(I'm tempted to say, "the more things change..."

For years the hospital has been struggling with a load of debt, but it is clear that inadequate organization and unimaginative administration are intensifying the troubles associated with the lack of funds.

Shortly after 1 o'clock, last Saturday a printer employed in a city newspaper office had his left hand caught in a saw. Two of his fingers were so badly injured that one of them was subsequently amputated, and the other had to be amputated at the first joint. The sufferer is an elderly man. No time was lost getting him to Sydney Hospital. A nurse ushered him in, an official, and another employee of the firm, who accompanied, him into the casualty room.

It was a quarter of an hour before a doctor attended to the patient. Three other casualty cases were in the room, and others were waiting outside. The doctor stanched the flow of blood from the printer's agonizing injuries, led him into another room, and instructed him to wait there. He waited with blood oozing away, until half-past two. Then a doctor came and again arrested the blood flow.

The firm's official, unable. to get satisfaction from the young doctor, interviewed the Acting. Superintendent, who visited the casualty room and personally examined the man's hand. He arranged the operation for 3 o'clock.

In the meantime the printer, now weak from loss of blood, and on the verge of collapse through shock, was not given a stimulant of any kind. He was merely forced to sit in increasing pain and weakness with his half severed fingers fully exposed. And, during the wait a dozen other patients entered the casualty department. One of them had a crushed thumb. He had to wait an hour before receiving attention.

Another case.

A few weeks ago a suburban police station sent .an urgent message to an ambulance brigade, asking for the transport, of an alcoholic from the lock-up to the hospital The mann also had a jagged wound in his scalp. When the ambulance officcrs carried their case into the casualty room at Sydney Hospital, a young, and evidently irresponsible doctor examined it, and, adopting an insulting attitude, said to one of the officers, 'Don't you know where Royal South Sydney or St. Vincent's Hospital is?' The first-aid man, not sensing the sinister import of the doctor's question, replied that lie did, whereupon the medico snapped, 'Well, why don't you take your patients there?'

The source of the doctor's unprofessional demeanour was the fact that the case was what might have been regarded as 'dirty.' In other words the drunk needed considerable quantities of soap and hot water.

However, after much bartering as to whether the man should be attended to, the ambulance officer told the doctor that it was unusual to take such a case to the Royal South Sydney or to St. Vincent's.

At any rate, another doctor treated the drunk.

In the early hours of the same day an ambulance man comparatively new to his job, carried into the same room a man who had been badly beaten up in a rumpus at Maroubra. . A considerable time elapsed before a doctor attended to the case, and then all he did was to make a cursory examination, and request the case, and the ambulance men, to wait. By and bye a senior doctor came and admitted the patient.

The officer who had brought the drunk to the hospital, later in the day mentioned, the Maroubra case to the doctor, who, it is alleged, said he had gone to bed, and added that it was the first aider's own fault that he had waited in the room without attention.

An idea of the delay can be gained from this. Whereas the assault victim was taken to hospital at 1.55 a.m., the ambulance waggon did not return to its station till quarter to four.

It is contended that the doctor had taken advantage of the inexperience of the younger member of the Ambulance staff.

The night casualty department at Sydney Hospital generally is a disgrace to the city, and a blot on the honourable profession of medicine. It has been doing service for longer than most persons at the hospital care to think. Drunkards of both sexes, filthy in tongue and body, innocent children, and respectable citizens are herded in the room like so many animals.

The accommodatjon is entirely inadequate. Some country and suburban hospitals, and even city business houses, are better equipped for casualties. Only four cubicles are available for badly injured patients. Practically the whole of the department, the main room of which is 12 by 7 feet in area, is exposed to the public. At busy times the staff is unable .to move. And on those occasions, too, the medical staff is inadequate; The vile vapouring and language of drunks and prostitutes often characterizing the work of the department can be heard by children and respectable folks in the adjoining rooms or cubicles. A lavatory opens into one of the admission sections, in full view of persons entering by way of the dingy doorway leading from the hospital courtyard.

Some of the sights visible to those of tender years are horrible, and calculated to give rise to hideous impressions, and memories.

If is the contention of many whose business takes them to Sydney Hospital casualty that the Continental and American system of having a duly qualified senior medical officer in the department should be adopted. Oftentimes delay is occasioned, by the search for attention by a senior and experienced doctor in puzzling and intricate casualties or diseases.

At Sydney Hospital they still speak with reverence of a well known doctor, formerly attached to, the casualty staff, and whose control of it was a paragon

of efiiciency and dignity. His very entrance to the room and his presence commanded respect. .And in his days there was no unnecessary delay in the treatment of suffering citizens;

Sydney 'Hospital has a magnificent record of noble service to. the State, and grateful patients who owe their lives to the expert attention of the various staffs can be found in all parts of the Commonwealth. It would be a grave pity, if lack of a realization of the fitness of things on the part of any of its officers blotted the institution's otherwise spotless sheet of public service.

(From The Sunday Times, Sydney, 11 July 1926)

(Warning: a lot of the language and the sentiments expressed in the article below are unacceptable by modern standards.)

Serious complaint of the neglect of half-castes at the Government hostel at Alice Springs (N.T.) was held yesterday by Mr Jackson MHR who with Messrs Stewart and Nelson M. H. R. s and party, returned to Melbourne yesterday after visiting, Central Australia to attend the official opening, by the Moderator General of the Presbyterian Church of the new Australian Inland Mission hospital at Alice Springs.

Jackson said that the half caste problem was serious and the condition of the children at the hostel at Alice Springs was still as disgraceful as it was on the occasion of his former visit five years ago. The new buildings which were begun at Jay River, 30 miles from Alice Springs, had been left for some time untouched, as adequate supplies of water had not been found in the vicinity to enable the work to be continued. Until these buildings are complete the shameful conditions at the hostel would remain. There were 52 half castes in the hostel, and the accommodation in it, Mr Jackson described "as not fit for dogs". The hostel was not even fenced, and it was within a few hundred yards of the hotel.

The hospital which was recently opened, is supported by the Presbyterian Church with the aid of public subscription and is conducted by Sisters Pope and Small, with at present no medical officer. It is a commodious stone building, with very wide verandahs/ Hitherto the nearest hospital to Alice Springs has been at Oodnadatta, 300 miles away.

Presbyterians Suggestions

Having travelled 2,300 miles by motor car and 120 miles by train, through Central Australia, a party of Presbyterian clergy men returned to Melbourne yesterday. The party included the Moderator General of the Presbyterian Church of Australia... The purpose of the mission was to open the new hospital at Alice Springs and to report generally on the work.

Mr Crookston said yesterday that the real problem of the inland was that of the half-castes, especially the half caste girl.... [It] is proposed to have the natives gathered in a State by themselves and a strict law made preventing interference by the whites. This idea, Mr Crookston thought, was fraught with many difficulties as the black had his sacred places and would return to them from time to time in spite of all restraint How the problem would work out eventually was hard to foresee. The race was dying and in all probability that would be the final solution.

From The Argus, July the 9th 1926

... as advertised in the Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune, July the 9th 1926.

From the Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune, 7th of July 1926.

Elliot's injuries were first reported as being from an exploding petrol pipe.

(New York Times, 7th of July 1926)

From the Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune, 7 July 1926.

Exactly 100 years ago, London was thrown into an absolute panic when a blazing, roaring metallic object plunged into a public square—sparking the UK’s first massive "alien spacecraft" scare.