Sylvia Chase
A Remarkable Woman
One of 10 children, Sylvia Mabel Chase was born in 1897 at Sydney Grammar School where her father, Albert Weigall, was headmaster for 45 years. Her maternal great-grandfather, James Raymond, was the first postmaster-General of New South Wales from 1833 to 1851. Contrary to the general custom of the time, Albert Weigall insisted that his five daughters as well as his sons should have a career.
After attending Kambala School, Sylvia Mabel chose nursing and studied first in Melbourne then in Sydney. When WWI broke out, she volunteered for overseas service and sailed for Egypt in November 1914 with the hospital ship Kyarra. For the next four years, she worked, as she quietly put it, in Egypt, just behind the front lines in France, and then in the hospital ship on the high seas. In 1919 she came back as Matron of Kyarra.
The only recorded comments on what must have been a gruelling experience for someone so young were apparently typical of this quiet, compassionate woman "How often I admired their (the wounded soldiers) courage and spirit in the hospital". Shortly after the war, she married Cedric Chase, a brilliant architect who was wounded at Gallipoli, then badly wounded in France. As a result of the second wound, Cedric died in 1929 in France, where the couple lived for about 10 years. At the age of 32, Sylvia came home to widowhood and voluntary social work.
A LIBRARY WITH NO BOOKS
In 1937 when the first Police Boys Club was established in Woolloomooloo, the Police Commissioner of the time asked Mrs Chase to look after its library.
Since there was no library, Mrs Chase bought the first books with her own money and continued to build the library from her own resources. For more than 22 years, she was at the Club every night, handing out books, soft drinks and biscuits which she also provided. She gave her time, energy and understanding even more freely to the boys, listening to their problems and also to parents who sought her advice and help.
When WWII came, she wrote regularly and sent parcels to 170 of "her boys" who were on active service in Africa, the Middle East and New Guinea. After the war, she became godmother to dozens of their children. FIRST LIFE GOVERNOR Helping young people seemed natural for the woman who later became our first Life Governor. She learned the great pride that comes from nurturing young people from her father.
"My father always said he was not interested who and what the boys were when they came to his school, only what they were when they left it. I found the same principle in the Clubs" she once said. "I remember many boys who were not much good when they came in but who grew up to be fine young men in the Club. That's why I'm so fond of the movement".
Affectionately called "Lady", no matter how strongly she protested, she is remembered still with great affection and gratitude by the boys she cared for so long ago. Sylvia Mabel Chase was awarded the MBE in the late 1950s for her work with the Police Boys Clubs.
THE SYLVIA CHASE MEMORIAL LEAGUE
The Sylvia Chase Memorial League is a tribute to a remarkable woman affectionately called 'Lady' Chase by many who knew her. The Sylvia Chase Memorial League is a very special group of people whose thoughtfulness, planning and generosity in leaving a bequest to PCYC will become an enduring memorial, multiplying itself in the changed lives of disadvantaged and vulnerable young people for generations to come.
