A Single Tree Read online

  Bleakley pointed out that motorcar loads of men from bush townships and construction camps bent on ‘ginsprees’, or drink and prostitution orgies, raided the station camps for women. A stanza from a ballad sung to an Irish drinking tune and entitled the ‘Combos Anthem’ hailed the custom:

  So hail Borroloola, the Ord, V.R.D.

  The ‘Nash’ and the ‘Hill’ for a cracker old spree

  We are riding with cheques and we sing as we come

  For a gut-full of wooing, a gut-full of rum.

  These black women – euphemistically referred to as ‘spinifex fairies’ or ‘pandanus fairies’ in the ballads – were regarded as vessels to be used and then discarded. This is not to imply that the women were not sometimes willing parties to these ‘sprees’, for they often awaited them as a source of income. But if they had not, it is doubtful whether the drunken men would have taken any notice of their non-compliance. Since the strong younger Aboriginal men were engaged in stockwork and often spent long periods of time away from the homestead, the women left behind were especially vulnerable to rape.

  Some managers tried to prevent white men’s visits to station camps, but they were often threatened with violence and told to mind their own business. These working-class men hated protective station managers, labelling them ‘gin shepherds’. This song typifies the interclass rivalry over black women:

  Let gin shepherds watch when the rain clouds appear

  And the ring of horse-bells tells his ‘girls’ when we’re near

  He will lock up his ‘studs’ but we’ll steal them away

  To our paper-bark fires till the breaking of day.

  Part-Aboriginal men were also forced into behaving as whites in order to obtain women. As Jack Sullivan explains:

  ‘We had to sneak round to get a bit of girl, the same as the white man, instead of camping with them. You might go over and tell the girl to go down and meet you, for you could not go into their camp . . . You were sacked . . . In those days white men and we half-castes treated the blackfeller like a dog. We could go in and belt him or take his stud away for the night.’

  In later life, Sullivan lived with the Aboriginal community.

  Aborigines sometimes attempted to control the exchanges, and obtain goods over the longer term, through incorporating certain white men into their kinship network. More importantly, through attachment to women, the white men were virtually tied to the land and local community. They also had a sense of belonging not so common among other newcomers. Sandy McDonald, the son of a Djaru-Nyining mother, was born on Inverway Station in 1908. He explained that his father, Jim McDonald, ‘had a lot of natives in his camp and through their custom they gave my mother to him. That was why in those days a lot of the whites did not have any trouble with the full-blood Aborigines. The elders gave them wives, promised them just like in their custom.’

  The white man concerned was thus given a ‘skin’ name. It followed that he was then incorporated into the kinship structure, with its complex reciprocal obligations. He was obliged to supply certain goods to the woman’s relatives; by fulfilling these obligations he was able to avoid trouble. The Aborigines could then maintain a certain control over the situation, despite their subordinate position.

  Whites who intended to settle permanently in an area sometimes agreed to negotiate for women with the Aboriginal men. This was partly a measure to ensure their own safety in a country where there were few white settlers. When the Herbert brothers, Oscar and Frank, settled as lessees of Koolpinyah Station, they negotiated with the elders for women. The diary entry for 9 December 1912 read: ‘Oscar and Frank go to black’s camp at Bridge Creek – cannot obtain lubra for latter, but one promised.’ A week later, ‘Kitty and Annie arrive looking for hubbies’. In July the following year, Oscar wrote of Annie, ‘at present cook and housekeeper of this establishment, and a Princess in her own right. In August the young men of the Aboriginal camp paid ‘a nocturnal visit’ to the women’s beds at the homestead in a bid to claim them back, but nothing eventuated. Oscar suffered badly when Annie was absent. He conscientiously reported the various phases of Annie’s illnesses, and without her company became depressed, and in her absence proclaimed he was ‘Sick of Life’. On 12 October, 1913, Frank was again trying to ‘secure a bride’ but reported the venture ‘unsuccessful’. The following day he made another attempt, but was stalled off by the Aborigines. Here was a situation where white men asked the elders’ specific permission to obtain black women and – at least in their diaries – they made little attempt to disguise the bonds of mutual affection and dependency between themselves and their ‘wives’.

