseases, with statistics, the legal background and something on current campaigns in both Britain and the United States; its whole tone was robust, matter of fact, professional but not chilling.

The Woman's Weekly of 20 August 1942 rejected hush-hush attitudes which left girls ignorant of symptoms and afraid to go to doctors. Women should demand information by radio, booklets, lectures (including lectures to high schools and factories), films and newspapers; they should insist on more women police, both experienced and tactful; insist on compulsory notification; insist too, although there would be a storm of protest, on licensed prostitution, for in fact there were professionals already. They should insist on the strictest control of liquor, with massive penalties for sly grogging: ‘drink is the most dangerous ally of the scourge.’ Medical attention should be so arranged that girls who had been foolish could go to a doctor without the stigma of going to a special ward, and without being humiliated.

Towards the end of 1942 authority moved more strongly against the seeding centres of venereal disease. In both Auckland and Wellington, anti-vice police squads were formed, each working over the whole city, not in districts, which made them more effective against sly-grog operators, against the ‘disorderly’ women who haunted page 1036 hotels, one-woman brothels and apartment houses where rooms were let for an hour or two at prices ranging from 16s to 20s and where ‘sanitary conditions were shockingly low’.125 Such room-letting was not itself illegal, although brothel-keeping or allowing premises to be used as a brothel, were crimes.

Regulations on 23 December 1942 (1942/350) made it illegal to manage, occupy or reside in premises used for prostitution, and for males who had attained seventeen years to live on the earnings of prostitutes. Police were empowered to search without warrants places suspected of such use. Any person convicted in a court, or appearing in a children's court, if suspected of having venereal disease, could be taken to hospital, examined, and if infected held there until discharged as cured.

The peak year for venereal disease, as evidenced by clinic figures at the four centres, was 1941, with 403 new cases of syphilis (260 men, 143 women) and 1511 cases (1135 men, 376 women) of gonorrhoea. In 1942 these figures were 327 (161 men, 166 women) and 1295 (804 men, 491 women) respectively. In the next two years women were notably in the lead: in 1943, 114 men and 153 women were new cases of syphilis, 576 men and 637 women new cases of gonorrhoea; in 1944, 76 men and 88 women contracted syphilis, 544 men and again 637 women gonorrhoea. The increase of gonorrhoea found in women, who might be unaware that they had it, suggested that the regulations were useful in locating infected women, while its decrease among men was presumably related to the numbers in the forces. During 1945, with demobilisation in progress, men resumed their customary lead: there were 182 new cases of syphilis (men 114, women 68), 1304 of gonorrhoea (762, 452), and the Department of Health remarked that figures again approximated pre-war levels.126 The figures rose slightly in the first post-war years: 1946, syphilis 220 (152, 68), gonorrhoea 1572 (1157, 415); in 1947, syphilis 196 (107, 89), gonorrhoea 1496 (1106, 390). By 1955 the year's recorded new cases of syphilis had fallen to 63 (31, 32), gonorrhoea to 843 (595, 248).127

The women sequestered for treatment in hospitals, besides occupying much-needed beds, were behaviour problems, particularly at Auckland. When their ward overlooked the Domain the Hospital Board, complaining that the behaviour of some was ‘scandalous in the extreme’, said that they should be under stricter control, as of page 1037 a prison matron.128 They were moved to a cottage annexe overlooking Grafton Gully, which servicemen haunted at night.129 They suffered the woes of boredom, which they relieved with violent quarrels among themselves and temporary escapes, sometimes only to shops or nearby relatives, sometimes to go with servicemen, for which several were sent to prison. One complained, ‘If we girls had a radio, or were allowed to do some knitting—had cards or some other games to occupy our minds, we would not want to run away. But we've got nothing to do there.’130 By early 1944, the average number under treatment at Auckland was 12, but some were returned within a month or even a fortnight of being discharged.131

Contraceptives were not easily come by. New Zealanders at large felt that if the wages of sin were not paid, sin would increase and that in any case children were necessary. There had been worry about the birth rate since it fell in the Depression, and some censure of couples who were too ‘selfish’ to have children.132 There were no pills, but as well as the ubiquitous condom there were female devices which required fitting by doctors, suppositories and vaginal jellies of doubtful effectiveness. Most girls, too ignorant or too embarrassed to acquire them, left the issue to luck or their boyfriends. Clergymen and others repeatedly inveighed against the ‘free sale of contraceptives’, and politicians voiced fears of race suicide. Polson on 26 March 1941 told the House that an Auckland firm had recently imported ‘3 000 gross of a singularly noxious aid to race-suicide’, suggesting that such should be sold only on a medical certificate.133 In July 1943, another member, C. G. E. Harker134 of Waipawa, warning that war's heavy death rate made it doubly important that race suicide should not be made easy, wanted very careful control of all articles capable of being used for contraception or abortion.135 The Minister of Health replied that all chemists had been asked not to sell contraceptives to young people and that a certain drug commonly used for contraceptive purposes had now been prohibited by page 1038 the Medical Supplies Controller.136 Otherwise, the government kept aloof and silent. In 1936, a government inquiry into abortion had recommended clinics for instruction in contraceptive methods for patients whom doctors considered should have temporary or permanent relief from child-bearing, and a scheme of domestic assistance for mothers. A more rational and wholesome outlook on sex should be encouraged by teaching biology and physiology in schools.137 The Family Planning Association, formed to foster these recommendations, remarked in September 1942 that nothing had come of them, but it continued to work modestly through its own membership.138

There were abortions, the number unknown and speculation thereon unlimited. The 1936 inquiry had estimated that 4000 a year were criminally induced. Mr Justice Blair in July 1941 said: ‘The evidence we get in the courts makes it abundantly plain that … abortion is unfortunately very, very common.’ The murder of an unborn child was considered, he said, even by educated people, not to carry the stigma or horror engendered by murder of a child after birth. ‘People look on the procuring of abortion as something that can be successfully done, and people can go to the lengths of boasting about it.’ With regret he sentenced to two months in prison a 24-year-old labourer with a blameless record—‘not a professional abortionist’—who had paid a chemist 26 shillings ‘for some stuff that was no doubt worthless’.139

The churches were particularly disturbed, as was the Dominion Settlement Association which in mid-1944 launched a campaign based on its belief that shortage of population would be the gravest problem of post-war Australia and New Zealand.140 On 16 June 1944 it declared that the prevalence of abortion was the most serious and urgent issue facing the country: ‘recently published figures’ estimated 15 000 to 20 000 cases a year, whereas live births in 1943 totalled 30 311. These figures were widely and anxiously discussed, for example by Wellington's Chamber of Commerce and Taihape's Farmers' Union.141

