Courier-Mail (Brisbane, Qld. : 1933 - 1954), Saturday 3 May 1941, page 7


FIRST VOLUNTARY A.R.P. POST

ON Saturday, May 17, an A.R.P. parade from the Jubilee Terrace Police Station to St. John's Wood, Ashgrove, will inaugurate the first A.R.P. first-aid post to be established in Queensland by voluntary effort.

The parade, which is being organised by the Ashgrove air raid wardens, will include, it is anticipated, representatives of wardens from adjacent districts, including Kelvin Grove, Ithaca, Bardon and Red Hill.

Other bodies which are being invited to take in the march are the Ashgrove and Ithaca Junior Red Cross, the 1st, Company of the

Brisbane Boys' Brigade, the Returned Soldiers' League Volunteer Defence Corps., the Fire Brigade and the Ambulance Brigade. Drum and fife bands from the Ashgrove, Ithaca Creek and Oakleigh State schools, together with the band of the Boys' Brigade will take part. The official opening at 3 p.m. will be performed by Mr. W. Richardson, chairman of the Queensland Ambulance Transport Brigade. Recent war developments give added emphasis to the foresight of St. John's Wood in establishing its own A.R.P. first-aid station. The movement owes its origin to the enterprise and generosity of Mr. W. R. Johnstone, who after an active life in the bush, is now living in retirement in, but not idleness, in Piddington Street, St. John's Wood. He realised that the nearest first-aid centre at the Ashgrove Hall was too far from St. John's Wood to be effective in time of emergency. Also, that it was in a thickly populated centre, and might be fully occupied in attending to its own immediate needs to adequately serve surrounding districts. He offered to provide a first-aid centre and equip it at his own expense. Other patriotic citizens came to his assistant. Mr. E. A. Hawkins, of Clayfield, offered a room in the recreation hall at the old St. John's Wood homestead. This has now been fully equipped, and is ready to serve the district when and if an emergency should arise. Nurse G. Weight, of St. John's

Wood, offered her services, and her husband, Mr. R. J. Weight, offered his motor car and camping equipment. Other owners of trucks and cars also offered assistance, and Mr. C. W. Bellingham is to be lecturer for first-aid classes. My Johnstone describes his career in the Queensland bush as "from horse boy to station owner". He has had to be bush doctor and nurse at a moment's notice in places far removed from skilled medical aid. On one occasion he was the only one at hand when a boundary rider had his leg fractured and his eye gouged out of its socket by his horse striking a tree. Mr. Johnstone replaced the eye, saving its sight and set the fractured leg. Then he set out with the patient many miles to the nearest doctor in Mt. Perry. There the doctor complimented him on his work, his only criticism being that he had not pulled the patient's leg hard enough.