  European drover Matt Savage explained meeting his Mudbura wife at Montejinnie around 1930: ‘Before very long I had snaffled her for my own . . . I got her young and treated her rough and she thrived on it.’ Despite such a crude exposition, Savage speaks very favourably of his wife Ivy for her ‘honesty, truthfulness and loyalty’, for she cared for him when he was lame, and, as many Aboriginal women did for their white partners, looked after him in his old age. Aboriginal women thus filled the western expectations of a ‘wife’, but did not object to bush life, and had much to contribute: as Savage wrote, Ivy was ‘a part of that life in a way no white woman could ever have been’ . . .

  Aboriginal women learnt how to manipulate the system: they were astutely aware of the extra personal and family advantages of being the boss’s ‘stud’, for it could mean protection and economic security. Jack Sullivan claimed that women were pleased to achieve such status, citing his sister Wongala as an example. The woman’s husband similarly expressed pride about her association with the manager. Nevertheless, as Sullivan explained, the Aboriginal woman agreed to fulfil her part of the deal, but did not allow the man to completely dominate her if she could help it. Wongala boasted of humbling a ‘big fellow boss’ who wanted to have sexual intercourse with her on the kitchen floor: ‘No matter him big fellow boss and me just nothing; I bin say must be longa big bed all-a-same white fellow missus.’ It should not be forgotten that through the sexual pleasures they provided, the women could exert a great deal of control over white men.

  Born in the Cattle, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 1987

  Dennis McIntosh

  2009

  At the end of the third run, late in the first week, the team had settled and there was a fierce battle between Bernie Bourke and Viking to ring the shed. Harold was in one and shearing about twenty-five a run. Morgan in two was holding thirty-five. Haveachat in three and the Captain in four were holding forty-five a run. In five was Micky Lewis, he was holding forty-eight. Bernie Bourke in six was holding fifty-one, fifty-two, Viking in seven was holding the same and I was getting about thirty a run.

  I was Vikings penmate. I pulled an old cracker ewe out before the bell rang for smoko. My back was killing me, and my comb and cutter were blunt. I screwed the tension nut down to push one more sheep out before smoko. I rushed the first blow and cut her from brisket to crutch. I didn’t even realise I’d got the end tooth of the comb under her skin.

  Viking glanced across a couple of times. ‘Sew it up boy. Shut the cocky up.’

  It wasn’t a deep cut but it looked worse than it was. The squatter came along and started helping. He was wearing his moleskins and a flash shirt. He smelt of aftershave. I smelt of lanoline and sheep shit. My flannel was dirty and my dungarees were drenched in wool grease. I hadn’t noticed how much I smelt until he came near me. I started stitching the old ewe but I was running out of cotton.

  Viking yelled at me, ‘Your stitches are too close.’

  By that time I’d put about thirty stitches into the belly; now I was covered in blood to go with the sheep shit and lanoline. To break the tension the squatter yelled out to Viking that there were only seven stitches in a wheat bag. The team laughed and the squatter laughed but his lips remained tight and his face was strained. I had to stay behind during smoko and finish.

  I wasn’t happy. I only sewed the cut
to shut the squatter up. He might have laughed but he wasn’t happy either. And the team had been laughing at him trying to fit in with us, using one of our sayings with his plum-in-the-mouth voice. He was trying to put me down with a joke because he wasn’t allowed to bomb me. He had to go through the overseer if he wanted to complain, even though it was his shed, his sheep, his farm and his money. It was my pen. My stand. My job. And the squatter hated that. He would have liked to shoot my dog as well, so we weren’t friends.

  The squatter was mainly talking to the old ewe, pacifying her. I didn’t know what to say to him. I couldn’t even look at him. I wanted to say something that sounded smart. I guess I wanted to impress him, or for him to like me, and to break the tension. I laughed and finally said, ‘It’s only an old cracker ewe anyway.’