There was comment of a different tone, signed ‘A Doctor’, in the Evening Post a few weeks later. Abortion, like the consumption of page 1039 alcohol had existed widely from time immemorial and there was no evidence that dire punishment would eliminate either. Abortionists existed because of demand; increased penalties would drive them further underground and raise their fees. The powerful force of public opinion, ‘always able to do what the law cannot’, often actually favoured abortion. ‘At certain periods of life,’ the letter continued, ‘glands pour out into the blood streams of both sexes something which overpowers the usual reactions of mind and body, and inhibitions are overwhelmed…. What next happens is that an unmarried woman finds that if she lets things drift she will be the object of all the spiteful and malicious things other women may say of and do to her. Here lies the cause of the majority of abortions. A little more charity and much less cattiness would be the ruin of the abortionist.’ Inhibitions in both sexes should of course be cultivated in order that the brain should not be overwhelmed, but both Church and State seemed to fail here, concentrating on the memorising of words and numbers, and neglecting the higher faculties. The correspondent reminded that abortion was not limited to unmarried women. The high cost of living ‘which often is synonymous with luxuries being accepted as necessities’ and housing difficulties often made the prospect of another baby ‘desired as it may otherwise be’ economically impossible. The logical answer was to make married life much easier than at present. ‘I do not think any woman would willingly resort to the perils of an abortionist if society did not virtually compel her to.’142

Truth, on 15 April 1942, said that health-wrecking abortion was a greater menace than social disease and that in the previous year 464 women, many young and married, had been admitted to Auckland Hospital with septic abortion, in most cases with no proof but strong suspicion that it had resulted from interference. The chairman of the Hospital Board, A. J. Moody, though notably hostile to leftists and aliens, was sympathetic to such women. It had been the practice to report to the police women who came to the hospital following abortion, but in March 1943 Moody said publicly, ‘I have told the medical superintendent that this must stop. Why should we pimp upon a woman who has strayed and paid the price? Our job is to see the woman is restored to health. If we turn informers, we shall force the criminal abortionist deeper underground, and hundreds of women will die of blood-poisoning.’ There was general backing from the Board, Dr Hilda Northcroft143 adding, ‘It isn't page 1040 the bad girls who have babies, it is the more innocent ones. We have got to preserve secrecy as far as possible.’ Moody stated that between 20 and 30 abortion cases were being admitted to Auckland Hospital each week.144 Early in 1944, in a case which brought Moody's instruction under fire from the coroner, the medical superintendent stated that the greatest number of abortion cases treated was about 30 a week, but he could not indicate how many were criminal.145 Despite pressure, Moody and his Board, claiming that they were supported by high medical authorities, continued in their refusal to drive abortion further underground by giving information to the police, though every case of septic abortion was reported to the Health Department.146

Elsewhere police questioning continued, but did not produce more than a handful of prosecutions.147 The annual reports of the Health and Justice Departments were silent,148 the Yearbooks were reticent, recording however that in 1938, in public hospitals, there were 182 cases of septic abortion and 30 deaths throughout New Zealand; in 1939, 179 cases and 22 deaths; in 1940, 150 cases and 17 deaths; in 1941, 170 cases and 26 deaths; 172 cases and 32 deaths in 1942; 201 cases and 16 deaths in 1943; 180 cases and 21 deaths in 1944; then comes a break in figures till 1948 with 285 cases and 9 deaths.149 Obviously this is but a small part of the abortion story, but it is clear that sulphonamides kept the death-toll low;150 after the war penicillin would make it lower still.

Illegitimate births showed a modest rise and fall. There were 1210 in 1937, 4.65 per cent of total births; in 1938 1164 (4.27 per cent); in 1939 1133 (3.93 per cent); 1284 (3.92 per cent) in 1940; 1281 (3.65 per cent) in 1941; 1339 (3.99 per cent) in 1942; 1467 (4.84 per cent) in 1943; 2020 (6.01 per cent) in 1944; 1824 in both 1945 and 1946 (4.93 and 4.36 per cent). They fell to 1727 page 1041 (3.85 per cent) in 1947; 1686 (3.82 per cent) in 1948; 1671 (3.80 per cent) in 1949.151

Adoption statistics, registered since 1919, increased sharply from the later part of the war. Prior to 1940, the highest yearly total was 584 in 1921, the lowest 329 in 1931, followed by 337 and 332 in 1932 and 1933. For 1937–43, adoptions numbered 444, 570, 530, 632, 561, 773, 577; for 1944–9 they were 1313, 1191, 1373, 1339, 1362, 1249.152

Unmarried mothers, unlike those who attempted abortion, broke no law, but their way was not easy. With rare and spirited exceptions, a girl with a baby but no ring on her finger was considered a heavy disgrace to her family. There were few avenues for employment apart from housekeeping, and no State support. They had some public champions such as Luxford who spoke for pity, for less hush-hush treatment of sex and against giving a child ‘that filthy name of bastard’.153 Several hospitals took in unmarried mothers as charity, some with stress on prayer and redemption which could be irksome. As well as the nationally based Salvation Army, which took in more unmarried mothers than did any other institution,154 the Alexandra Home, Wellington, was notable as a long established, non-sectarian refuge which unmarried girls could enter at any time during pregnancy, to work anonymously in its laundry and attached maternity hospital, and which, in co-operation with the Child Welfare Department, arranged adoptions. During 1943 it took in 73 unmarried mothers.155 In mid-1944, at the Wellington Diocesan Synod, it was urged that there should be a home to take single mothers for six months after they left the Alexandra Home, where they remained only three months after giving birth. In some cases they were forced on to the streets again, or into indifferent lodgings. The general idea was that babies should be taken from unmarried mothers, but many girls were anxious to keep their babies and face the so-called disgrace.156

