CAPTAIN-CHAPLAIN JAMES WILSON

HIS POLITICAL CAMPAIGN AS INDEPENDENT CANDIDATE 1919

Wednesday March 5, 1919

PETERSHAM BY-ELECTION

POLLING MARCH 22

The writ for the Petersham By-election will be issued by the Governor to-day. Nomination day will be fixed for Saturday next, and the polling will take place a fortnight afterwards, on Saturday, March 22. April 8 will be named as the date for the return of the writ.

Considerable interest is attached to the opening of the campaign in support of the National candidate by the Premier to-night in the Petersham Town Hall. It is expected that several Ministers will accompany Mr Holman, and the Major Shillington will also address the meeting.

Captain-Chaplain Wilson, the Independent candidate, who has been nominated by the Soldiers and Citizens’ Political Federation will open his campaign in the Petersham Town Hall to-morrow evening.

Thursday March 6, 1919 (Abridged)

PETERSHAM

THE CAMPAIGN OPENED

It is doubtful whether the Petersham Town Hall ever held a larger or a more lively audience than last night, when the Premier (Mr Holman) opened the campaign for the National candidate, Major Shillington. (opening paragraph abridged)

The most important pronouncement made by the Premier was the legislation proposed to compel employers to re-employ returned soldiers.

CHAPLAIN-CAPTAIN WILSON’S CANDATURE

Major Shillington then explained that the suggestion that he should try to get the selection for Petersham had come first from some of the soldiers now belonging to the association which had now selected Chaplain Captain Wilson. Lieutenant Cortis, the secretary of that association had asked him to withdraw his name from the National selection.

A voice: That is a lie?

Major Shillington: “I will bring the letter along with me next time. I replied to him and told him that the one great aim was to unite the anti-Labour section of the people so as to present a bold front to the Bolsheviks. (Hoots and cheers) I said I would stand down if he could arrange for Chaplain Captain Wilson to be the joint candidate of the two associations. Their reply was that they could not entertain it because the Soldiers’ party was out to smash the machine, there is only one machine to smash, and that is the Labour machine. (Cheers) Unless that is done we shall be inundated with Bolshevism. All the Soldiers’ party can do in this contest is to injure the Nationalist cause, because you can’t take one vote away from labour. In this contest Chaplain Captain Wilson is being made use of by a few ambitions, disappointed, and disgruntled would-be politicians. As a result of his candidature it is quite possible that Petersham will be represented by labour. He is splitting the vote and playing Labour’s part. (abridged)

Friday March 7, 1919

A FIGHTING PADRE

CHAPLAIN WILSON’S SPEECH

CHALLENGE TO OPPONENT

PETERSHAM CONTEST

Petersham Town Hall was again crowded to the doors last night, when Captain-Chaplain Wilson, the Soldiers and Citizens’ candidate, opened his campaign. Many people were compelled to stand in the corridors, while others failed to gain entrance to the building.

Although the candidate would offer no such special attraction as that which the Premier’s presence lent to Major Shillington’s meeting on the previous evening, everything was done that could be done to arouse enthusiasm, and a returned soldier’s band, parading the streets, and eventually drawing up outside the hall, helped to swell the already large crowd which had gathered there.

The meeting opened with the singing of the National Anthem. The Mayor of Petersham, Alderman Gendle, again occupied the chair, and intimated that the overflow meeting would be addressed later on. He then called upon Lieutenant Thomson, of the 1st and 2nd Battalions, who said they had had Mr Holman’s soldier addressing them last night. To-night he was speaking for the soldiers’ soldier candidate.

THE RIGHT TO BE HEARD

“We claim as soldiers,” he said “that we have the right to be heard in the affairs of the country. If the soldier is to be shut out from the affairs of the country, then the country will go on under the old two-party system, which will ultimately lead to ruin.”

They were offering themselves up on the altar of progress in order to break down this two-party system and to see that all sections of the community had a voice in the affairs of the government. This he believed to be true democracy. What Captain-Chaplain Wilson should do would be the best for the digger. The Premier had said that if they would allow Captain-Chaplain Wilson to run under the National banner he would wipe out all other aspirants for the seat. Major Shillington was informed that if he would leave the National party and come to the Soldiers’ party Captain-Chaplain Wilson would stand down in his favour and allow him to run.

“You treat the soldiers right,” said the speaker, “and they will stand as a bulwark between you and the Bolshevism. But let the diggers come home and see that they have not got preference and anything might happen. (Applause) We do not want promises. We do not want sympathy. We do not want charity. We want justice. (Applause) And we are going to get it.”

A voice: “Holman, will never give it to you.”

CHAPLAIN-WILSON’S SPEECH

Captain-Chaplain Wilson said that he did not expect to stand before them as a candidate for Parliamentary honours.

