How one egg thrower sparked the formation of the Australian Federal Police

Egg Boy will likely go down as one of this year's biggest stories. But a century before Egg Boy rose to fame, there was Egg Man and his mark on history is even bigger.

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Yesterday, 24-year-old Amber Holt tried but failed to egg Prime Minister Scott Morrison on the campaign trail in Albury. She was likely influenced by the now-infamous "Egg Boy" who egged Fraser Anning back in March.

In the fallout, the PM thanked the Australian Federal Police for their service. But what he might not know is that an egg throwing incident is responsible for their creation.

But back in 1917, a single egg hurled at the Prime Minister during World War One triggered the formation of a national law enforcement body, what we now know as the Australian Federal Police.

Billy Hughes, the country's seventh Prime Minister, was campaigning on a national plebiscite on conscription to increase Australia troops.

While in Queensland rallying for the "Yes" vote, a local and anti-conscription campaigner Patrick Brosnan was in the crowd of people attending Hughes' speech at a train station in Warrick.

An article in the Warrick Daily News, 1948 Source: Trove

During the speech, Brosnan hurled an egg at Prime Minister Hughes, which knocked the PM's hat off his head.

As the legend goes, Hughes reached for his gun, which wasn't there, with one eyewitness recounting that a man took hold of an upset Hughes and said:

Billy, Billy, for God's sake pull yourself together. Remember you are the Prime Minister.

In the furor, Senior Sergeant Kenny stopped the culprit who dropped three eggs from his pocket. But when the Prime Minister demanded his arrest, the sergeant said that he couldn't and Bronson was released.

"I deal only in Queensland law, this is a Commonwealth matter," Senior Sergeant Kenny reportedly said.

An excerpt from the The Australian Worker newspaper, 1917 Source: Trove

The Prime Minister demanded that the sergeant be investigated for his failing to arrest the egg thrower. In an official response, the Queensland police commissioner said:

"I find no evidence that there was any refusal to arrest any person who had committed an offence, nor that Sergeant Kenny gave any orders to any member of the police not to arrest any such person," he said.

"I desire to add that if the Prime Minister will indicate, with so much precision as will enable me to follow him, what Commonwealth law was broken at Warwick, and what emergency arose that was beyond the scope of the ordinary law of the State under which the police were naturally prepared to act as witness the arrest of the egg-thrower Brosnan."

Unimpressed with the outcome, Hughes ordered the formation of a national body to enforce Commonwealth law - now known as the Australian Federal Police - so that future egg throwers may be brought to justice.

Information board about the famed Egg Throwing Incident of 1917, in Warrick Source: Supplied