Robert Henry CALDICOTT [5482]

  General Notes:

1905 SA Death 313/61 CALDICOTT Albert Henry undefined Nairne

Adelaide Observer Saturday 25 January 1873
Adelaide: Wednesday, January 22.
[Before Messrs. S. Beddome, P.M., and W. Harcus. J. P.]
Emma Paton Caldicott and Alice Caldicott, daughters of R. H. Caldicott, of Unley, clerk, appeared on the remanded charge of stealing a rake and beehive, found on the premises of Joseph Allen, chemist, Unley. Mary Hughes stated that on December 23 she saw prisoners coming out of Mr. Allen's yard with a small box and a rake, which they took to their house. Mr. J. W. Downer said he appeared for the father of the children. He was employed in the Post-Office, and his work took him away daily from early morning till about 11 at night. His wife was unfortunately out of her mind, and the result was that he was forced to leave the entire bringing up of these children to a stranger, who, it appeared, had rather abused her trust. Mr. Downer asked His Worship, looking at the respectable position of the father and the extreme youth of the children, not to commit them or send them to gaol, which would make them portion of the criminal class, but seeing the mode in which they had been brought up give the father an opportunity of trying to take better care of them in future. Under these circumstances, he asked His Worship to suggest to the prosecution to withdraw the charge. His Worship--What surety is there that the father will take any better care of them than he has for the last three or four years. I have had complaints of these children almost daily of their running about and pilfering in all directions.
Mr. Downer- Mr. Caldicott has heard nothing of it till lately.
His Worship- I don't believe him. He ought to be very glad to get them into the Industrial School. If he has an insane wife it would be the best thing for them. Why is he not here, Mr, Downer!
Mr. Downer- He cannot leave the Post Office. His Worship, to the prisoners-Will you be tried by this Court or the Supreme Court!
Mr. Downer again made the request that His Worship would deal leniently with the children.
His Worship- The only thing I can do is to ask them whether they will be tried by me or the Supreme Court. I suppose you can decide. Mr. Downer, after hesitating, said they would be tried by His Worship, but he again asked him not to send them to the Industrial School or the Supreme Court.
His Worship- I would not do either if the father came forward as a man. If he wanted he could have left the Post-Office. I can't send them to the Industrial School as neglected children as they have a father. At the request of Mr. Downer, His Worship said he would let the case stand over till the father was sent for. On his arrival Mr. Downer put him in the box, where he stated that his office hours varied considerably. Generally he had to leave home about 11 or half-past, and did not get home till about 11. His wife was out of her mind. She would not allow him to be about the place. Could take better care of his children in future. The youngest was to go to school at the Meadows, and a friend had offered to take care of the eldest. Inspector Bee said he believed the prosecutor would be satisfied with that.
His Worship to Mr. Caldicott- I will allow you to take your children, but if they are found pilfering again I shall have to send them to the Industrial School, and make an order on you for their maintenance.
Mr. Caldicott- I have done the best I could to keep them right.