In Auckland, two small-scale organisations for the aid of unmarried mothers came into being. In September 1943 the Motherhood of Man movement was formed by a group of men and women keen to enlist public support for women alone and in difficulties with children, and in particular to help those who wished to keep their page 1042 babies instead of having them adopted. It had comprehensive plans for a home and crèeche, coping both with unmarried mothers and those who needed daytime care for their babies: the children would be tended, under trained supervision, by the mothers-in-waiting who would thus receive good training. Those who wished to keep their babies would work during the day, returning to them in the evening at the home, if they did not live elsewhere. The movement hoped to establish several such homes, each taking about 20 women. It was, said its secretary on 23 October, ‘an adventure with a vision’, hoping to make a stand for a better way of life, with a wide-ranging educational programme through films and literature under the guiding spirit of Christianity. Donations of money were sought, and also clothes and accessories for mothers and babies. By January 1944 Motherhood of Man had city headquarters for interviewing applicants. In its first four months, 61 expectant mothers had sought advice and 41 other women had made general inquiries; 9 adoptions had been arranged and foster parents were sought for 18 expected babies. Baby clothes had been given to destitute mothers, and fathers of motherless children had also been given aid and advice.157 Its home remained an aspiration, but it continued to give practical help with advice and organisation. For instance, in January 1945 it advertised: ‘Deserted single girl. Mothers receive no maintenance or social security benefits for babies; domestic employment wanted where child no objection; country or town. Motherhood of Man (Inc).’158

In April 1944 Agnes Hodge, wife of a prominent Baptist in Auckland, and several helpers began taking care of babies of unmarried mothers in their own homes, until well-chosen foster-homes could be found. Working with the New Zealand Council of Christian Women, an inter-denominational body, the group in October 1944 collected £600 as deposit on a 12-roomed house in Epsom. It could handle 24 babies who could be kept there until adopted. Like Motherhood of Man, this group encouraged mothers to keep their babies and campaigned for the State to recognise actualities by granting the Social Security child allowance of 10 shillings a week. They also urged that the State should seek support from the fathers instead of leaving indecisive and work-hampered mothers to pursue justice. Lady Newall, wife of the Governor-General, gave moral and social support by formally opening ‘Childhaven’ in March 1945.159

The Society for the Protection of Women and Children and the National Council of Women also urged that the family benefit should page 1043 be paid for illegitimate children.160 On 5 October 1944, J. Acland,161 National member for Temuka, said that as a Christian duty the 10s should be paid to unmarried mothers who, instead of being ostracised and penalised, should be helped for the sake of the child. F. Findlay (National, Hamilton) added that illegitimate children were the least protected section of the community.162 The Minister of Social Security answered that his Department did a good deal of quiet work with the problem, taking the same course with unmarried mothers as with deserted wives; if the wife took legal proceedings against the husband, and if the unmarried mother disclosed the father's name, the Department helped her to chase the man.163

In February 1945 the Society for the Protection of Women and Children reported the first known case of the 10 shilling family benefit being paid for an illegitimate child and hoped to secure more.164

Fortune-telling was an offence regarded more seriously during the war than at other times. This also happened in Australia: in July 1940 Sydney police said that it was increasing and a magistrate, saying that it could do a lot of harm to credulous people, sent a man to prison for a month.165 In October 1941 Truth declared that the cruel hoaxing of mothers, sweethearts and relatives had become a profitable racket.166 A woman was, in January 1942, fined £10 and warned of prison by J. L. Stout SM, who said that she was taking advantage of others' misfortunes; women had been seen leaving her house in tears. She herself had lost a son in the war and claimed to be trying to support a sick husband.167 At Albany, north of Auckland and then almost a country district, a widow with three children said that her fortune-telling, at 2s 6d a time, had fallen off considerably because of petrol rationing. She was convicted with sentence deferred for 18 months, Luxford SM saying that it was remarkable how fast and how far a reputation for fortune-telling could spread among the credulous and that most practitioners were page 1044 charlatans who could do incalculable harm.168 Some were unlucky in their soothsaying: telling a policewoman that a relative had been shot and would not return cost a fine of £5.169 A 66-year-old widow who promised marriages and children to policewomen was fined £3.170

Cup-reading, which some teashops offered openly as entertainment, was also prohibited but with much lighter penalties. In Christchurch, where about a dozen cup-readers were convicted and discharged, a newly appointed policewoman was told that a friend would soon be invalided home from Egypt and would go before a board; his leg was bandaged and he was troubled by sandflies; she would be married in a few months.171 In Dunedin a proprietress, who for six years had advertised free cup-reading, paid costs although a conviction was not recorded, the magistrate remarking that normally the matter was regarded lightly, but when so many women had relatives overseas it could become serious.172

Despite public perturbation about liquor, the number of those charged with drunkenness declined: during 1939–45 they were, successively, 5935, 5470, 4887, 3001, 2304, 2132, 1854.173 Apart from beer being weakened in 1942, many drinkers were overseas, and drunken servicemen, unless involved in other offences were usually left to the provosts. Police tolerance, too, may have risen through pre-occupation with other things, for though police were exempt from war service, their intake was lessened and their duties in some other areas increased. Also as the months and years passed, there were increasing numbers of discharged servicemen about, many with more than physical scars, and it would have seemed both wrong and tactless to pick up a veteran of Greece or Sidi Rezegh or Cassino merely for being boozed.

More serious offences also decreased. Again, the forces held many who were either experienced in crime or might have become its recruits; Manpower officers kept others occupied in honest work, even seeking out men as they emerged from prison, and scarcity of labour produced many opportunities for making a fairly quick quid legally. Repeatedly judges commented on the lightness of criminal page 1045 sessions, even in cities,174 while in some provincial towns they were presented with white gloves, the traditional ceremony marking the absence of any criminal charges.175 Persons sentenced in the Supreme Court totalled 571 in 1939 (3.51 per 10 000 mean population), averaged 545 over the next two years, fell to 457 and 494 in 1942 and 1943, and thereafter, as in many other countries, rose noticeably, to 560 in 1944 and 740 in 1947.176

Magistrates Courts' work was lighter also, though the two successive days when Auckland had not a single criminal arrested, ‘not even a solitary drunk’, were unusual.177 The number of distinct cases convicted fell from 44 208 in 1939 to 32 419 in 1941, and reached 34 600 in 1947.178

In September 1941 legislation abolished the death penalty for murder, substituting life imprisonment. This was already government policy, all death sentences having been commuted since 1936.179 Flogging was also abolished, exciting the disapproval of several judges who deplored inability to impose it for some sexual offences.180 Proposals for the abolition or tighter control of corporal punishment in schools had no success.181

