Family Hansford
Family Hansford
Our home at Hynam
This story was given to me by Thelma Pillifeant in 1992. It is an account of the life of the Hansford family while they were living at Hynam in those heady pioneering days & was transcribed by Thelma October 1987.
The home gradually took shape after all our work preparing the necessary stringybark for the roof, roof timbers, beams and studs then there was framework of scrub timber on top of the roof to hold the stringybark sheets in position, the amazing part about this structure was that no iron or wire nails were used at all, the whole of the framework was held together with half to three quarter inch dowels or as we called them spikes all of them cut from redgum saplings that grew profusely on the block next to ours so were nor trouble to get.< xml="true" ns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" prefix="o" namespace="">
I must mention that all the timber being green it all had to be barked even to the spikes and that was where we children got jobs to be done after we came from school each day, but we seemed to get through with it in quite good time because our brother Alf and our father were getting on with the home which was one room about twenty by twelve feet which was later divided in the centre with a wheatbag curtain.
The bags were bought from the flour miller at Narracoorte Mr J W Thompson, all the bags were ripped down the sides the bottom of the bags being left intact all the stitching that had been cut had to be carefully removed, that being another job for we children after school then the bags were sewn together down the sides this being a very tedious job also required a good deal of skill so that was my mother's job. When completed they made 2 kind of tarpaulins about six feet by six feet mailed along a big six foot by six inch beam of scrub timber that had been carefully adzed to somewhere near square this beam did double duty as it held the walls from spreading when the heavy timber was put up for the roof framing and also a room divider, the two rooms being a living room to be used as a kitchen dining-room and through the curtain into the bedroom which turned out to be far too small.
I will always remember that building and more especially the big beam before the curtains were mailed to it, there was a friend of the family there on a visit to see how the building was going along and he got up onto it and we smaller ones hung onto his feet and he would swing us quite high up in the air until he decided he had had enough and all was quiet again.
This friend was a son of Mr Charles Sneath of Robe SA (and was H J Sneath) Charles Sneath and Mr R Jackson of Mount Benson near Robe and my father all came to Australia in the same boat from England and all landed at Robe.
M Jackson became a farmer and C Sneath a carpenter at Robe and remained there all his life.
I met these two old gentlemen many years later when I too went to live there and they both gave me a vivid description of theirs and my father's life as boys in England and also of their association with him in Robe before he went away from the area.
They told me they had lost contact and did not know what had become of him until they found out that he was building his home at Hynam hence the visit of H J Sneath to our home there.
While on this subject of my father's break away from his friends I would like to mention a few of his experiences soon after he left and headed out into the country unknown to him, he told us his first day out was very tiring he walked until he felt he could go no further but was too afraid to just lie down under a bush because there was quite a lot of aborigines about there at that time and as far as I have been able to find out the tribe that frequented those parts was only partly civilized and father had been warned about them. Eventually he discovered a very rough kind of hut which I have since found out was used as a shepherd's or boundary rider's hut to afford protection from the aborigines at night.
This was my father's first night out in the Australian bush alone and although he was very tired and badly in need of a good sleep he had a very disturbed night because of the native cats that were numerous in those parts and it seems were evidently short of food because they chewed the uppers of his boots that had to be greased every day while he was on the boat out from England, but with difficulty he was able to save enough of his boots to happily walk away from there next morning. That day was another long walk but he got to a small sheep station and at shearing time he was made a very welcome visitor and when he told his story of where he had slept the previous night he was proclaimed a bit of a hero as the person the hut had been built for only stayed in it one night and said he would not stay there alone again.
