Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

After four years of war, many returned servicemen looked forward to a peaceful life back home with family and friends. This was not so for George Quigley, whose post-war life was a time of trouble. In the 1920s he faced charges of larceny, assault and attempted murder, for which he served time in gaol, and he was later caught up in a war pension fraud involving his estranged wife Elsie.George Quigley was born in Carlton in 1889, the son of Samuel Quigley and Harriet Lawlor (Lalor). He had five siblings, including an older brother of the same name who was born in 1887 and died at the age of seven weeks. He married Elsie May Davey in 1908, but within 3 months he was charged with unlawfully deserting his teenage wife, as he had neither a job nor the means of supporting her. Their first child Vera May was born in 1909, but she died at the age of one month. A second child, George Rupert, was born in 1913. Elsie went on to have at least six (possibly eight) other children, born between 1915 and 1930 and bearing the name "Quigley", but George later denied that he was the father.1

At the time of his enlistment on 31 July 1915, George was 25 years old, working as a wharf labourer and living in Market Street, Fitzroy. The address for Elsie as next of kin was later changed to Rose Street, Fitzroy. Private George Quigley embarked from Melbourne on 8 February 1916 on HMAT Warilda and joined the 21st Battalion in France. He was wounded in action on 24 August 1916 and spent three weeks in hospital with "shell shock". He rejoined the battalion in September 1916, but had several other hospital admissions for gastritis and diarrhoea. There is little doubt that the stress of war and insanitary conditions in the field contributed to his illness. George received a gun shot wound to the left foot in July 1918, a few months before the end of the war. During the war, it was not uncommon for servicemen to overstay their leave passes and be charged with the "crime" of being AWL. Private George Quigley was no exception and his service record shows charges on 17 April 1917 and 29 October 1918, resulting in the forfeiture of a total of 9 days' pay. He returned to Australia on the Castalia on 30 May 1919 and was discharged from the AIF on 14 July 1919.

It is not clear whether George returned to his wife Elsie May after his discharge. When Elsie was investigated for pension fraud in 1932, she was reported as stating that her husband had gone to war and "no one knows where he is or what has become of him." The report by Constable Luke Reid Nelson concluded "Mrs Quigley is also a convicted person and of bad repute", which casts some doubt on the veracity of her statement. We know from newspaper accounts that Elsie was in Rose Street, Fitzroy in August 1920, when she and a man named Herbert Backhouse were targets of a shooting by Backhouse's brother-in-law Thomas Edward Moran. This incident bore some similarity to a later shooting involving George Quigley and Mary Skelton in 1922.2,3

George resumed his work as a wharf labourer, in an environment where there was ample opportunity for pilfering and other crimes. He was charged with assault in May 1920, for which he received a fine of £5 or 14 days' imprisonment. In October 1921, he was charged with stealing two dozen table forks, the property of J. and A. Boyes ironmongery store in Elizabeth Street, Melbourne. He pleaded not guilty in the General Sessions Court of Melbourne in November 1921 and was given a suspended sentence of six months' "on his own bond of £50 to be of good behaviour for two years." There was a charge against George Quigley of "illegally using a horse and gig" in Ballarat in March 1922, but his identity was in question because this "George Quigley" was also known as "George O'Keefe." 4

So far, George had avoided a custodial sentence, but this changed with a more serious charge of attempted murder in 1922. The evidence presented in court also sheds some light on George's personal life in the immediate post-war years. Mary Amelia Skelton, a married woman living in Shakespeare Street, North Carlton, stated that she had known George Quigley for 4 years and had lived with him for 18 months. She had left him about 5 months previously to live with her sister in Drummond Street, Carlton, then she returned to her husband William Skelton. On the evening of 15 April 1922, George Quigley visited the Skelton house in Shakespeare Street, in the hope of persuading Mary to return to him. She would not allow him to enter the house and, in the ensuing struggle, a shot was fired and Mary was wounded in the arm, though not seriously. She was taken by her sister to Melbourne Hospital, where she was treated as an outpatient.5

Quigley pleaded not quilty to the charge of attempted murder and was committed for trial at the Supreme Court of Melbourne on 15 May 1922. In his defence, he claimed that he had not intended to shoot Mrs Skelton and that the revolver had gone off accidently. John Kennedy, a witness who lived nearby in Lygon Street, reported hearing a shot and the voice of a man saying, "There's no harm done. It's a pity it didn't settle you." Considering the evidence, the jury was on George's side, possibly swayed by the romantic nature of the crime, and returned a guilty verdict of unlawfully wounding without intent to do grevious bodily harm. George Quigley was sentenced to 12 months' gaol and he served an additional 6 months' sentence for breaking his previous good behaviour bond.6,7