Beginning in 1940, there were complaints from the Bench, echoed by members of Parliament, education boards and many worthy citizens that youthful offences were increasing.182 Theft in various forms was the most frequent offence. Generally the majority of those admitted to probation or given deferred sentences were under 25 years of age and a substantial number were under 20 years. The Bench, presumably minded to deter others by severity, awarded light penalties to fewer young offenders and sent more to prison. Admissions to probation and deferred sentences, which together totalled 1117 in 1939 fell to 1070, 879 and 807 in the next three years, page 1046 averaged 1025 in 1943–4 and fell again to 972 in 1945.183 Those under 20 years old who found their way into prison totalled 96 in 1936, 178 in 1939, 203 in 1940, 201 in 1941, 308 in 1942 and 354 in 1943; in 1944 their number dropped to 283, and to 254 in 1945. Grouped with others of up to 25 years of age they formed, until 1944, an increasing proportion of those admitted to prison: 281 out of 1790 in 1936; 602 out of 2505 in 1939; 551 out of 2201 in 1940; 679 out of 2369 in 1941; 1057 -out of 3029 in 1942;184 993 out of 2482 in 1943; 789 out of 2099 in 1944; 778 out of 2065 in 1945.185

Percentages derived from such figures were repeatedly quoted with alarm and with some imprecision as to what they actually referred to.186 In September 1941 Auckland authorities on youth problems, in discussions prompted by Polson's remarks'187 on the 111 per cent increase between 1936 and 1940, discountenanced any ideas that distraction caused by the war and the absence of family members in the Services were responsible for increased delinquency. They saw lack of parental control as the prime cause and advocated more activities, particularly sport, for youths with too much leisure.188 One held that too many were paraded before childrens' courts for trivial offences, mere pranks. The Minister of Education, however, was certain that war conditions were a major factor, mainly because parental control was less in war time.189 It was usual to attribute the deplorable increase in youthful offenders, of whatever age, to lax parental control, though some also urged the need for religious or moral training in schools.190

Work bringing in too much money, £4–£6 a week, to irresponsible young men was rated another disturbing factor.191 Recklessness page 1047 induced by the prospect of a short future was more obliquely mentioned sometimes, as when the chief probation officer said, in 1942, that home, church and school, the institutions which should instil the fundamentals of moral conduct, were failing in this purpose, but added: ‘It has to be admitted that the war has undoubtedly brought in its wake a crop of social problems, the quickened tempo of life, the anxieties, and the loosening of conventional restriction, these all tend towards a drifting from socially acceptable standards— sacrilege and sacrifice are the strange bedfellows of war.’192

A few judges and magistrates made reverberating statements on a very serious increase in theft by young men of about 17 to 22 years, which should be countered with heavy penalties.193 Judicial generalisations helped to arouse expressions of alarm by some persons and groups about juvenile delinquency, vaguely defined, which expressions in turn excited others. The Press on 29 October 1942 traced such a sequence in Canterbury; an Auckland Education Board committee was criticised by the Auckland Star on 8 April 1943 for its working methods, its generalisations and its lumping together of school-age and young adult problems. Mason, Minister of Education, in June 1943, deplored such head-wagging and parrot-talk about delinquency while Children's Court figures showed only a small rise.194 Magistrate Luxford, in a widely reported luncheon speech, said that it was no new thing for adults to lament shortcomings in youth. Citing 1942 Yearbook figures, he explained that the percentage of those under 17 who appeared in Children's Courts was very low and he hoped thus to check the loose and irresponsible statements being made. He declared his faith that current youngsters were likely to produce men and women who would so run the world that they would not have two world wars in 25 years.195 Luxford's views were echoed by others such as the Mayor of Dunedin and the chairman of Otago's Education Board.196 Another magistrate, F. F. Reid,197 thought that too many trivial offences went to the Children's Courts but that theft was increasing among post-adolescents, 18–22 years, both boys and girls; girls' stealing was mainly of the ‘magpie’ sort, a regular sign of juvenile instability, not taken very seriously.198

page 1048

A Canterbury Education Board committee on child delinquency noted lack of parental care and guidance, due in part to war conditions. It advocated stressing Christian ethics, steps against truancy, including teachers visiting homes, supervised playgrounds in congested areas, legislation against the sale of contraceptives to children, checks on cinema attendance and daytime continuation courses for those already at work up to 18 years of age.199 The Wanganui Education Board, which had begun to worry about child delinquency in 1941, sent questionnaires to its schools and produced a 91-page booklet. It found that delinquency inquiries broadened into the need for general improvement in life conditions for youth. There was little delinquency among school children, more among those who had left school. There was none in Maori schools but for Maori children in pakeha schools incidence was above average. The report held that home was the most important adult agency affecting the child and anything that could assist parents to discharge their responsibilities effectively should be done. It advocated nursery schools, radio education sessions for parents, early sex instruction from parents and legal steps against parents culpably responsible for delinquency; more character training in schools, more sports club type activities, control of cinema viewing and the cutting out of radio programmes high in sensationalism but low in ethics.200

These reports showed a state of affairs very little directly affected by the war. City schools however, particularly at Auckland and Wellington, faced problems acute as well as broad, with increased truancy the path towards many errors. In part, such truancy grew from worsened social conditions—bad housing, absent fathers, mothers at work or over-taxed as solo parents—but many children in good homes were affected by current restlessness and precocity. Child Welfare officers helped to combat truancy, but as their powers were limited and indirect some of the children whom they returned to school were soon absent again; also, where no definite wrong-doing was charged, parents were inclined to resent their visits.201 Young children found that by shoe-shining or by plain begging they could get from open-handed Americans money for a spree of fish and chips, sweets and the pictures, without parents being any the wiser; such adventures tended to be repeated and extended. In some areas the disturbing effect of American troops was increased by their camps being in city parks: children were both deprived of their normal recreation areas and exposed to temptations. They hung around these page 1049 camps, thronging the barbed wire enclosures ‘like little vultures’, shoe-shining, offering to run errands, canvassing for washing orders on behalf of their mothers, cadging money and cigarettes.202 One Wellington headmaster, finding 25 per cent of his pupils away, rounded up most of them at a nearby American camp.203 Auckland in the latter part of 1943 appointed a full-time truancy officer who patrolled the main streets, American camps, rubbish tips and timber yards, taking children back to school and visiting homes. American authorities helped by ordering children away between 8.30 am and 4.30 pm. Some truancy was complicated by mothers who might keep a child at home to mind younger ones, or to do errands, or who might condone or even encourage American pickings—as when a boy was seen shoe-shining, but his mother sent a note saying that he was sick.204 Also in Auckland in 1943, two visiting teachers were appointed to the schools most affected, with this type of truancy in mind. They concentrated on disturbed children, visiting their homes, advising parents, and co-operating where necessary with Child Welfare and the Health Department. They found that many mothers, strained with the tasks of solo parenthood, were glad of aid and advice; they were rated so useful that others were appointed to additional city schools.205