My father asked for a job shearing g and as there was a pen to spare he was engaged but as he had never seen a sheep shorn and actually did not know how to hold it let alone how to catch it in the first place the boss could see he had no idea of the job in hand and asked him to take a job as a rouse-a-bout which he accepted. Unfortunately for his family he did not give us any more details of how he got from that station which could not have been any more than about forty miles from Robe to the next place of abode which as far as I can find out was Benayeo Victoria where he married and a family if eight before starting the home at Hynam, the distance from Benayeo to the station "Woodleigh" where he had worked was about fifty six miles so that is a gap in his life that I did not find out about or how he got that distance or what he did in that time. I am afraid I have rambled away from the building of the home to tell of my father's experiences so to continue; the bedroom which proved to be too small for the family and a tent which had been borrowed for some to live in had now to be returned, it became necessary to add another room for the boys (there were four at the time).
Plans were immediately put into action for this boys room which was to be constructed of wattle and daub walls with a galvanised iron roof which was to extend four feet over to provide a verandah from the first building and also to connect to the proposed two new rooms that were to be built of timber walls with a galvanised iron roof and to have a board floor this seemed to we children to be a mansion and to actually have a board floor as the other rooms had pug clay floors.
This was clay from the dam that had been dug for our water supply and was barrowed into the rooms then wetted down until quite a puddle and we children were allowed to go in barefooted and puddle it up as much as we liked we thought this was great fun then when my father thought it was ready it was levelled off with a shovel and smoothed with a trowel or float and left to harden and cure then bags were placed on the floors as carpet of the day, so much for the construction of the floors in those early days.
The job now for the children again was cutting redgum saplings and barking them then going into the scrub to find nice straight stringybark posts about nine feet long to these were nailed the sapling sticks horizontally about two feet high at a time all around the room then the same routine as for making a floor but the pug was not quite so wet and gum leaves, grass or any other binding was mixed with it and then it was shovelled in between saplings and pugged until it came out between the sapling sticks which were nailed quite close together as the pug dried a little, it was smoothed with a trowel then another two feet high was constructed on top of the previous one until the top was reached then roof timbers were put on and the pug was filled in right up to the roof iron, this made a really good weather proof job.
A post was placed on the outside to carry the overhang of the roof which was to act as a verandah and this post must get a special mention as we found to our sorrow that we could be tied to it to be thrashed which we certainly got with a vengeance. I remember being tied to it with a rope then my hands were tied behind my back and I was left there while my father went down to the gum saplings to get a suitable pliable stick and I knew what was coming and began to scream at the top of my voice hoping that some of my brothers or sisters would come to my rescue but not this time and my mother was also away that day, she was always to be depended on to come to our rescue but my cruel father just seemed to choose that time when he knew that I could get no help from anybody so my screaming was of no avail, I had to take it from start to finish and believe me it was laid on heavy too.
A thrashing like this was common in our family especially among the boys we would get it for the most trifling thing like not coming immediately we were called, or not doing some little thing we had been told to do this particular thrashing I got was for not running at once to get a spade from the other end of the garden so he called me again and I met him just at that post where he grabbed me - he had the tying rope behind his back - so I could not get away which we usually did if we got a chance. That was the only time I was caught at that post but I had a few very narrow escapes at various places, once in our room which only had one door I was pushed down on the bed and overpowered by him and he sat on me while he got out his pocket knife opened it grabbed my hair pushed my head back and said "I'll cut your throat you b..." can you imagine my relief when mother rushed in and grabbed his hand it seemed to me just in time to save a tragedy.
If my father really would have carried out the things he said he was going to do no one will ever know but he did have a dreadful temper. After this mother decided to send me down to my married sister Francis her husband was Tom Baker they had been married for a few years but had no children and she had been wanting me to go down to Penola with her for company as Tom was working at Mount Riddock Station a few miles out of Penola and did not come home at night, this seemed to be working quite well and I was doing better at school there than I had at Hynam.
I was very happy down there with them and his sister Naomi used to come to the house quite a lot and often stay the night and she was a very nice girl indeed, also I had made some very nice friends at school and they used to come over and play games until it was time for us to all go to our homes for tea, so I was having the happiest time of my childhood there because I was not in continual fear of my father.
