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Portrait of Natalia Davies
Title : Portrait of Natalia Davies Portrait of Natalia Davies
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Date of creation : ca. 1928
Format : Photograph
Contributor : State Library catalogue
Catalogue record
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Description :

Natalia Davies graduated from Adelaide University in 1930 but had begun teaching several years previously. In 1933 she founded the Defence Society and provided classes for the largely female membership in rifle maintenance, first aid, fire drill, and motor mechanics and electrical engineering.


From 1940 the range of skills was broadened to include first aid, home nursing. The society's members were predominantly women drawn from all walks of life. For a fee of a shilling (about 10 cents) an hour, the society taught women to shoot and maintain a rifle. After Japan's entry into the war in 1942 members went on duty every night at a roof-watching post in the city.
Subjects
Related names :

Defence Society (Adelaide, S. Aust.)

Period : 1927-1939
Further reading :

Beaumont, Joan (ed.) Australia's war, 1939-1945, St. Leonards, N.S.W.: Allen & Unwin, 1995

Bolt, Andrew Our home front 1939-1945, Melbourne: Wilkinson Books, c1995

Clark, Rosemary The home front: life in Australia during World War II, Melbourne: Australia Post, 1991

The Home front family album: remembering Australia 1939-1945, introduction by Nancy Keesing, Sydney: Weldon, 1991

McKernan, Michael All in!: Australia during the second world war, Melbourne, Vic.: Nelson, 1983

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