  He didn’t laugh at that. He mumbled something under his breath.

  I was sweating, exhausted, and my back ached. I was shaking from holding down the fretting sheep. I realised the squatter wasn’t really helping me. He was protecting his sheep, his property. The sheep meant more to him than I did. Then his smell, his clothes, his resentful look, the way he ignored me, made my skin crawl. I wanted to smash his tanned face with my handpiece. The way he held the sheep made the sheep fight more. He was useless, a private-college boy. I figured he’d never even worked on his own property before. I wanted him away from me. I wished I was on strike right now.

  I eventually sewed the old ewe up and shore out the last run in silence. The weekend was one day away.

  Beaten by a Blow: A Shearer’s Story,

  Penguin, Melbourne, 2009

  Dorothy Maguire

  1944

  At first the land was very heavily timbered forest and brush, well watered, a creek ran through the property, as well as numerous springs. Father’s first job was to erect a shelter for us to live in, which consisted of slabs, and a bark roof and earthen floor. The hut completed we settled down to a life of hard struggle and toil.

  Firstly, we had to clear the land to plant corn and potatoes. We had one cow to begin with. While the crops were growing we went on clearing the timber ready for more crop planting, which was very hard work as we were only children at the time, my brother Edward being the eldest aged 15 years, my sister aged 13 and myself aged 10, the three younger being babies. My Mother also helped Father do the clearing.

  We had much to contend with, for a start our tools were very primitive . . . our only tools being a hoe, spade, one mall, wedges and brush hook. We made all the handles for our tools out of hickory . . .

  Our nearest store was 60 miles away at Wollongong. These trips were very trying. We had to follow the blazed track over the mountain as only packhorses were used and the journey taking three days to get there and back. Father only went every three months for supplies. On one of these trips Father bought a cross-cut saw and carried it on his shoulders all the way on foot as his pack and saddle horses were both heavily loaded.

  As time went by we felled more timber and cleared more land for crops, burning-off the timber by rolling logs in heaps with the help of hand spikes. At the end of a heavy day’s toil we looked more like black fellows than white children. We had no clock, having to guess the time by seeing the tree shadows turn around for 12 o’clock, and the hourly laugh of the jackass, called the settler’s clock. There were no 44 working hours in our week. We made our candles in a mould with bees wax. Bees were very plentiful in the bush and we always had plenty of honey. There were a large number of cabbage trees and we made use of them. We girls picked the young leaves and bleached them white and made cabbage tree hats for the stockmen and ourselves at 1 shilling each, these were made by candlelight at night.

  In the early years all our crops were chipped in by hoe. No easy work when it came to acres. Our first wheat crop was a failure, taking the rust, all our hard work was done for nought. However, we started again and chipped in 10 acres of wheat, non-rusting Egyptian type, which was a great success. Father paying 10 shillings a bushel to get the seed. We grew arrowroot, but unfortunately, no sale for that, so we fed it to the calves in the milk.

  We grew our own wheat, thrashed it with a flail, ground it into flour, we also grew our own hops make bread. In earlier days we had to live on damper made on the hearth and covered in hot ashes to cook. Later we purchased a camp oven, a three-legged pot, iron kettle and a tin teapot. As time went on our wheat ripened, we cut it with reap hooks and stacked it until required. Father bought a small steel mill and had to thrash the wheat with a flail and then grind it into flour. We also grew our own fruit and vegetables. We were never idle.

  We still had much to contend with, crops failing, drought and bush fires which destroyed our fences, caterpillars, grasshoppers and floods. Snakes, hundreds of them, all sorts and colours – had many escapes. Father bought more stock and reared all the calves and they soon grew up.

  There were no rabbits but many worse pests such as wallabies, paddy­melons, bandicoots, native and tiger cats, dingoes, which played havoc with young calves, poultry and pigs. When the crops were ripening it was my job, wet or dry, to keep the birds off the crops. That meant running up and down all day to frighten them. That done, come home, turn into the stockyard as we were milking 10 cows. The blacks were very numerous but did us no harm . . .