However the bubble burst one night with a vengeance, I was playing a game of hide and seek with my playmates and I had found a good hidey and could not be found so when my brother-in-law called me to tea I did not want to let the other children see where I was so I stayed there until they all went home which did not seem very long to me. Then I was called again and went straight inside but before I could give any explanation he came from behind the door with his stockwhip in his hand and began to thrash me and I got the full benefit of the handle too on which was fixed a fancy silver grip of a horse's leg and hoof.
I can assure you I was in a pretty mess by the time neighbours came in to stop him and one took his whip and was just about to lay it around him when he roared out you are on private property and if you touch me I will call the police so the man threw the whip at him and left but wanted to take me home with him for protection - his name was Mr Hemmings and years later when I was working at Coonawarra I renewed my acquaintance with him under much more pleasant circumstances and he asked if I had any ill effects from that flogging and I showed him a big mole that had formed on my thigh from one of the worst bruises that I had and I still carry that mole to this day and I am now 75 years old.
After that very bad affair I told them I was not going to stay any longer and if they would not take me or send me back home I would start to walk and get a ride where I could so I was sent back to Narracoorte by train and when no one was there to meet me I began to walk the six miles to my home and at this time I was eight years old.
On arriving back home I was not greeted too well because Francis had written and given a very bad report of me and lied and said that I was so bad that Tom had to give me a hit with his whip in the hope that he could make me a better boy. I was told then that they did not care whether I came home or not, that was why I had not been met at Narracoorte Station, they thought it would do me good if I was left to walk home.
This bad report that had been sent to my parents took a good deal of straightening out as they seemed to doubt me all the time, then one day my mother took me aside and said she would like to hear the truth about what happened in Penola, then the whole story was out and my proof was on my body still for them to see and my parents were both very upset when they saw the whip marks and bruises still on my body. Mother was very sorry for me and helped to convince my father to feel the same way and after this I was treated very well at home and once again was one of the family.
While I was away the home at Hynam had improved so much that I hardly knew it, the two extra rooms had been added and they were living in them and the garden plot had got into better production, fruit trees had grown and vegetables were very plentiful in fact in such good supply that we used to take a dray load into Narracoorte every week and sell them, we also had two cows that supplied plenty of fresh milk for the family. There were three younger sisters and a brother and myself now at home of our family of twelve but the older ones had either gone out to work or become married. The young sisters had not started school and things at home seemed to be going along nicely when my mother was taken away to hospital never to return, the last time we children saw her was when she was being helped out to the conveyance to go to hospital.
Mother had seemed to be progressing well and father used to play a tune on his concertina every night while we children sat around the fire wondering how long before our dear mother would be home with us again then one night after father had visited the hospital he told us that mother would be home in about a week and we were all so happy and were having a sing song around the fire, but our happiness ended all too abruptly as a knock on the door came from a messenger from the hospital for father to go back with him as our mother had taken a very bad turn and I am sorry to say our dear mother passed away that night (15th September 1897).
My sister Ethel who had come home to look after us when our mother was ill now decided to give up her job and stay at home as the three younger sisters required looking after. The names and ages of the six children left motherless were Wattie (13), Charles (11), Lewis (9), Maud (7), Mabel (5) and Floss (3), so it was a bit of a handful for my sister to take on and she was not too keen on doing it but a meeting of the older brothers and sisters decided to pay a small sum each to her to stay home for twelve months which she did but was not too happy about it and took to showing her unhappiness by ill treating the younger ones in fact she became absolutely cruel to them. Wattie got a job that year so that left me the eldest one at home and it was me that was always taking part of the younger ones and trying to protect them from being unnecessarily knocked about by Ethel and this action on my part caused many an upset in the family because my father used to side with her and he led me a pretty strenuous life of it and Ethel could run pretty fast and it took me all my time to keep out of her clutches and not to be dragged again to that tie-up post but fortunately I avoided it.
