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Darwin Police Station

The first police station in Darwin was a crude affair of poles and plaster, measuring 20 feet by 12 feet, which provided ‘very poor accommodation’1. -

Paul Foelsche oversaw the construction of a well constructed station and cells to take its place.


A photograph taken by Paul Foelsche of the first properly constructed police station in Palmerston (now Darwin).


This building was restored and now forms the Administrators Office behind the modern Supreme Court Building.


There was no hospital in Darwin until June 1874 and, in the more remote areas, no trained medical help was available until well into the twentieth century. Even after the hospital was established in Darwin, police officers being treated there, even if injured on duty, lost three shillings per day from their pay. They also had to pay a further three shillings per day for treatment received. This situation was not remedied until 1901.2





1. Reynolds. Commissioner of Crown Lands, Report on Northern Territory Government Buildings, SAPP number 120 of 1874.

2. Commissioner of Police to the Minister, 3 January 1901, NAA ACT, A 1640/1, item 00/524.


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