Item 1 - William Gore Elliston Diary

Identity area

Reference code

AU TAS UTAS SPARC H13-1

Title

William Gore Elliston Diary

Date(s)

  • 1829-1864 (Creation)

Level of description

Item

Extent and medium

1 folder

Context area

Name of creator

(1798-1872)

Biographical history

William Gore Elliston (1798-1872), schoolmaster and editor, was born on 17 October 1798 at Bath, England, the eldest son of Robert William Elliston, actor and theatre manager. After education at Martley, Worcestershire, he was admitted a pensioner at Trinity College, Cambridge in 1824. He then managed the reading room at Lymington and, for a time, the Royal Theatre, Drury Lane, London. For more information see: http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/elliston-william-gore-2024

Name of creator

(1911-1980)

Biographical history

John Noel Douglas Harrison spent 25 years in Malaya and China, surviving several years in Changi prison camp and a murder attempt by bandits, before settling in Tasmania in 1958.
Harrison was born in 1911. He left England at the age of 22 to take up an appointment as probationary Assistant Commissioner in the Malaya Police Service. In 1933 he was sent to China to study Cantonese for two years, and he was later to teach this language to fellow prisoners in Changi. He was a POW in Changi in 1942 and 1943 before being moved to Sime Road in May 1944 until his release in 1945. While imprisoned he used his talent for drawing, his sketches and paintings depicting many aspects of prison life. He was later to exhibit in the Royal Academy and the Paris Salon.

In 1948, at the beginning of the Malayan Emergency, Harrison was appointed Superintending Officer of Police at Tapah, one of the areas worst affected by Communist terrorism. Two months after his appointment as CPO, Negri Sembilan, in May 1949, he was ambushed at Durian Tipus and lost part of his right hand. For a year from April 1952 he was in charge of retraining all police officers and men, and then served two years as CPO, Perak. His final posting before retirement was to Alor Star, Kedah/Perlis in 1955 as Chief Police Officer. John Harrison died in October 1980.

Immediate source of acquisition or transfer

Donated by J.N.D. Harrison.

Content and structure area

Scope and content

Diary of William Gore Elliston 1829 - 1864 as transcribed by J.N.D. Harrison - consists of a typed carbon copy on flimsy paper

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Conditions governing reproduction

This material is made available for personal research and study purposes under the University of Tasmania Standard Copyright Licence. For any further use permission should be obtained from the copyright owners. For assistance please contact Special.Collections@utas.edu.au

When reusing this material, please cite the reference number and provide the following acknowledgement:
“Courtesy of the UTAS Library Special & Rare Collections”

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Dates of creation revision deletion

He Jan 2018

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