In those days there was no baker nearer than Narracoorte so all the bread was baked at home and once a week a batch of bread was set and I was now being shown how to do this as well as cooking generally which I thought was great but little did I know what was in store for me because as soon as I became competent at the cooking and housework washing and all, Ethel decided to leave home and go out to work again so there was I left to look after that small family at the age of twelve while still going to school. My father used to look after the young ones during the day and I took over as soon as I got home from school and I did not mind doing this however it was not to last long because I soon reached the age to go out to work and then my brother Lewis was to take over the household chores which I now had to teach him to do.
My first place of employment was at Lawrie Park Station about seven miles away from home but I would be able to come home every weekend as my Uncle Henry Munn used to come home to his place which was only about half a mile away from ours. He had got me the position and promised my father that he would look after me while I was out on the station.
The first night we were there was the night before shearing was to start and I was to be a wool picker for the six shearers - the wool pickers job was to pick the fleece up from the floor carry it to the wool table and spread it out for the wool roller who then skirts the fleece rolls it up and places it on a smaller table for the wool classer to class and put away in the bins.
I had never done any work away from home before and the thought of having to do something I knew nothing about began to get me down and being among strangers did not help either and at teatime I was feeling pretty blue what with the strange faces of the six shearers and three rouseabouts, the bush greetings to one another and all the various conversations going on, it seemed just one big hub-bub and I couldn't eat my tea despite all the encouragement from Uncle Henry telling me I must eat something. Then lo and behold in walked or just about fell into the hut Big Bill Cassidy, half drunk, a voice so loud that it just drowned out everyone else, a jet black full beard hanging down to his chest and bushy head of hair that looked as if a comb would fall to pieces if used on it and this was the last straw for me, I jumped up from the table and tore to my bunk.
Luckily I was with my Uncle in a room of our own instead of all in together in one big room, two bunks high, with some talking in their sleep others snoring, some chasing bugs, which were prevalent in most sleeping quarters then, all this I experienced later in other sheds that I worked in but now I was just so pleased to be away from all that noise in the hut but it was still too much for me and childlike, for that is all I was, I began to sob and couldn't stop and Uncle asked me what was wrong but I didn't tell him I was really scared and homesick but said I did not want to work with those rough men and wanted to go home.
Of course this was impossible but he promised that if I would stop my crying he would take me up to the kitchen at the station where there was a mother with a young daughter working and they had a tiny monkey up there, so this seemed to pacify me.
My Uncle was permanently employed at the station and used to have all his meals there except at shearing time when he ate with the shearers so he knew all about the kitchen, mother, daughter and the monkey which were all there to my great surprise when we went up, as I thought he was just telling me these things to quieten me down. The girl was about six months older than me and was the most beautiful blonde I had ever seen, her name was Minnie Baker and we became great pals.
Life at the station was different altogether from then on, Mrs Baker was also very nice to me and seemed to understand how I felt about my first job away from home and I think Uncle had told her the whole story about our family too. Minnie gave me her photo to keep and I had it for many years, I didn't want to go home at weekends and I could stay there and help to move shorn sheep away and muster woolly sheep and bring them closer in to the shed for shearing the next week so Uncle used to go home and leave me there with the other man who worked at the station. Minnie was quite a good rider and used to come out mustering and changing sheep with us on Saturdays and Sundays, Mrs Baker used to do my washing and mending so the station was quite like home to me now.
I eventually got used to the shearers but I could not do my job satisfactorily and Mr Henderson who owned Lawrie Park in those days was always at me and didn't seem to give me much encouragement I was doing my best but he wasn't satisfied, then one day when he was giving me a proper talking to and saying that he would give me the sack if I didn't do better, strange as it may seem, Big Bill Cassidy who I was so scared of at the start spoke up on my behalf and gave him a real dressing down saying he was the one at fault and if he sacked me or kept at me as he had been, all the shearers would pack up and leave.
