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M Cigler, The Afghans in Australia, 1986; W Geisler, Durch Australiens Wildnis, 1928; R G Kimber, Man From Arltunga, 1980; P Roikowski,
In the Tracks of the Camelmen, 1987; R G Kimber, Private records (unpublished); T A Bradshaw, Diary note of May 1902 (kindly provided by
Mrs C Torlack of the Conservation Commission of the NT, Alice Springs).
R G KIMBER, Vol 1.
SALT, FREDERICK (FRED) (1913– ), soldier, mental health officer and security officer, was born
on 25 July 1913 just outside of the village of Salt in Staffordshire, where the Salt family had lived since the
11th century. He was the eldest son of soldier and miner Frederick Salt, and Gertrude, nee Bailey. There were
five children, three boys and two girls. Salt was educated at Queen Street primary school, and later Queensbury
Road secondary school in Stoke on Trent. At the age of 12 Salt bought a sixpenny copybook and started the
life-long habit of keeping a diary. The keeping of detailed records may have been a family trait as one of his
ancestors, Sir William Salt, laid the foundation of the Staffordshire Records Office. Salt’s mother wanted him
to be an Anglican minister, but his father and grandfather insisted that he follow in the long Salt family tradition
of military service. In 1930, he joined the North Staffordshire Regiment as drummer boy, and completed his
secondary education while serving with the Army.
In 1932, Salt transferred to the Royal Horse Artillery and was posted to India. He served in the Central Provinces
and the North West Frontier, and was part of the expedition mounted to hunt down the anti-British Mohmand
leader, the Fakir of Ipi. Salt was awarded North-West Frontier medals in 1935 and 1936. In 1938, he returned to
England pending discharge from the Army. It was during this time that Salt made his, almost accidental, entry
into the field of mental health. His girlfriend, later his wife, Helen, was a mental health nurse. With an important
soccer match coming up, the mental health service was short of a player. Salt, a keen soccer, rugby and cricket
player was co-opted for the match. He scored two goals, and won the match for the team. The mental health group
was keen to retain their new player, and persuaded Salt to begin studies at the Shenley Mental Health Hospital
near St Albans.
On 15 June 1939, Salt was recalled by the Army, and posted as non-commissioned officer of Signals with
the Medium Artillery Regiment. The regiment was sent to France in October 1939 but, in May 1940, joined the
340 000 Allied troops forced to retreat across the English Channel through the Dunkirk beachhead. Salt was put
in charge of training new conscripts for the military build-up. On 6 June 1944, D-Day, Salt’s regiment as part of
the Allied offensive against Hitler’s Fortress Europe landed on the beaches of Normandy. At dawn, the regiment
came under attack by a German Focker Wolf aircraft. Salt did not have time to get to the trenches, so flung himself
down in the space under a gun. The spade of the gun, a metal plate designed to prevent the gun from recoiling
back on the gunner, took a direct hit, blowing a hole in the plate only inches from his head. Salt served in Europe
during the whole of the Second World War and was awarded the France and Germany medals, the Defence Medal,
the 1939–45 Star and the Victory Medal.
Salt finished his military career in 1946, and returned to Shenley to continue his mental health studies. He took
all three certificates then available on the subject and, in 1951, started teaching mental health care and hygiene to
student nurses at Shenley. He also ran a stud farm, providing horses for the Lord Lieutenant of the County. In 1954,
Salt was offered a scholarship to Kings College, Cambridge, to further his studies. However, he had also been
offered the post of Superintendent of the Sarawak Mental Hospital in Borneo, which he accepted.
The task in Sarawak proved somewhat larger than Salt had anticipated. There was no mental hospital, although
the British had allocated land for the purpose. Sarawak had been declared a Crown Colony in 1946, the hundred-year
reign of the Brooke family ‘the White Rajahs’ having ended in 1941 when the Japanese drove out the third Rajah.
When Salt arrived in Kuching, the capital of Sarawak, he found 320 mental patients housed in four outbuildings
behind the general hospital. These were mainly Chinese, Malays and Dyaks, many with severe problems relating
to the Japanese occupation. Not the least of Salt’s problems was the language barrier, although he did speak Malay
and Hindi. He was also without staff, and had to battle to acquire suitable staff, and even basic equipment for his
patients. He organised the building of the new mental hospital seven miles outside Kuching, and trained Chinese,
Dyak and Malay nursing staff. Salt also served as officer in charge of the Kuching Port Authority medical facilities.
By May 1958, the mental hospital was nearing completion. Salt chose 6 June for the opening. That year finally
saw the appointment of a qualified psychiatrist to the hospital as Deputy Superintendent to Salt, and the opening
of outpatient clinics. On 11 June 1960, Salt was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE)
for his work in Sarawak.
Salt had married Helen Hunter in the Chelsea Registry Office, London, on 21 July 1940. There were two sons
of the marriage, Frederick Gordon and Robin Hunter. Salt’s wife did not accompany him to Sarawak. While in
Sarawak, he married a Dyak girl called Sanggan. There were three boys and one girl from this marriage. In early
1969 ‘Doctor’ Salt, as he was always called, finally left Sarawak for Australia, arriving in Melbourne in November
1968 with his wife and family. He started work teaching, but soon determined to move to a warmer part of
Australia.
Salt wrote to Spike Langsford, the Director of Medical Services in the Northern Territory, regarding a position
in the mental health field. Langsford showed the letter to Dr Cowdy, the only psychiatrist in the Health Department.
Cowdy urged that Salt be offered a position. However, there was one slight problem in that the only vacancy they
had listed in the mental health sector was for a nursing sister. Salt arrived in Darwin in April 1969 and took charge
of the infamous Ward One at the Darwin Hospital on Myilly Point as ‘Mr Salt’. Although it was supposed to be a
psychiatric ward, its residents were often chronic alcoholics, or the overflow from surgery wards. It was always