  We built cockatoo fences around our crop, that meant saplings placed on sheer logs, one after another. However, it served the purpose for some time until we got hardwood fences up. I helped Father to fell the heavy timber and the cross cutting in many lengths to fence with, and when ready I had to carry the posts and rails and lay them on the line, miles of them, very heavy work for a frail girl. This work went on week in and week out, year by year . . .

  My brother made yokes for us out of limbs of the creek oak, also a slide out of slabs. We soon got our bullocks quiet and attached them to the slide with ropes. In this crude way we drew our crops home from the paddocks. Before this we had to carry it in sacks on our backs. I was mostly the packhorse . . .

  About this time my elder sister married, and I being the next eldest my burden was made heavier as my Mother was a very frail little woman, but she still attended to the dairy. We had a barrel churn which I helped Mother to churn to make butter. That done I had to go and help Father in the paddocks. After tea all the cleaning was done, scouring floors with stone, cleaning the butter kegs, as we were now sending our butter and produce to Broughton Creek. The steamer Meeindery coming once a week. The price the settlers got was 4d a pound for butter.

  Pioneer Women of the Bush and Outback (1990),

  Jennifer Isaacs (ed.), New Holland, Sydney, 2009

  David Malouf

  2000

  This is blacksoil country. Open, empty, crowded with ghosts, figures hidden away in the folds of these who are there, who are here, even if they are not visible and no one knows it but a few who look up suddenly into a blaze of sunlight and feel the hair crawl on their neck and know they are not the only ones. That they are being watched or tracked. They’ll go on then with a sense for a moment that their body, as it goes, leaves no dent in the air.

  ‘Blacksoil Country’ in Barry Oakley (ed.), Best of the Best,

  Modern Australian Short Stories, Five Mile Press, 2009

  Alan Mayne

  2003

  Native forests, broken up by grazing land, surround the town. The forests are of the open-woodland dry sclerophyll variety in which brittle gum and red stringybark are the dominant species. There is an understorey of native shrubs and grasses. Red gum dominates on the hard rocky ridges, and white box and long-leaved box grow on the steep hill slopes that run south of the town down towards the Turon River. There is a small patch of savannah-type woodland on Bald Hill, where long-leaved box and red box grow.

  Notwithstanding the sense of natural equilibrium and timeless continuities that the forests convey, they are in fact largely regrowth forests. The mallee-type growth form adopted by many of the eucalypts, with clumps of multiple trunks, i
s the result of continual cutting back of trees during the gold rushes. The district was heavily timbered before the discovery of gold, but by 1872 the forests around Hill End had been cleared for building (timber slabs for walls, wattle and mud for filling, and stringybark for roofing), to line mine shafts and tunnels, and to fuel the Cornish boilers that powered the stamper batteries. Deforestation became so severe by the early twentieth century that even miners – with an eye to long-term supply – voiced alarm at the wholesale ‘destruction of timber’ on the tablelands and along the Macquarie and Turon Rivers. The Hill End council recommended tighter controls, warning that all the remaining stands of timber near the town were being destroyed . . .

  Not only does the legacy of mining endanger people, it continues to degrade the landscape itself. Most of the local district is characterised by mild to severe sheet erosion, and severe gully erosion. The former has been exacerbated by grazing, the latter by mining. Erosion has scoured out gullies to depths of 15 metres and more in some places. Russell Drysdale’s photographs and paintings of Hill End during the late 1940s and Donald Friend’s diary sketches of the town during 1948, starkly reveal the severity of gully erosion at Hill End in the middle of the twentieth century. The alarming scale of this erosion was confirmed in a series of state government photographs, taken in 1952 as part of its soil conservation programme. Friend’s oil painting Hill End Landscape (c. 1951) probed this eroded landscape with spectacular effect, as did later works by Jean Bellette and Paul Haefliger during the 1950s, David Strachan during the 1960s, and – perhaps most evocatively of all – Brett Whiteley during the 1980s. It was estimated in 1981 that erosion had removed over a million tonnes of soil from the main mining areas around Hill End.