I got on splendidly after this and Big Bill was one of my best pals from then on, I was sorry when the shed cut out and it was time to say goodbye and although I used to work in sheds every year after that for about seven years and always enquired after him I never saw him again he had gone right out of my life as had Mrs Baker and Minnie but I had two letters from her after she left Lawrie Park and by the way they read she was going to marry the other man who had worked there, Don Smith but I never heard of any of them again.
When I returned home after my first job my father seemed very pleased to have me back again as my brother Lewis was not getting on too well with the cooking and housekeeping but now I would be able to put my full time into looking after him and my three young sisters and he would have more time to himself as he was not yet twelve years old and didn't seem to be as healthy as the rest of us.
The wages that I got from my first job which lasted four weeks and for which I was paid twelve shillings per week all went into the housekeeping budget the younger children had to have new clothing so it was used chiefly for this. My father was also pleased to have me back again because he could not do any of the cooking now as he had got a severe skin complaint and had to give up his job as station cook at Hynam Station, for this work he used to receive fifteen shillings per week and a quarter of mutton as well as Station rations which were five pounds of tea, one bag of sugar and one bag of flour every six months but this was all lost to us now and things did not look too bright for us.
I used to go hunting rabbits, possums and native cats for their skins and used also climb tall redgums for young yellow crested cockatoos, black cockatoos, rosellas parrots, Blue Mountain parrots, plovers, curlews and laughing jacks as I could readily sell all these young birds. Lewis and I used to spend most of our time at weekends getting wild duck, swan and brolga eggs when the laying season was on, then the eggs from our own hens were sold to raise more money, butter from our two cows was also sold and we used dripping on our bread instead of butter.
We could not buy much kerosene at a time as money was always very short so we used what was called a slush light, that is a jam tin full of fat and a stick was wrapped with a piece of moleskin, this was a material that was commonly used for men's trousers, the fat was melted and when it started to harden the covered stick was stood up in it then left to cool off when it was then ready to use.
This type of light was anything but pleasant to use, it was a very poor light as well as being a very unpleasant smell, but these were the things we had to do to make our money spin out and we managed with the assistance of our other brothers who were out at work in permanent positions.
My next job was at Hynam Station at shearing time again and when I applied for it I was asked had I done this work before so I reluctantly said I had been at Lawrie Park and I was told they would enquire how I got on there and would let me know in a weeks time which they eventually did and so I was booked on as woolpicker again.
I only had six shearers to look after the year before but now I would have eight and I had heard that the Hynam bosses were very hard to work for but I felt more confident than I had at Lawrie Park.
I arrived at my new place the day before shearing was to start and everyone else was there and all very busy settling in, getting two bags with either straw or chaff in them which would be our mattresses then selecting a bunk and making up our beds, mine for instance was a camp blanket and three chaff bags which I had to sew together, the blanket was folded in half and I slept in it with the bags put on top to act as a quilt, no pillow so I used to fold my clothes and place under my head. Next I had to get hold of some paper to seal up the cracks between the timber in the wall which were constructed of rough slabs from the local sawmill many years before, these were slid down between the cleats of timber which were nailed to the posts, this was the usual construction to be used as sleeping quarters for shearers in those days in the year 1900. I was now fourteen years old and my wages were twelve shillings and sixpence per week with keep. By the time my bed was made and the worst of the cracks plugged up with paper, it was time to get washed up for the first meal which was tea. I would like to tell you about the dining room, if it can be called that, the table was made of flooring boards, just one