I am staying in Mudgee, New South Wales and recently read about a local cleaning woman named Mary St. Clair who was arrested for swearing. She told the local constable that she had had a large sum of money stolen. He didn’t believe her. The year was 1875 and the place was central New South Wales in Australia. “Nice” women didn’t swear and women of her “station” did not have large sums of money to steal. He sent her to the Mudgee Gaol telling them she was suffering from “Lunacy” and had a “disordered intellect”.

Mary spent several weeks in gaol in a cramped confined space at the mercy of the system. The gaols were very basic in those days. Mudgee Gaol has since been demolished but a nearby gaol has been restored and shows a single bedroom sized cell with one rough blanket and a mat covered canvas bed per person. I have seen horse stalls with more comfortable facilities.

Mary spent two weeks in gaol before the authorities realised she was sane and she was allowed to go home.  Naturally Mary was still concerned about getting her money back, but all they could tell her was that it had been deposited in a local bank and bank regulations would not allow them to find out who had taken it.

Australia today is obviously a very different place. People no longer get arrested for swearing, (if they did the jails would be vey busy) and there is not really a down trodden poor class to be suspected of lunacy just because they claim to have had some money of their own. Anyone can save money here if they work for it. Like America it is a land of opportunity and people come here from all over the world for a better life.

There is also a sound and sometimes over eager legal system. I suspect that if something similar was to happen today then the victim would be paid thousands, if not millions, of dollars in compensation for being wrongfully incarcerated. She would then go on to make another squillion dollars from media interviews and from sales of a book about her life. She would also be much more likely to get her money back.

I appreciate the opportunity to live in modern Australia and enjoy the kind of community that has been forged by pioneers and pprotected by those who went to war to make sure it stayed a free and democratic country. As an election looms the big issues of the day are whether to give more money to families for childcare or for energy efficient items like newer cars, solar power or home insulation. People here have come to expect a very high standard of living. I love it.

And .... by the way, the story of Mary St. Clair has an interesting ending. It seems that while she was in gaol, a relative in England died and left her a large sum of money. I hope she enjoyed it.

If you want to read the original account of Mary St. Clair, you can find the newspaper report here