“To me,” said Captain-Chaplain Wilson, “the Australian ‘digger’ comes first. He had made me his choice. Whatever Mr Holman or Major Shillington may say, I want to tell you here and now that I claim to be the ‘digger’s choice.” (Applause)

The speaker referred to his efforts in the recruiting campaign, and stated that, without being paid for it or receiving travelling expenses during his tour in 1915, a thousand men were recruited at his meetings. They were in the presence of the “dinkum Aussies”—the ‘diggers’ who fought and suffered.

There were some people who would unfrock him for the stand he had taken. It had also been stated that he was not a fighting man, that he was only a chaplain, and the Major Shillington had the advantage of being a fighting man. Before the campaign was finished perhaps they would be able to judge whether he was a fighting man, he at least had a son who had been over there for four years.

The speaker said that he wanted to put himself right, and would not worry about policy for the time being. He wanted to tell them that he was perfectly satisfied that in the future the men were going to count more than they had in these political campaigns. It was a tragedy in human life to be born a man and die a politician. But once he had said to the soldiers, “I want you, and he felt he would not be playing up to the highest type of manhood if he did not say to the boys now, “If you want me, I want you.”

The speaker said that he had received some terrible letters from people who really believed he was going to the devil. “I do not suppose,” he added, “that I will be very far away from him when I get to Macquarie street.” (Laughter)

WILL GO THROUGH THE FIGHT

Having once passed his word he would stand for this fight, he would go through it if he died on the way. The fact that there was no second ballot was the fault of the National Government and not his.

A voice: We will see you through.

The speaker: “We will get through. We have got through before, many a time. We have been used to the shell holes in “No-man’s-land before. Having served our nation once we will serve her forever, and having fought for the whole of its people, by the help of God we will go in and do the best we can for the whole of them in the councils of the country.” (Applause)

Major Shillington had suggested that he was being used by disgruntled politicians. He wanted to say that this was a deliberate falsehood, and he charged him with the responsibility of making good his statement.

Referring to the general discussion regarding the appearance of two soldiers in the campaign, the speaker said he proposed to make a last offer to end the unfortunate position created in Petersham. He was prepared to fight it out with Major Shillington in the presence of the Diggers, and he made the following offer:—

MAJOR SHILLINGTON CHALLENGED

“As Major Shillington has suggested that he is as much the nominee of the returned soldiers as I am, and that the said returned soldiers are not in agreement with me, and further, that I am being made use of by disgruntled politicians, I feel it necessary to challenge the major to a contest this position in the presence of returned soldiers at a meeting to be convened in the Sydney Town Hall on next Monday night, or at any other night, at which he shall have the privilege of putting his case in a twenty-minutes’ speech, and I the same privilege, a vote of the men to be taken—this vote to decide whether Major Shillington or myself shall stand down from the Petersham election. This course would save us from the difficulty created by the absence of the second ballot and save any splitting of the votes in the electorate. I wish this course to be taken, as I desire to safeguard the interests of the returned soldier and save the Petersham electors from what must be a very embarrassing position.”

He felt that he had done a thing perfectly fair and honourable, and he left it to Mr Holman and His Cabinet and to Major Shillington, and if the returned Diggers in the Town Hall said that Major Shillington was the man he would willingly stand down.

SANE UNIONISM WANTED

Referring to his attitude towards Labour, the speaker said he had been misrepresented because he had said that the workers of Australia had been betrayed again and again by the men who were professedly their friends, and who ought to be booted out. Unfortunately the Parkes Labour league said he had urged that the Labour party should be booted out. He asserted, however, that sane unionism was wanted in the country. The curse to-day would be Bolshevism and extremism. The Kaiser was an extremist, and he became an autocrat and a danger until the Allies dammed back the goose-stepping hordes and put the Kaiser where he was to-night. Bolshevism, it if came out for domination; the O.B.U., if it stood for domination as a class—then they, the soldiers’ representatives, would fight them as they fought the Kaiser. (Applause) The great danger was that if the men were not treated as they should be a great percentage would be driven, not only into the labour party, but into the arms of the Bolsheviks themselves. There was, however, a sane Labour party in Australia, and there was sane unionism in Australia, and he asserted that sane unionism would be on the side of Justice when we came to any conflict with extreme Bolshevism. The sane labour party was the first line of defence and the “Aussie Diggers” were the second line.

BOLSHEVISM AND BAD GOVERNMENT

Bolshevism was here in Australia to-day, and Bolshevism was the product of bad government.

A voice: “Lack of education.”

The speaker: “Yes, you have got profiteering. Why does not the Government stop profiteering? Is profiteering such a problem that it cannot be handled by the Government?”