Junior teenage girls were among those who went with servicemen on excursions attended with liquor and ending in bed or the bushes. ‘The way girls of 13 and 14 get about around Victoria Park and the waterfront is revolting’, said an Auckland headmaster, adding that two girls whom he judged to be not more than twelve years old, out with servicemen, had asked him for a corkscrew to open a bottle of wine.206 The Dominion on Saturday 8 May 1943 carried a photograph of a missing girl, ‘fourteen years, but looks older’, last seen near Anderson Park (site of an American camp) on Thursday evening. A Wellington Child Welfare officer said in November 1942 that juvenile prostitution was an ‘ugly and increasing’ trend among girls from 13 upwards; 100 children, not all from poorer homes, had passed through her hands in a few months, some infected with VD.207 Certain boarding-house keepers who let rooms by the hour turned a blind eye when girls obviously under 16 came through their hallways.208 It was to combat this evil, among others, that anti-vice squads were formed among Auckland and Wellington police page 1050 towards the end of 1942, and regulations in December gave the police power to search without a warrant houses suspected of ill-fame.209

It was realised fairly early that under war's disruption the spare-time energy of many young people would lack direction. In July 1942, a conference of bodies concerned with recreation and youth, presided over by a professor of education, saw two distinct problem groups: school children and those who had left school.210 The YMCA and the YWCA stepped up their activities in many directions, covering both groups: Wellington's YMCA for instance catered for 150 children from five city schools on two evenings a week, with hobby groups, film showings, organised games, etc, besides training more adults in youth leadership with the idea of forming boys' and girls' clubs in connection with churches,211 which could prevent troubles before they started. The YWCA, with its Down Town Club at Auckland and Gaiety Club at Wellington, open from 10am till 11 pm provided cafeterias, lounges, dancing and games space, where young working girls could entertain their boyfriends. These catered especially for girls under 18, too young to be members of the many clubs devoted to the entertainment of servicemen.212

School holidays loomed out of the general problem. In October 1942 a conference called by Dr Beeby, Director of Education, considered that the care of primary school children in holidays was a common responsibility in which churches and youth organisations, such as scouts, guides, etc, should help, along with parents. It was pointed out that in Hutt Valley and Wellington schools between 10 and 27 per cent of the children had both parents at work.213 For the summer of 1942–3, the Education Department arranged recreation centres, at the Thorndon, Petone Central and Waterloo schools, which teachers were asked to organise, without extra pay. Some were ardent to keep children off the streets; others were dubious, pointing out that they had already had a heavy year, with big classes and children affected by war neuroses, and needed a break from teaching. They also doubted the real need for such a scheme, remarking that headmasters' questionnaires had shown cases where mothers not doing any sort of war work would avail themselves of it; they said that page 1051 children had been roaming the streets and selling sweets in theatres long before the war, and that in Britain when such schemes were tried, children had not responded.214 At Auckland a survey of schools, which showed that 641 children aged from 5 to 14 would have unsupervised holidays, had been made far too late for any programmes to be organised,215 but the Thorndon centre opened on 21 December and the Hutt Valley ones on 5 January, with carefully devised programmes and teachers, training college students and others ready to supervise games, picnics, rambles, and on wet days indoor games, concerts, music, drama, films and handcrafts. The reluctant teachers were proved right: ‘provision was made for hundreds of children, but the attendance on any one day at all the centres did not exceed 100 children. At Thorndon sometimes not even half a dozen children were present, though many parents had asked for something to be done.’216 Perhaps the association with school was too strong, perhaps many families as usual contrived their own arrangements. The State-run effort was not repeated.

Other youth leaders were more successful, if more modest in scope. Some like C. L. Cato, secretary of Wellington Boys' Institute, saw clearly the interplay of disruptive forces that were increasing recalcitrance.217 Others had narrower vision, but it was clear that children from homes that did not provide for after-school interests were more likely to become delinquent: the ancient adage about Satan and idle hands had slightly freshened application to war-time children. In Wellington the Boys' Institute, besides vitalising its normal activeities, in May 1943 started holiday programmes, based on hobbies, films, concerts and sports, with 100 boys in the first week and nearly 200 in the second, capped with a visit to a Marine camp where their ice-cream capacity astonished their hosts.218 In August 1943 increased numbers, both boys and girls, enrolled for activities that included treasure hunts, a visit to Trentham military camp and collecting paua shell and willow wands for disabled servicemen's workshops.219

Church organisations ran holiday programmes in several centres,220 notably at Auckland where the Sunday School Union in May 1944 working first at Grey Lynn and Onehunga attracted several hundred daily.221 In May 1945 it was active, assisted by churches at Point page 1052 Chevalier.222 In August 1944 Christchurch ministers, who regularly gave bible lessons in schools, combined religious instruction with games, films and handcrafts in the Lin wood area.223

More sustained answers to needs were given here and there. The Auckland Star on 2 September 1944 noted that after twelve months' activity a boys' club in a congested part of the western city had become an established part of the lives of about 80 boys, who had the use of a gymnasium and boxing ring, had recently formed a radio group and had plans for camping, hiking and cycling in the summer. In July 1944, at St Columba's Hall, Grey Lynn, a youth centre for all between 10 and 20 years was opened, under Church of England auspices but undenominational and not heavily religious. It hoped to draw in the ‘unclubable’ youth of the district who belonged to no other organisations. It was open after school, in the evenings and at weekends, offering action ranging from boxing, gymnastics, ju-jitsu, basketball, table games and dances to music, reading and handcrafts. Within a month it had gathered 300 members.224

In short: New Zealand in the war years became more aware of the problems attending youthful leisure. Children shared in the general release from toil as gas and electricity replaced wood and coal, vacuum cleaners replaced brooms, machines replaced hand-milking. At the pictures, a few shillings could buy hours of romance, violence and unreality; radio serials brought the same into every home and both, by content and by encroaching on sleep, made children bored at school. The war's disturbance, with parents absent or pre-occupied, increased restlessness and the search for excitement and diversion, especially in soldier-filled centres. The great majority was quite unaffected, but a distressing few fell into truancy, scrounging and precocious sex. Alarmed elders and educationists raised the school leaving age, took steps againt truancy, inveighed against films and radio, and besought all possible organisations to pull their weight in filling youthful leisure usefully. No total answer was found to the problem. It was eased by various local efforts, and by the passing of the war, but it was both older and longer than the war.

