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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 13, Issue 7 (October 1, 1938)

Swindley's Little Joke

Swindley's Little Joke.

Naturally the old hands who had served with regular troops in the Wars of the ‘Sixties did not relish the Constabulary organisation at first. One of these veterans was Captain Swindley, afterwards a settler at Te Puapua, near Whakatane. Swindley being a cheerful soul and incorrigible joker, realised the humorous side of it all. Capital soldier, skilled bushman and scout, he was a popular man with his comrades in the field. But his special aversion was his superior officer, Commissioner Branigan.

Swindley amused some of his friends with pen-and-ink drawings depicting himself in the uniform of a London policeman with a lantern at his belt and a baton in his hand. This illustrated the fate he professed to believe would overtake the A.C. Field Force. He had his photograph taken in that costume. The caricatures were circulated from field post to post, and at last the story came to the ears of Mr. Branigan.

The rest of the story is told in a MS. diary of the service period kept by the late Captain G. A. Preece, N.Z.C., who sent me a copy of it.

Swindley, he wrote, was at the Constabulary Depot on Mt. Cook, in Wellington (where the Dominion Museum and Art Gallery now stand), when he was sent for by Mr. Branigan.

“I understand, Captain Swindley,” he said, “that you have been caricaturing the Force by exhibiting some pictures showing what you were and what you expected you would become, the last in page 12
(Rly. Publicity photo.) The new standard railcar, “Aotea,” which, in a recent trial run from Napier to Wellington (200 miles) covered the distance in 4 hours 36 minutes running time.

(Rly. Publicity photo.)
The new standard railcar, “Aotea,” which, in a recent trial run from Napier to Wellington (200 miles) covered the distance in 4 hours 36 minutes running time.

the uniform of a London policeman with a baton.”

Captain Swindley, who was never at a loss, replied: “Oh, no sir. In my various occupations I have had my photograph taken”; and he took a packet of small photo-cards from his pocket.

“Here is one showing me as a digger on the West Coast. Here is another as a surveyor's chainman. The third shows me in A.C. officer's uniform. The fourth is as I found myself in the field, with a shawl around my loins, a carbine over my shoulder, a revolver in my belt, and a haversack on my back. I heard that you were going to demilitarise the Force, so I thought I would make my collection complete. These are very old, so you can see that it was with no intention of bringing the Force into ridicule.”

Mr. Branigan took it in good part, Preece continued, and no more was said about it at the time. Probably the Captain agreeably entertained the Commissioner with some of his funny stories. But Swindley could not leave well alone.

The Commissioner's official life was brought to an unfortunate close about the beginning of 1871; his mind became deranged, the effects of an old sunstroke. Preece wrote in his diary (July 14th, 1871), after recounting the incident just related:—

“I am afraid Swindley must be held partly accountable for poor Branigan's condition. Some time after the Wellington interview, he sent the Commissioner the following extract from Mark Twain's ‘Innocents Abroad’:

“‘But perhaps the most poetical thing Pompeii has yielded to modern research was that grand figure of a Roman soldier, clad in complete armour, who, true to his duty and full of that stern courage which has given to that name its glory, stood to his post by the city gate, erect and unflinching, till the hell that raged around him burned out the dauntless spirit it could not conquer. We never read of Pompeii without the natural impulse to grant to him the mention he so well deserves. Let us remember he was a soldier, not a policeman, and so praise him. Being a soldier, he stayed, because the warrior instinct forbade him to fly. Had he been a policeman he would have stayed also, because he would have been asleep’.”

(Rly. Publicity photo.) Interior view of the signal cabin at Wellington, New Zealand.

(Rly. Publicity photo.)
Interior view of the signal cabin at Wellington, New Zealand.

“This quotation,” said Captain Preece, “was sent to Branigan shortly before he went off. Swindley said he thought it might have been this that finally sent him off his head.”