Boyle Travers Finniss willing to take dual roles as head of South Australian police from Thomas O'Halloran
South Australia's second and third police commissioners: Boyle Travers Finniss (1843-47) and George Frederick Dashwood (1847-52).
Images courtesy State Library of South Australia
Boyle Travers Finnis, future first premier of South Australia, became the colony’s second police commissioner in 1843.
He succeeded Thomas O’Halloran, the resigned when South Australia’s third governor George Grey decided the roles of police commissioner and police magistrate to save £250 a year. This was part of Grey cutting public expenses by lower wages, halting public works, increase taxes and retrenching staff to make up for the province’s £294,000 debt left by previous governor George Gawler.
With the wealthy O’Halloran returning to tend his property (later O’Halloran Hill), south of Adelaide, Finniss was happy to accept the dual position at £350 per annum as a loyal public service. A former British army officer who became assistant to the colony’s first surveyor general and Adelaide city founder William Light, Finniss was devoted ally of Light during his controversial final years. That devotion to Light had contributed to the failed surveying firm of Finnis, Light and Company.
Gawer, realising Finniss’s skills, appointed him deputy surveyor general under Charles Sturt (and later Charles Frome) at £400 per annum. This security gave Finniss the confidence to invest in his flour mill on 80 acres in Burnside, He sold his other properties to fund the project that crashed in 1842 by relying on water to power his mill in dry conditions.
After his position as deputy surveyor general was abolished, Finniss he petitioned Grey for a position – any position – in the government service. In September1842, Finniss humbly and thankfully accepted the temporary post of chief draughtsman in the lands office on a salary of £200.
When O’Halloran departed as first police commissioner in 1843, Finniss was willing to accept the dual post of police magistrate and police commissioner with a salary of £350.
Once he assumed O'Halloran's duties, Finniss found that he had a "book of rules" to guide him in all police matters. He had no difficulty in settling down and for the next three years the department run smoothly under his capable management.
Three years ealier, O'Halloran had taken over the police department that he found disorganised, corrupt force. He left behind a well-disciplined, efficient body of 78 men and he gave Finniss detailed accounts of how the establishment was administered. O’Halloran had enforced restrictions such as on Aboriginal people found wandering naked through Adelaide streets being e detained "for 24 hours, without sustenance of any kind.” O’Halloran also left numerous details regarding police discipline.
Finniss’s diligence and loyalty to governors saw him move up in the South Australian public service to chief secretary. He was succeeded as police commissioner in 1847 by George Frederick Dashwood, a former British naval officer, who was in charge of police until 1852, with an interval as stipendiary magistrate at Port Adelaide.
As police commissioner, he often asked for more men and more money to improve the protection of property yet he advised working class villages to set up their own private constabularies. He insisted that prisoners should support themselves by working in gaol but, although forced sometimes to act against Aboriginal offenders, he also supported their official protection and declared that it was but a bare act of justice to supply them with food and sustenance.