Lieut. Cortis, secretary of the Soldiers and Citizens League, also spoke, and Mr R. Windeyer, K.C., moved a vote of confidence in the candidate, which was seconded by Dr Kane and carried enthusiastically.

Saturday March 8, 1919

THE CHALLENGE

TO BE DEALT WITH LATER

SPEECHES AT PETERSHAM

Major Shillington, the Nationalist candidate for Petersham, does not as yet propose to deal with the challenge thrown out by Captain Chaplain Wilson at his meeting in the Petersham Town Hall on Thursday night last, regarding the proposed meeting of soldiers in the Sydney Town Hall. He will do so, however, at a meeting to be held in the electorate on Monday night next.”

“From now on,” said Major Shillington, at a meeting held outside the Stanmore railway station last night, “I do not propose to deal greatly with the claims of the Independent candidate. I intend that his shall be a fight against Labour and against Bolshevism. A challenge was made last night by the Independent candidate, and I do not propose to deal with it to-night, because it is a matter which will take some time. I propose to deal with that at my meeting at Lewisham on Monday night. I think that when that challenge was made, the gentleman who made it must have recognised that it was an absurd proposal.”

A voice: “You are not game to take it up.”

Major Shillington: “I will deal with it on Monday Night.”

A voice: ‘Why don’t you meet him?”

Major Shillington: “He leaves it until it is too late. I have been prepared all the time to stand down. However, I am not going on with that. I will deal with that on Monday.”

The speaker then explained at length exactly what had occurred in connection with the trial of Corporal Williams, with regard to which he had been questioned at his previous meeting. He stated that the soldier in question was found guilty and sentenced to seven day’s detention, but was recommended for mercy on account of his service, and never went to goal at all. He did not think the man had any complaint against him, but he believed he was being put up by somebody who wanted to make political capital out of his case.

Major Shillington added that he had previously expressed himself in favour of 6 o’clock closing of hotels, and he now wished to say that he was also of the opinion that the Government should, at the next session, pass an anti-shouting measure. This had been suggested in connection with demobilisation, and some people believed that it should be made illegal to treat soldiers. He could not see any necessity for that discrimination, and he thought everybody should be on the same place, and that shouting throughout the community should be absolutely illegal.

Mr Doe, M.L.A., afterwards addressed the meeting, and referred to Mr Storey’s repudiation of Bolshevism. He had repudiated Garden, and he had repudiated Judd, but he would party to-day there were men who were opposing the old Labour party’s doctrine of arbitration and substituting for it the I.W.W. doctrine of One Big Union and direct action, and, if Mr Storey wanted to repudiate these things, he had got to put out of his movement the men who were preaching them in season and out of season. It was a remarkable thing that these repudiations always came about when there was an election on.

“Your report of the Petersham Town Hall meeting of Thursday night,” writes Mr T.J. Hoskins, M.L.A. “give Chaplain-Captain Wilson as saying that I had referred to him as the ‘canting parson who could pray, and not fight.” Chaplain Wilson has been misinformed. Anyone who knows me will readily admit that I am not in the habit of referring to ministers of religion in terms like that. What I did say was that there is a danger of the vote splitting allowing a Labour candidate to slip in, as happened in Western Australia in the by-election for Lord Forrest’s seat. Chaplain Wilson, the representative of the Farmers and Settlers’ Association, is endangering the situation in the same way, for a lot of supposed followers of his are in reality Labour supporters whose one object is to keep him in the field, so that Labour will get the chance of a lifetime.

Monday March 10, 1919

PETERSHAM SEAT

CHAPLAIN WILSON DISQUALIFIED

NOMINATION REJECTED

THE RESIDENCE CLAUSE

Nominations for the Petersham by-election, to fill the vacancy in the Legislative Assembly caused by the appointment of Mr J.J. Cohen to the District Court Bench, closed at noon on Saturday. At that hour Mr W.E. Gould, the returning officer, received the following nominations:—

DONALD WALTER CROAL, Accountant, Stanmore.

BERNARD CLARENCE OLDE, Clerk, Petersham (Labour)

SYDNEY JAMES SHILLINGTON, Grazier, Manly (Nationalist)

The appearance of Mr Croal came as a surprise. This is the first occasion on which he has been heard of publicly, at all events in connection with the election.

A nomination of Captain-Chaplain James Wilson was received, but it was found that he was not qualified. It appears that Captain Chaplain Wilson lost the qualification he held in the electorate in which he was enrolled. For the past 12 months, since his return from the front, he has been residing at Randwick, and in his candidature for Petersham he and his supporters have been relying on the inclusion of his name in the recent police collections for the new rolls under proportional representation as qualifying him to contest the seat. That collection, however, does not apply to the election, and therefore his nomination was held to be informal.