George Ernest Billings
Disobeying a lawful command
Domingo Carlos
Illegally boarding a ship
Joseph Clapham
Supplying liquor to a soldier
Freda Clive
Keeping a brothel
Alfred Davis
Giving false answers
Peter Fraser
Seditious utterances
Joseph Jones
Seditious utterances
Mati Jujnovich
Failing to do national service
Rua Kēnana
Resisting police
Roy James Lambess
Desertion
Ernest Lynd
Publishing a disloyal statement
Terrence John McKenna
Illegally wearing a uniform
John O'Neill
Sedition
Thomas Simpkins
Failing to enrol
Robert Strachan
Obstructing a military guard
Tom Young
Inciting a seditious strike
Click on each person's name to find out more about their crime.
The War Regulations Act passed in 1914 gave the government special powers to control the activities of the public. The War Regulations extended police powers to monitor and control ‘enemy aliens’, to suppress anti-war political meetings and publications, to imprison prostitutes, to force reluctant conscripts into uniform, and much else.
While the government saw these measures as necessary to ensure the success of the war effort, critics thought them heavy-handed impositions on individual civil liberties. The 16 individuals pictured were each imprisoned for a breach of wartime law.
Images: Police Gazette
Design: Ministry for Culture and Heritage.