South Australian Register (Adelaide) Friday 7 February 1873
NEGLECTED AND CRIMINAL CHILDREN.
Anyone who has intelligently studied the history even of a young country like this must feel that there is yet great room for improvement in the means adopted for the suppression of crime, The system in operation deals rigorously with surface manifestations, but it does not probe the wound to the bottom; it aims at removing out of sight the overflowings of vice, but it leaves the fountain itself untouched. So soon as the culprit becomes sufficiently courageous to commit an overt act of criminality the law lays firm hold upon him, but it makes very little effort to withdraw him from evil courses until he has thus hopelessly committed himself. It lies placidly by watching him pass from bad to worse, knowing full well what the end of it all will be. It provides its police officers and detectives, its gaols and penitentiaries for the capture and punishment of unwary transgressors, but it winks at the existence of criminal nurseries which flourish in the light of day and annually send forth their dangerous brood to prey on the community. It sees parents deliberately bringing up their offspring to be a curse to society, a constant source of expense to the State, and yet it declines to interpose in time. The mischief must be done; vice must take firm root and germinate before repressive measures can be adopted. It seems to us that such a view of the duties and responsibilities of Government errs egregiously on the side of neglect. The problem of how far the State should interfere with the liberty of the subject is a perplexing one; but it need not be brought into the reckoning here, for the case is one in which the good of the public imperatively demands that interference should be resorted to. Where it is notorious that parents, either through being themselves vicious or through wanton and culpable neglect, are training up their offspring of suffering them to grow up a pest to the community, the Government should step in and remove the children from such contaminating influences. If the relatives are in a position to maintain them they should be required to do so; but if not, it is better that the public should be at the charge of clothing and feeding them and having them brought up as reputable members of society than that it should have to submit to the double tax of being preyed upon by them when out of prison and of supporting them when in it. It would be easy to multiply illustrations of the necessity for some such action as that here advocated. Scarcely a week passes without furnishing evidence of the seed for more effectual provision against the ill effects of unscrupulous parenting negligence. Of late two cases differing in character, have both of a very flagrant kind, have come before the public. The history of the first it is impossible to give in a few words, but the details are so apposite that we present them in full. About a month ago a letter appeared in the columns of the Register directing attention to the state of a family then resident at Unley whose predatory habits had become a scourge and whose mode of life had for a long time become a scandal to the neighbourhood. The fear of exposure which this letter might well have caused led to no practical result and at last one of the neighbours had sufficient public spirit to take steps to put a stop to the evil from which he had so long suffered. He laid an information and on January 22 two members of the family - little girls aged respectively twelve and nine years - were found guilty of theft at the Adelaide Police Court. They were, however, dismissed by Mr. Beddome upon the promise of their father to take better care of them for the future. The day but one following this dismissal the children were again brought before the Police Magistrate on the charge of wantonly throwing stones and again annoying the neighbourhood. This time Mr. Beddome, passing a . . . . upon the father, sent the children for three years to the Industrial School. The details of the young lives of these poor little criminals, and the circumstances which have led to their incarceration as, to use Mr. Beddome's own words, 'the best thing for them,' are of so revolting a character as to appear incredible, having made strict enquiry, however, we believe it is an undoubted fact that these children, with four others, have been for years growing up almost utterly untaught and uncared for amid the most shocking surroundings of negligence and filth. The head of the family is a Mr. Robert Henry Caldicott, a clerk in the General Post Office, Adelaide, in receipt of a stipend of £220 per annum. His family consists of a wife and six children- four boys and two girls - of various ages, ranging from fifteen down to two years. Mrs. Caldicott has been well educated; she was once an accomplished musician, and accustomed to the usages of good society, but she is now unhappily imbecile. For nine years, or perhaps longer, this family has resided in a cottage at Unley. About five years ago the attention of the neighbours began to be attracted towards their mode of life; the father was seldom at home, and for the last twelve months it has been widely known in the vicinity that his family were living in a most disgusting and barbarous state. The daily pursuit and almost the sole occupation of the children was to pilfer. Clothed in the scantiest of dirty ragged garments, with neither shoes nor stockings on their feet, boys and girls alike have been accustomed to scour the district late at night, in the early morning, and even in broad day light, stealing fruit, eggs clothes pegs, onions, and whatever else they could lay hands upon. Not only did they rob hen-roosts, but they would also, in wanton mischief, completely devastate the neighbours' fowl-yards, tearing the hencoops to pieces, and breaking down whatever was in their way. So fleet of foot were they, too, that they were extremely difficult to catch, even when seen in the act of stealing; and the neighbours who suffered by their ravages were too compassionate to press them hard, until at last the nuisance became unbearable. On one occasion one of the boys was found in a store with his hand in the money-till; but before he could be seized he was off and made good his escape. At last two of the children having stolen a beehive and a rake- both articles, by the way, being perfectly valueless to them- the owner determined upon taking measures to abate the annoyance. He went to their cottage, found the articles, and made known his intention to take steps against them; and so hardened had these poor children already become that the very same night on which the articles were found in their possession they paid another visit to this gentleman's house, and sitting on a fence close by, sang 'Slap bang ! Here we are again.' But what this gentleman saw upon his visit to the children's home led to more active steps being taken. The cottage consisted of two rooms with one window in each, but in neither window was there a single pane of glass. There were holes through the ceiling and roof in both rooms, and large holes through the walls. Two small out buildings adjoined at the back, but they could not be called rooms, inasmuch as neither of them had a