The Rifle Club Movement and Australian Defence 1860-1941

Abstract

This thesis examines the rifle club movement and its relationship with Australian defence to 1941. It looks at the origins and evolution of the rifle clubs and associations within the context of defence developments. It analyses their leadership, structure, levels of Government and Defence support, motivations and activities, focusing on the peak bodies. The primary question addressed is: why the rifle club movement, despite its strong association with military rifle shooting, failed to realise its potential as an active military reserve, leading it to be by-passed by the military as an effective force in two world wars? In the 19th century, what became known as the rifle club movement evolved alongside defence developments in the Australian colonies. Rifle associations were formed to support the Volunteers and later Militia forces, with the first ‘national’ rifle association formed in 1888. Defence authorities came to see rifle clubs, especially the popular civilian rifle clubs, as a cheap defence asset, and demanded more control in return for ammunition grants, free rail travel and use of rifle ranges. At the same time, civilian rifle clubs grew in influence within their associations and their members resisted military control. An essential contradiction developed. The military wanted rifle clubs to conduct shooting ‘under service conditions’, which included drill; the rifle clubs preferred their traditional target shooting for money prizes. The ageing leadership of the rifle associations, although pro-military in sentiment, failed to integrate the rifle clubs into the military structure and was unable to appease either the military or the clubs. The end result was a disconnect between the needs and aims of the military and rifle club movement, and a growing mutual disdain. The outcome, when war came in 1914 and again in 1939, was that the military ignored the movement and developed new structures to meet the wartime challenges. This thesis argues that this outcome was inevitable given the failure of the rifle club movement either to break away from its military roots, or adapt to evolving military requirements in accordance with its traditional aims.