George was released from gaol on 25 August 1923 and, less than a year later, he was facing another assault charge involving Mary Skelton. They were living together at 18 Murchison Street, Carlton and, on the evening of 4 July 1924, Mary alleged that George had thrown a knife at her. There was no doubt that Mary was injured - she was bleeding from a head wound that required hospital treatment - but the circumstances of the alleged assault were questionable. George refuted her allegation, claiming that Mary had attacked him and he had pushed her away and her injury had resulted from a fall. When the case was heard in Carlton Court on 15 July, Mary admitted to having had been drinking on day of the assault. George was sentenced to one month's gaol and he was released on 14 August 1924.8,9

The last stint in gaol was not quite the end of George's criminal history, nor was it the end of his domestic strife with Mary. In April 1926 he was charged with receiving stolen goods, a case and a number of magnetos, being the property of the Melbourne Harbour Trust Commissioners. Quigley and his co-accused Frank Currie pleaded not guilty in the General Sessions Court of Melbourne and both were discharged. George was living in Cobden Street, South Melbourne, at the time and Mary was at the same address. In June 1928, Mary Skelton laid a charge of assault against George Quigley, but she failed to appear in South Melbourne Court. The chairman made a comment that "It's only history repeating itself," while the sergeant said that the man and woman had a brawl, and the woman "made a convenience of the police." 10,11,12

George and Mary moved back to Carlton, living at 14 High Street, from 1930 onwards. In the meantime, George's wife Elsie was living with a man, known variously as Albert George Quigley, alias Backhouse, alias Thomas Lalor, alias Foster, who may have been the same Herbert Backhouse involved in the Fitzroy shooting incident in 1920. He claimed to be a returned serviceman, but a police investigation in 1932 revealed that he was posing as Elsie's husband and was not the same George Quigley who had served with the AIF in World War 1. At the time, Elsie had six children ranging in age from 18 months to 15 years and she was drawing a war pension. In sworn evidence, George Quigley stated that these children were not the issue of his marriage to Elsie May Quigley and that the only issue was one child over the age of 16 years. Elsie was found guilty of claiming a war pension under false pretences and her payment was cancelled after 23 March 1932. A year later in June 1933, when she was living in Little Palmerston Street, Carlton, she pleaded guilty to a charge of shoplifting a coat from Holders Pty. Ltd. in the city. Elsie was sentenced to 14 days' imprisonment and her co-accused, niece May Davey, was given a suspended sentence of 14 days' on her entering into a good behaviour bond for two years.13,14,15,16

George Quigley died at Heidelberg Military Hospital on 6 June 1947, aged 58 years, and was buried in the Warringal Cemetery, Heidelberg. His death notice, published in The Age on 9 June 1947, refers to George as "dearly beloved friend of Mary Skelton". Mary remained in High Street, Carlton until the 1950s. She died in 1963, aged 78 years.17

Notes and References:
1 The Age, 9 January 1909, p. 20
2 Report of Constable Luke Reid Nelson, 8 March 1932 (NAA:B741, V/9617)
3 The Argus, 22 September 1920, p. 19
4 Criminal Presentations (VPRS 17020/P1/49)
5 The Argus, 28 April 1922, p. 9
6 The Age, 18 May 1922, p. 6
7 Prisoner No. 36181, Victoria Prison Register, vol. 71, p. 292
8 The Age, 16 July, 1924, p. 11
9 The Argus, 16 July 1924, p. 17
10 Criminal Presentations (VPRS 17020/P1/60)
11 The Age, 17 April 1926, p. 13
12 Record (Emerald Hill), 23 June 1928, p. 3
13 War Pension Investigation, 18 March 1932 (NAA:B741, V/9617)
14 According to his war service record, George Quigley requested a replacement of his AIF discharge certificate in 1927 and his returned services badge in 1930, which he claimed to have lost. It is possible that these lost items were used to establish a false identity.
15 The child acknowledged by George Quigley was not named, but parts of the report have been expunged for privacy reasons.
16 The Age, 7 June 1933, p. 13
17 The Age, 9 June 1947, p. 10. The death notice appeared in the "On Active Service" column of the newspaper, but no record of George Quigley's service beyond his discharge from the AIF in 1919 has been located.

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