1 In 1916, as a result of petitions and prohibitionist pressure, closing time had been moved from 10 pm to 6 pm as a wartime measure, and at the war's end this was continued by statute until 1967.

2 NZ Herald, 7 Mar 40, p. 11

3 WHN, ‘Police Department’, pp. 257, 260

4 Star–Sun, 18 Jan 42, p. 4

5 Air Force and Navy men might still do so, and this anomaly persisted till in June 1942 all servicemen alike were officially but ineffectively barred from thus beguiling their journeys or post-6 pm leave. See p. 1021

6 WHN, ‘Police Department’, p. 263; Bollinger, Conrad, Grog's Own Country, p. 95

7 NZ Herald, 17 Jan 42, p. 8

8 Dominion, 9 Feb 42, p.6

9 Ibid., 7, 16 Feb 42, pp. 6, 4; Evening Post, 14 Apr 42, p. 4

10 Evening Post, 19 Feb 42, p. 8

11 Auckland Star, 12 Mar 42, p. 8

12 Salient, 17 Jun 42

13 NZ Herald, 5 Jun 42, p. 4

14 Evening post, 6, 9, 11 Mar, 4 Apr 42, pp. 9, 6, 6, 8

15 Ibid., 10, 11 Mar 42, pp. 6, 6

16 Auckland Star, 9 Mar 42, p. 6

17 Coates, Canon Robert George (d 1953 aet 71): Anglican minister; Deacon Napier 1910, Canon St Mary's Cathedral Auck from 1937

18 Auckland Star, 9 Mar 42, p. 6

19 Evening Post, 12 Mar 42, p. 8

20 Auckland Star, 14, 16 Mar 42, pp. 5, 4

21 Ibid., 14 Mar 42, p. 8

22 Ibid., 21 Mar 42, p. 8

23 Ibid., 26, 30 Mar 42, pp. 10, 3

24 Evening Past, 10 Apr 42, p. 6

25 NZ Herald, 20 Apr 42, p. 6

26 Star–Sun, 2 Apr 42, p. 6

27 Evening Post, 22 Apr 42, p. 6

28 WHN, ‘Police Department’, p. 258, referring to notes on the deputation

29 NZ Herald, 4 Apr 42, p. 6

30 Ibid., 20 Apr 42, p. 6

31 See p. 345

32 Evening Post, 27 Mar 42, p. 6

33 Auckland Star, 17 Jul 42, p. 6

34 WHN, ‘Police Department’, pp. 260–1, referring to notes of the deputation

35 Press, 15 Apr 42, p. 6

36 Andrews, John William, OBE('50), Councillor of Honour, Red Cross, (1891–): Mayor Lower Hutt 1933–47; municipal positions (Pres Municipal Assn 1944–7), govt boards, RSA, Pres Hutt Valley Red Cross; NZRB WWI, cmdr Home Guard battalion 1939–46

37 Scholefield, Diary, 1942

38 NZ Herald, 12 Jun 42, p. 2

39 Evening Post, 10 Jun 42, p. 4

40 Ibid., 1 May 42, p. 4

41 Ibid., 25 May 42, p. 6

42 Dominion, 11 May 42, p. 4

43 In many cases thereafter there were two Saturday drinking peaks instead of one.

44 Excise duties and sales tax on beer which had been 1s 5d a gallon in August 1939 were 3s 11d in June 1942; 19.5 million gallons had been brewed in 1941. Evening Post, 1 May, 25 Jun 42, pp. 4, 4

45 Auckland Star, 23 Jun 42

46 Press, 24 Jun 42

47 Dominion, 24 Jun 42, p. 4

48 Evening Post, 13 Feb 43, p. 7

49 Dominion, 14 Mar 42, p. 9; Evening Post, 6, 9 Mar 42, pp. 9, 7

50 Auckland Star, 13 Mar 42, p. 6

51 A to J1942, 1943, both H–16, p. 1

52 Ibid., 1944, 1945, 1946, H–16, pp. 1, 1, 5

53 Truth, 12 Aug 42, p. 8

54 WHN, ‘Police Department’, pp. 265, 268

55 Ibid.; NZ Herald, 4 May 43, p. 4

56 Star–Sun, 22 Mar 43, p. 2

57 Evening Post, 7 Aug 42, p. 4, 13 Apr 43, p. 3; NZ Herald, 16 Nov 42, p. 2; Auckland Star, 22 Apr 43, p. 4

58 Evening Post, 22 Jan, 27 Mar 43, pp. 3, 6; Truth, 24 Feb, 24 Mar 43, pp. 9, 9; Auckland Star, 12 May 44, p. 6

59 Evening Post, 15 Jan, 10, 28 Apr 43, pp. 3, 4, 3; Auckland Star 19 Sep 42, p. 7

60 Dominion, 24 Oct 42, p. 10; Evening Post, 24 Apr 43, p. 6; Evening Star, 23 Jul 43, p. 2; NZ Herald, 5, 8 Dec 42, pp. 6, 2