long table the full length of the room, seats were forms made up from off cuts from the old saw mill, with four auger holes put in and then pieces of red gum sapling driven in to form the legs, this was quite all right while they were new no doubt, but when I was there if you lifted a form to shift it in or out the legs would drop to the floor requiring the refitment of the legs, this was OK sometimes, but if there happened to be three or four grumpy shearers sitting on a stool, and it was too far out from the table, it was usually better to make the best of the position and reach for your food, the eating utensils and cutlery were the cheapest it was possible to buy, plates were tin, pint pannikins were tin, spoon and fork seemed to be a composition of tin and lead, the knife was certainly not stainless steel. The first meal over, then try to make a few friends for the next four weeks which was the working time of the shed, then to the sleeping quarters and into bed early because in those days work started in the sheds at 6am work until 8am then breakfast which consisted mainly of fried mutton chops or rissoles with bread, then back to the shed to start work again at 9am until 10.30am then morning tea time with brownies and black tea, work again from 10.50am to 12n. Lunch was then taken and this usually consisted of roast mutton, boiled and baked potatoes and for sweets plum pudding and on some days ration sugar tarts made in long tin trays and cooked in the brick oven, these trays of sugar tart were usually taken straight from the brick oven and placed on the table in front of us with the sugar boiling, of course not many would attempt to eat it as it was so hot to eat in the time we had left, this was good for the cook as he would then have the sugar tarts cold to put on the table for tea, which was usually cold roast meat that was left over from lunch or a stew. Sometimes potato pie would be served and this consisted of cold meat left over from previous meals minced and seasoned and then topped with mashed potato, then recooked in the brick oven. Home made bread was really good and of course the old fashioned brownie as it was called in those days plus the buns and rock cakes were provided for the sweets. The rock cakes were sometimes put on for smoke-ho and they were rock by nature as well as by name, then at bedtime hot fresh tea and brownie was always available for those wishing to partake. After tea on the first night everyone was called to attention outside the hut and a shed representative was appointed, his duty was to see that everything ran smoothly and to handle any reports or complaints that may be made. The appointed representative was a good choice and after a short speech of thanks he made us aware of his requirements and asked that all complaints be made directly to him and not to the individual concerned as this could cause unnecessary friction and trouble, should he not be able to handle the case satisfactorily he had the right to call in two senior members of the team or call a general meeting to reach a final decision.
The next morning was the start of shearing and after a roll call the boss of the board addressed individual sections of the team and stated his requirements, firstly the shearers were instructed to treat the sheep with care and not knock them about, remove all wool as close as possible to the skin without removing any skin at all, a good clean shear without any ridges over the back, all trimmings to be taken off cleanly, and the shearing rate was to be twelve shillings and six pence per one hundred sheep.
The next were the wool workers and they were to handle the fleeces with care and that they were not to be unnecessarily broken when being rolled, all pieces to be cleanly handed over to the piece pickers table, all locks to be removed from the floor and the floor around the wool table to be kept clear and clean at all times.
Next was the wool pickers, they had to look after two shearers, remove the fleece from the floor as soon as it was removed from the sheep, carry it carefully to the wool table and spread it out for the wool workers, keep the shearers area clear and clean at all times.
The boss of the shed then explained that the wages for the general shed hands was to be twelve shillings and sixpence per week and in my case to earn this I was to look after eight shearers, the most shearers I had looked after before was six at the Lawrie Park sheds on the previous year and the boss there said that I had only just made the grade, so eight shearers was going to be a very busy time for me.