particle of roof, door, or window. For furniture there were a fruit-box with a cedar table-top nailed to it, a pianoforte broken to pieces, an iron bedstead with neither mattress, sheets, nor blankets, an old rickety sofa, two or three broken chairs, a few cooking utensils, and a mass of filth and rubbish. The prosecutor of the children in his evidence at the Police Court said, alluding to the visit he had paid the hovel, "I cannot say whether the prisoners were present. There were three bundles wrapped in dirty rags, which I believe were children, but I could not say whether boys or girls." In this miserable place Mrs. Caldicott was wont to sit, perched upon the iron bedstead, some times perfectly nude, at other times with a single rag of a garment upon her; and here she would often remain for days together in a state of utter prostration and regardless of all that went on around her. The conduct of her husband and children towards her was so inhuman that they are reluctant to publish the particulars, amply vouched for as they are. And yet notwithstanding all, when the poor creature was urged to compel her husband by law to treat her as a husband ought to treat his wife, she would reply, "I could not say anything against my husband." Nor would she allow any one else in her presence to speak disparagingly of him. When the two little girls were being tried at the Police Court it was urged on behalf of Mr. Caldicott that he had ' heard nothing' of the pilfering habits of his children 'until lately.' We are in a position to state that about two years ago a gentleman wrote to him fully upon this very subject; and further, that another person addressed him by letter on the same subject some eighteen months ago. Mr. Caldicott himself urged that he had done the best he could to keep the children right. But upon this point it is sufficient to say that often for days together he never went near his family at all. His counsel pleaded for him in the Police Court that his office duties kept him in town from early morning till late at night, and thus prevented his giving proper attention to his family. We find, however, on enquiry, that his office hours are from 1.30 p.m. till about 9 or 10, and sometimes till 11 at night. Thus, with the whole morning at liberty, he had much more opportunity of watching over a young family than many a father who nevertheless trains up his children to be useful members of society. There is one other feature in the case which demands, a passing notice. It was stated before Mr. Beddome that a person was entrusted by Mr. Caldicott with the charge of his unfortunate family while he should be absent. How long this alleged arrangement may have been in force we cannot tell. Certainly the neighbours knew of no such person; but when, thoroughly aroused by the shocking rumours in circulation, they lately resolved to see for themselves whether these rumours were true, and if necessary to take action on behalf of Mrs. Caldicott, they found themselves opposed by a woman called Mrs. West - formerly known as Mrs. Lewis - who said she was in charge there, and forbade them to enter. The three gentlemen, however, went in, and discovered the nominal mistress of the house sitting on a corner of the iron bedstead with no other garment upon her than one of her husband's old shirts, and the cottage in other respects very much in its usual condition. It is proper to add that since these facts became known the family have been removed from Unley, but how far their condition has been improved we are not in a position to state. We have thought it well to be thus explicit in presenting the facts of this case, although even now, out of regard to the feelings of our readers, we have suppressed some of its most revolting features, not only because it is a telling illustration of the necessity for such a change in the law affecting neglected children as we have been recommending, but also because it is one that should receive the special attention of the authorities. It is not reputable that persons in the employ of the public should be allowed to follow the course pursued by Mr. Caldicott. The State has a right to demand of its paid servants that they should not deliberately leave their children to prey upon society while squandering their pay upon their own selfish gratifications. The other instance to which we referred above is that of the Thompson family, recorded in the Police Court proceedings of Friday, January 31, wherein a woman brought an information against her husband, whom she charged with desertion and adultery, for neglecting to maintain her and her children. The man declared that he had been driven from his home by his wife's infidelity, and produced his daughter- a child of twelve years- to bear testimony to her mother's shame. The woman rejoined by bringing forward an elder daughter to establish the story of the defendant's guilt; and the man met this daughter's evidence by representing her to be a common prostitute. No trouble seems to have been taken by either side to rebut the allegations of vicious living so freely bandied about, the particulars of which were of a thoroughly disgusting character; and the Police Magistrate very properly refused to relieve the husband from his liability to provide for the wants of his household. This gloomy picture of the lowest phase, of domestic life is rendered all the gloomier by the difficulty of suggesting any reasonable motive for the state of affairs that it brings to light. In places, where wages are poor, work scarce, and lodging-room scanty, there are incitements to low living of the kind indulged in by the Thompson family which are utterly wanting in Adelaide, where every ordinary labourer can earn sufficient to provide comfortably for himself and his family. The evil effects of such a condition of morality as this case reveals are very marked, but not more so than those due to criminal negligence of the kind displayed by Caldicott. It is from wretched homes of the kind described above that the streets are replenished with victims and the gaols with inmates, and it seems to us that the duty of the State in such matters is clear. Where it is evident beyond question from the testimony of the police or of neighbours of undoubted credibility that parents are unfit to bring up their children to be anything else than a nuisance to the community, the Government should step in and assume something like a guardianship over them- a guardianship which will not absolve their natural protectors from the necessity of contributing to their support, but will afford some guarantee for their being properly cared for and educated.

The Register (Adelaide) Wednesday 18 October 1905
Death Notice:
CALDICOTT.-On the 15th October, Robert Henry Caldicott, of Forest Range, aged 71.

Robert married Emma Eliza SAUNDERS [7837] [MRIN: 1840], daughter of Robert Tuckey SAUNDERS [7852] and Emma PEYTON [7853], on 24 Jun 1858 in St. John Church, Adelaide, South Australia. (Emma Eliza SAUNDERS [7837] was born in 1831 in Birmingham, Warwickshire, England, baptised on 1 Jul 1831 in St. Phillips Cathedral, Birmingham and died on 12 May 1891 in Parkside, Adelaide, South Australia.)

  Marriage Notes:

1858 SA Marriage 34/420 CALDICOTT Robert Henry SAUNDERS Emma Eliza Adelaide