61 Evening Post, 3 Sep 43, p. 3

62 Truth, 6 Jan 43, p. 7; Evening Post, 10 Apr, 3 May 43, pp. 4, 4

63 Auckland Star, 20 Mar 43, p. 5

64 Ibid.

65 Dominion, 16 Oct 43, p. 4

66 Auckland Star, 27 Mar 43, p. 6

67 Evening Post, 19 May 43, p. 3

68 Auckland Star, 5 Apr 43, p.4

69 Ibid.

70 Evening Pose, 15 Jan 43, p. 3

71 Dominion, 1 Feb 44, p. 4

72 Evening Post, 27 May, 3 Sep 43, pp. 3, 3; Auckland Star, 8 Oct 43, p. 4, 11 Aug 44, p. 6; Dominion, 4 Apr 44, p. 6

73 Auckland Star, 2 May 44, p. 6

74 Dominion, 11 Mar 44, p. 8

75 Evening Post, 22 Jun 44, p. 6; NZ Herald, 22 Feb 44, p. 4

76 Auckland Star, 26 Feb, 1 Apr 43, pp. 4, 4

77 Ibid., 12 May 43, p. 6

78 Ibid., 26 Feb 43, p. 4

79 WHN, ‘Police Department’, p. 266

80 Evening Post, 21 May 42, p. 4

81 Ibid., 7 Aug 42, p. 3

82 Auckland Star, 12 Jun 42, p. 4

83 Ibid., 26 Feb 43, p. 4

84 NZ Herald, 15 Apr 43, p. 4

85 Press, 1 Mar 43

86 Dominion, 27 Apr 43, p. 6

87 Auckland Star, 22 Apr 43, p. 4

88 NZ Herald, 1, 8 May, 9 Jun 43, pp. 6, 6, 2

89 Ibid., 14 Oct 42, p. 4

90 Evening Post, 13 Apr 43, p. 3

91 NZPD, vol 264, p. 72, vol 265, p. 538

92 Bollinger, p. 96; see p. 1238

93 Dominion, 15 Apr 44, p. 6; Auckland Star, 11 Aug 44, p. 6

94 WHN, ‘Police Department’, p. 268

95 Ibid.

96 Ibid., p. 269

97 Auckland Star, 17, 20, 28 Aug 42, pp. 4, 4, 4

98 Chandler, Very Rev Charles Walker (1894–1971): b UK, to NZ (Auck) 1928; Anglican Vicar Cambridge 1934–48, Dean Hamilton, Waikato 1948–58; Pres NZ Peace Council 1953–66

99 Evening Post, 8 Jul 42, p. 3

100 Methodist Times, Aug 42, in Auckland Star, 15 Aug 42, p. 6

101 Auckland Star, 20, 27 Aug 42, pp. 4, 6

102 Ibid., 17 Aug 42, p. 4

103 Ibid., 22 Aug 42, p. 4

104 Ibid., 24 Aug 42, p. 4; Truth, 2 Sep 42, p. 7

105 NZ Herald, 24 Aug 42

106 Ibid., 24 Jan 44, p. 4

107 Ibid., 8 Mar 44, p. 7

108 Dominion, 8 Feb 44, p. 3

109 WHN, ‘Police Department’, p. 269

110 Ibid., p. 270

111 Auckland Star, 4 May 44, p. 2

112 Ibid., 27 Jun 44, p.4

113 A to J1940, H–31, p. 4, 1942, H–31, p. 3

114 Ibid., 1943, 1944, 1945, all H–31, p. 3

115 Ibid., 1942, H–31, p. 3

116 Ibid.

117 The first such prosecutions were made in August 1942. Auckland Star, 22 Aug 42, p.7

118 NZ Herald, 15 Aug 42, p. 4

119 Ibid., 11 Aug 42, p. 5

120 Auckland Star, 19 Jun 42, p. 4

121 Evening Post, 12 Aug 42, p. 3

122 For instance, on 7 April 1943, at the request of the Victoria University of Wellington students' executive a Wellington medical officer, in a crowded room, spoke on forms of the disease and showed three films, one of a factory lecture on it in the United States, one showing its results, and another on the weapons available against it. Salient, 14 Apr 43

123 Evening Post, 30 Jul 42, p. 6

124 Auckland Star, 22 Oct 42, p. 8, film ad

125 WHN, ‘Police Department’, p. 271; Dominion, 4 Nov 42, p. 4

126 A to J1946, H–31, p. 3

127 Ibid., 1948, 1952, 1956, all H–31, pp.7, 13, 18–19

128 Evening Star, 23 Feb 43, p. 2; Truth, 3 Mar 43, p. 13

129 NZ Herald, 2, 29 Feb 44, pp. 4, 7

130 Auckland Star, 9 Nov 43, p. 4

131 NZ Herald, 29 Feb 44, p. 7

132 For instance, a Methodist minister. Rev Ashleigh Fetch, in mid-1943 said that decline in the birthrate was appalling, families were down to two or three children, New Zealanders as a nation were slowly committing suicide and the Maori were increasing three times as fast as the pakeha. Evening Post, 10 May 43, p. 4

133 NZPD, vol 259, p. 242

134 Harker, Cyril Geoffrey Edmund, OBE('64), JP (1899–1970): MP (Nat) Waipawa, Hawke's Bay 1940–63; member Law Revision Cmte 1946–9

135 NZPD, vol 263, p. 271

136 Ibid.

137 The report from this inquiry is in A to J 1937–8, H–31A, pp. 1–28

138 Auckland Star, 23 Sep 42, p. 2; Tomorrow, 20 Mar 40, p. 314

139 Dominion, 23 Jul 41, p. 6

140 NZ Herald, 13 Jan 44, p. 6

141 Evening Post, 16, 22 Jun 44, pp. 6, 3; Taihape Times, 26 Jun 44, p. 3

142 Evening Post, 14 Jul 44, p. 4

143 Northcroft, Dr Hilda Margaret, JP (1882–1951): member Auck Hospital board 9 years; cmdr WWSA in WWII

144 Truth, 31 Mar 43, p. 5

145 NZ Herald, 5 Feb 44, p. 8

146 Ibid., 15, 29 Feb 44, pp. 7, 6

147 In the notable instance of a Waikato doctor, the jury at his first trial in October 1943 disagreed. At his second trial in November he was acquitted on six charges, the jury, failing to agree on three others. In February 1944 the Court filed a nolle prosequi, ending criminal proceedings. He was however struck off the register by the Medical Council. Auckland Star, 20 Nov 43, p. 6; Dominion, 18 Jul 44, p. 3

148 A Health Department advertisement in 1944 claimed 4600 unlawful abortions a year. Auckland Star, 15 Sep 44, p. 7

149 Yearbook1940, p. 152, 1941, p. 116, 1942, p. 116, 1944, p. 78, 1945, P. 80, 1946, p. 93, 1947–49, p. 100, 1950, p. 113

150 A to J1945, H–31, p. 2

151 Yearbook 1947–49, p. 51, 1950, p. 62

152 Ibid., 1947–49, p. 53, 1950, p. 64

153 Auckland Star, 6 Aug 43, p. 4

154 Yearbooks 1939 to 1946

155 Evening Post, 22 Jun 44, p. 4; Alexandra Home, a 4-page leaflet published by the Wellington Ladies' Christian Association, 1957

