It now seems that in Kangaroo Lawrence conjured up an amalgam - as we shall see, he made much use of such amalgams - of his Whitmanesque League of Comrades and Australia's actual secret-army structures. (In Kangaroo he alludes to Walt Whitman's League of Comrades in the chapter about the "fictional" union leader, "Willie" Struthers.)

Today we know that the "little squads" in Scott's secret army were organised, not primarily in units of 10 or 20, but in multiples of five - that being the number who could fit into a car (the organisation of the secret army being, in essence, a mobilisation plan based on car-ownership - hence its Sydney nickname "the garage", and Jack Callcott's "profession" in Kangaroo..."garage proprietor").

In the text of the novel there are numerous correlations between Lawrence's "fiction" and historical fact. Perhaps the most persuasive one comes in chapter 5 "Coo-ee", when Callcott tells Somers about the background of Diggers/Maggies organisation:

"How long have you been started?" [asked Somers] "About eighteen months - nearly two years altogether." [replied Callcott]

The King and Empire Alliance was formed following a public rally in Sydney in July 1920, following the election of the Storey-Dooley Labor Government in March of that year - "nearly two years" to the very week when Lawrence and Scott (I argue) had their secret-army conversation on the beach below "Wyewurk" in early June 1922.

Over the ensuing years - decades - of the research, other correlations between fact and fiction emerged.

My colleague (now Professor) Andrew Moore found a telling one when interviewing people on Sydney's North Shore who were familiar with the Old-Guard milieu.

(Traditionally, those who lived on the northern side of Sydney Harbour - referred to as "the North Shore" - made up the more conservative element in Sydney society.)

One woman he interviewed, a Mrs Jeffery, recalled that at bridge parties on the North Shore in the 1930s Jack Scott had been "ribbed" over his portrayal as Jack Callcott in Kangaroo.