Pat Dwyer: Justice v. The Law
Sometime during 1962 I spotted a Karamui archer aiming at a chook. Good shot sir, right through the neck. ‘O, sori. Kakaruk bilong Sergeant Anki.’ Donning my police hat: ‘You’re nicked.’ Dissuaded the Sergeant...
Category: Political Development
A family matter: Chips MacKellar
(Originally published Una Voce, March 2000, and reprinted in Tales of Papua New Guinea, page 177) Chips Mackellar was at the Ela Beach Court House for five years. He said this story would be...
Forgotten murders—Still a mystery: Jim Toner
(Published Una Voce, September 1997, Page 38) Jim Toner: Chief Clerk, District Office, Mendi 1957-59; District Office, Rabaul 1960-64; Field Manager, New Guinea Research Unit (ANU), Port Moresby 1965-73 Forty years have passed since...
On being a kiap: Jim Sinclair
Notes for panel discussion, National Archives, Canberra, 21 November 2010. It must be emphasized that my experiences were shared by many kiaps, and were not in any way unique. I have decided to talk...
My kiap medal conundrum: Graham Taylor
Reading the commentary about medals for Kiaps afflicts me with conflicting points of view especially given that as an immediate post WW2 Kiap I might be qualified to receive one. My first point is...
Yes, we brought them shell: the best shell they ever had!: Jim Sinclair
“One cannot spend over 27 years in Papua New Guinea and fail to experience sadness and regret when forced to leave it, particularly when the circumstances are beyond one’s control,” writes J. P. Sinclair,...
Official Australian recognition of Kiaps’ services
On 5 November 2008, Chris Viner-Smith submitted a paper to the Australian Government seeking formal recognition of the services of Kiaps (patrol officers) in the development of the independent state of Papua New Guinea,...
Boiled puddings: Paul Oates
When I set up a permanent Base Camp at Mindik in the middle of the Huon Peninsula in1970, I arrived with the usual Patrol gear (Kerosene stove, canvas shower bucket and a “bedsail”. The...
Bob Cole and the thirty police badges: Chips Mackellar
When Bob Cole was Commissioner of the Royal Papua and New Guinea Constabulary, it was customary for kiaps passing through Port Moresby on posting or on leave, to drop in and pay their respects. So...
Career with a future, career with a challenge: Chris Warrillow
So read the heading on one of the pages of a booklet for school-leavers circulated when I was completing my “Intermediate” (Year 4), the year after I had arrived in Melbourne as a Pommie...
A career kiap’s wife: Nancy Johnston
Speech given at Sharing Histories: Kiap tribute event at the National Archives of Australia, 20 November 2010 In March 2002 Chris Viner-Smith commenced a lone campaign to have the service of Kiaps formerly recognised...
We’ve come for the money: Adrian Geyle
(Published in Una Voce, December 1998, page 16) Adrian Geyle was CPO for two years at Lake Murray, Kiunga, Gaima and Daru, Western District; PO OIC Green River, Sepik District; PO H/Q, Madang District....
Kiaps killed on duty: Jim Sinclair
John Green, Government Agent, 14 January 1897, Tamata, Northern Division, British New Guinea, together with Corporal Sedu, and Constables Dumai, Gaiwa, Mirio and Taurauki, Armed Native Constabulary. Robert Dorrien Kirby, Patrol Officer, April 1916,...
Kiaps of Papua New Guinea – The postwar era: Nancy Johnston
(Published in Una Voce, December 2003 page 9) A tribute to those who followed in the tradition and footsteps of the pre-war ‘outside’ men in penetrating and establishing law and order in the primitive...
Border confrontation: John Quinn
Like all good stories, this one starts “long, long ago and far, far away” The great bird island to the North of Australia dozed in the tropic seas for millennia until, in the mid-1840s,...