156 Evening Post, 15 Jul 44, p. 6

157 Auckland Star, 7, 11, 12, 23 Oct 43, pp. 4, 2, 2, 7; NZ Herald, 26 Jan 44, p. 4

158 Auckland Star, 20, 26 Jan 44, pp. 1, 4

159 Ibid., 23 Oct 44, p. 3; Truth, 28 Mar 45, p. 14

160 Auckland Star, 17 Nov 43, p. 3; Truth, 28 Mar 45, p. 14

161 Acland, Sir Jack, KBE('68), JP (1904–80): member Geraldine County Council 1934–42, Sth Canty Hospital Board 1940–59; MP (Nat) Temuka 1942–6; member NZ Wool Board 1947–73, chmn 1960–72; former member NZ Wool Cmssn, vice-chmn Internat Wool Secretariat

162 NZPD, vol 266, pp. 719–20, 721

163 Ibid., pp. 722–3

164 Auckland Star, 14 Feb 45, p. 3

165 Ibid., 31 Jul 40, p. 12

166 Truth, 29 Oct 41, p. 9

167 Evening Post, 9 Jan 42, p. 7

168 NZ Herald, 13 Jun 42, p. 6

169 Press, 15 Oct 43, p. 4

170 Auckland Star, 19 Nov 43, p. 4

171 Press, 23 Jan 42, p. 6; Star-Sun, 26 Feb 42, p. 8

172 NZ Herald, 21 May 42, p. 4

173 A to J 1940 to 46, all H–16, pp. 3, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1, 5

174 Auckland, Auckland Star, 10 Jul 41, p. 3, NZ Herald, 10 Jul, 14 Oct 42, pp. 2, 4; Wellington, Evening Post, 5 May 41, p. 9, Dominion, 19 Oct 43, p. 4; Christchurch, Dominion, 23 Jul 41, p. 8

175 eg, Invercargill, Otago Daily Times, 7 Aug 40, p. 6; Palmerston North, Auckland Star, 16 Jul 40, p. 6; Napier, Hawke's Bay Daily Mail, 4 Jun 40, p. 6; New Plymouth, NZ Herald, 4 Nov 41, p. 6; Auckland Star, 5 Nov 43, p. 2; Greymouth, Press, 29 Feb 44, p. 4

176 Yearbook 1947–49, p. 169

177 Auckland Star, 9, 10 Feb 43, pp. 4, 4

178 Yearbook 1947–49, p. 167; figures for years 1942–6 not available

179 Evening Post, 13 Sep 41, p. 8; Yearbook 1947–49, p. 170

180 NZ Herald, 15 Oct 41, p. 8; Otago Daily Times, 18 Oct 41, p. 10; Dominion, 14 Oct 42, p. 6

182 Press, 6 Aug 41, p. 6; Evening Post, 13 Nov 41, p. 6; NZ Herald, 5 Dec 41, p. 9 & editorial

183 A to J1940, H–20B, p. 1; 1941, H–20B, p. 2; 1942, H–20, p. 3; 1943, H–20, p. 2; 1944, H–20, p. 10; 1945, H–20, p. 21

184 In 1942 prisons received about 500 military defaulters and, very briefly, about 400 strikers. Yearbook 1947–49, p. 172

185 A to J1946, H–20, p. 4

186 Notably the 111% rise in ‘youthful offenders’, those admitted to probation or deferred sentence, between 1936(93) and 1940(203). NZPD, vol 260, p. 423 (Polson, 29 Aug 41), vol 262, p. 104 (Harker, 4 Mar 43); NZ Herald, 5 Dec 41

187 See NZPD, vol 260, p. 423

188 This remedy overlooked the fact that in war time fewer persons qualifed to run sporting activities were available.

189 Auckland Star, 5 Sep 41, p. 5

190 Chief Probation Officer, A to J 1940, H–20B, p. 1; F. W. Doidge, NZPD, vol 260, p. 414; Dominion, 9 Aug 43, editorial. Sir Thomas Hunter argued against child delinquency being related to absence of religious training in schools. Dominion, 18 Aug 43, p. 4; see p. 1134

191 Evening Post, 7 Aug, 4 Nov 41, pp. 8, 8, 23 Nov 43, p. 3; Dominion, 4 Oct 41, p. 5, 8 Sep 43, p. 4; A to J 1945, H–20. p. 21

192 A to J1942, H–20, p. 2

193 Such as Levvey SM, Press, 22 Jan 41, p. 12, Justice Callan, NZ Herald, 5 Dec 41, p. 9, 17 Apr 42, p. 4

194 NZPD, vol 262, p. 932

195 Auckland Star, 24 May 43, p. 2

196 Evening Star, 26 May, 21 Jul 43, pp. 2, 4

197 Reid, Frank Felix, CBE('61) (1892–1966): SM from 1935; chmn Armed Forces Appeal Board 1941, War Pensions Appeal Board 1944–6

198 Auckland Star, 27 Oct 43, p. 2

199 Dominion, 16 Aug 43, p. 6

200 Wanganui Education Board, Report on Character Training and Citizenship; Dominion, 20 Oct 44, p. 4

201 Dominion, 18 Mar 43, p. 4

202 NZ Herald, 17 Feb 44, p. 6

203 Dominion, 18 Mar 43, p. 4

204 Ibid.; WHN, ‘Education Department’, pp. 46–7

205 A to J1944, E–1, p. 5; NZ Herald, 17 Feb 44, p. 6

206 NZ Herald, 17 Feb 44, p. 6

207 Dominion, 19 Nov 42, p. 3

208 NZ Herald, 8 Sep 42, p. 4

210 Dominion, 9 Jul 42, p. 4

211 Ibid., 12 Oct 42, p. 4

212 NZ Herald, 17 Jun 42, p. 5, Evening Post, 18 Aug 43, p. 8, Dominion, 10 Jul 43, p. 6, 5 Jan 44, p. 3

213 Dominion, 12 Oct 42, p. 4

214 Ibid., 26, 27 Nov 42, pp. 6, 4

215 WHN, ‘Education Department’, p. 46

216 Ibid.; Dominion, 7 Jan 43, p. 4

217 Dominion, 22 Apr 44, p. 8

218 Ibid., 29 Apr, 15 May 43, pp. 3, 6

219 Ibid., 24, 25 Aug, 4 Sep 43, pp. 4, 4, 6

220 WHN, ‘Education Department’, p. 46

221 NZ Herald, 20 May 44, p. 8; Auckland Star, 13 May 44, p. 7, 31 Jan 45, p. 6 (photos)

222 Auckland Star, 8 May 45, p. 2

223 Press, 22 Aug 44, p. 3

224 Auckland Star, 13 Jul, 29 Aug, 2 Sep 44. pp. 4, 4, 4