The Journal of the DH Lawrence Society of Australia

ISSN No: 1039-9658 www.cybersydney.com.au/dhl Vol 17. No 1, February,2010

DEFENDING THE DARROCH THESIS

Dr Andrew Moore giving his talk

By ROBERT DARROCH Photographs by John Lacey

The DHLA held its 12th AGM and the 3rd

Margaret Jones Memorial Lecture at Minh’sRestaurant in Dulwich Hill on January 30.Andrew Moore, Associate Professor ofHistory at the University of Western Sydney(and author of The Secret Army and thePremier), gave the talk. About 20 membersand guests attended.

Andrew began by explaining the reason forhis talk. He had, suddenly and unexpectedly,found himself recently an unwilling combatantin “the history wars” (a term coined by

http://www.cybersydney.com.au/dhl

At the banquet table at Minh's Restaurant - Evie Harrison(foreground right) chats with Sally and JohnRothwell

Andrew Moore and Beverly Firth tuck into the Vitenamese paper

rice rolls

Artist Paul Delprat, in pith helmet, chats with

cartoonist Lindsay Foyle

Professor Stuart Macintyre to categorise theacademic reaction to what historian GeoffreyBlainey first called “the black armbandversion of [Australian] history”). (This latterterm was intended by Blainey – normallyregarded as a right-wing historian – tocriticise the contemporary theme of guilt inthe historical treatment of the role ofAboriginal matters in Australian history.)

Andrew’s portrayal of right-wing extremism in(mainly) the between-wars period as tendingtowards fascism had come under criticism by,again, a mainly right-wing source,spearheaded by ex-Liberal staffer (and nowhead of a Sydney think-tank, The SydneyInstitute) Gerard Henderson.

Henderson had written that Andrew’sportrayal (in, for example, The Secret Armyand the Premier) was biassed by Andrew'sopenly Labor point of view. Hendersonquestioned Andrew’s mainassertion/conclusion that right-wing para-military activity, often behind the scene, hadbeen a major factor in Australian politics andsociety in the between-war years. Accordingto Henderson there was no fascist activity ininter-war Australia, and no danger of civil warin 1932, the year Governor Game dismissedPremier Lang.

This view was subsequently taken up by anacademic historian, Richard Evans. Writing inthe the scholarly journal History Australia in2008, Evans had said that Andrew hadgreatly exaggerated the role and importanceof para-military right-wing activity in theperiod under question, and that in fact whatAndrew had called “the Old Guard” did notreally exist. Andrew, he argued, wasconflating minor, sporadic anti-Laboractivism, often by ex-servicemen, into anorganisation that had no substantiveexistence.

Needless to say, this undermined much ofAndrew’s academic work – indeed, his life’swork - and constituted a direct refutation anddenial of, among other things, The DarrochThesis (that DH Lawrence ran across asecret army in Sydney in 1922, and that hisAustralian novel Kangaroo was a thinly-fictionalised account of that encounter).

Andrew began his talk by confessing that itwas he who had first coined the term “TheDarroch Thesis” (in an exchange withLawrence scholar Dr Bruce Steele inOverland). He outlined the present disputeand reiterated his position as a nowcombatant in the history wars. He stronglyreasserted his belief in the Darroch Thesis.

He then gave a brief sketch of the evidencethat supported his account of the Old Guardand their between-wars activity. He said thatit had been born out of the activities of “the

farmers’ army” that had been recruited in1917 to combat a transport strike in NSW. Hetold of how this organisation was turned intoa “standing” reserve of secret soldiers thatwould be reactivated by its leaders wheneverLabor activity appeared to becomethreatening.

RobertWhitelaw

(right)and John

Ruffellslisten to

Andrew'stalk

He mentioned that Jack Scott was one of itsleaders, and he supported Darroch’sidentification of him as one of the charactersportrayed by Lawrence in Kangaroo. He toldhow this organisation spawned EricCampbell’s New Guard in 1931, and that itcontinued on into the late 1930s after Langwas sacked.

Andrew said that the contrast between thescant evidence Evans and Henderson wereadvancing, and the overwhelming evidencefor the existence of the Old Guard, was sogreat that it was hardly worth seriousattention.

Robert Darroch himself then reported on thelatest developments in the Darroch Thesissaga (see Secret Army Diary - cf. DHLAhome page). Then the society’s AGM washeld, with all the existing office-holders beingre-elected, en bloc, by acclamation.

And thus yet another pleasant DHLA functioncame to a satisfactory conclusion.

(Members may be interested in reading thefull text of Andrew's response to RichardEvans in History Australia, December 2009.The title of his article is “SuperintendentMacKay and the curious case of thevanishing secret army: a response to RichardEvans”. It is available online via MonashUniversity E-Press.)

R

DETAILS OF OUR AGM HELD AFTER ANDREW MOORE'S TALK - COMING SOON