The boss having checked that everything was ready rang the bell to signal the start of the Hynam shed and it was not long before the fleeces started to roll off the sheep and on to the boards, the first few fleeces I took up to the table were a disaster as I made a mess of the wool until the wool worker who checked and rolled the fleece on the wool table showed me the correct way to spread the fleece, from then on I got on all right. The shearers that I had on number two board were nearly all slow to average so I was able to handle my job with ease whereas the other wool picker on number one board had eight good shearers so he had a hard board to look after, particularly when seven of the eight finished their sheep together and required clear stands for the next sheep, he really had a busy time even though this was his third year as a wool picker. When I found that I could look after my eight shearers quite well I was able to pitch in and give the number one wool picker some help by picking up a few fleeces, spreading them on the table or sweeping the shearers stands to help him over the tight spots, then after a few days of this we decided to ask the representative to approach the boss for his consent for a part daily or daily change over of the positions to share the work load, the shearers then had to be approached and given reasons for our desire to change our allotted board ends from time to time and after a meeting our reasons were accepted by both parties and the new work method was a great success for the rest of the shearing. After a week on the new method the shearers held a further meeting and decided that the wool pickers should ask for higher wages as they were under paid compared to the wages paid by the other sheds in the area, the representative arranged a time for the two wool pickers to present our case to the boss Mr Smith after lunch on Saturday, we both felt pretty shaky as we approached the homestead and went in to Mr Smith's office, we stated our case of our wage level being lower than the standard set by the other shed for the same duties and would like a rise as our work standard had been considered satisfactory by the representative and the shearers, Mr Smith then said that being so early in the shearing he would not make a decision without further consideration and would advise the representative at a later date. We returned to the quarters and reported to the representative, told him the results of our meeting, he was most concerned when he found out that my mate had been the spokesman and that I had not had anything to say to back up the wage rise, this was considered in bad taste to let your mate down, also it did not help the wage rise, it could damage the whole case and he hoped I had learned a lesson from this affair and I can assure everyone I did.
Each Saturday afternoon the two wool pickers and the three wool table hands had to thoroughly clean the shearers board and wool tables due to the grease from the fleeces, this was a very strenuous job and required plenty of elbow grease and hot water, firstly water with lots of soap and washing soda was brought to the boil in a large cast iron vessel, the boiling liquid was then slowly poured from kerosene tin buckets over the area while another member of the team scrubbed the floor with very stiff yard brooms, this was followed by many buckets of clean water to wash the soap and grease off, the final operation was to remove all surplus water from the floor with mops made of broom heads covered with men's old flannel shirts, this was needed to stop the floor staining, should this occur the boss would make us do the whole job again in our own time, we made sure this did not happen. As the days went by we became aware that the job was coming to the end of a very satisfactory shearing season at the Hynam shed, friends made would part and we would return to our respective homes and wait for another shed or another year.
The shearing completed it was back home again, my father made me very welcome and my younger brother Lewis and sisters Maud, Mabel and Floss were happy that I was home to look after them again, this would make life a little easier for my father and my pay from the Hynam shed which was a hefty three pounds due to the two shillings and sixpence per week rise that Mr Smith had finally consented to, would help the house-keeping no end and enable the purchase of more clothes for the younger children which were badly needed. I had the offer of a dog to help catch rabbits, the carcass of the bunny was used for meat in the home, meat being one of the chief problems since my father had given up cooking at Hynam, then the skins were dried and sold but the price per pound was only nine pence to one shilling for the best skins and one dozen skins would only weigh a little over one and a half pounds so we would not get very rich out of them.
The dog was very handy for hunting the rabbits but my father did not like me having him as it cost two shillings and six pence to register him and as soon as I got back from hunting I would have to put him on the chain, but at times when I was doing some other work I would forget to do this and eventually this led to me leaving home. It happened one day after I had been home from shearing time about sox months, once more I had forgotten to chain him when I heard a call from father to come into the house, I naturally thought he wanted me in there for some of the various household duties that I used to perform, but to my amazement as I stepped inside the door he hit me with a gum sapling he had in his hand, saying at the same time I told you to chain up that dog but you have not done it again but I was too quick for him this time and grabbed the stick and threw it away. Of course this made him very angry and he showered all kinds of abuse at me and the dog and threatened to shoot us both and by the look on his face I really believe he would have shot the dog even if he hadn't shot me as well. He went into the house to get his gun which was an old muzzle loader but fortunately the gun was hanging on the far well of the room and the bag containing the ammunition was hanging just inside the door so I followed him in and as he crossed the room I made a grab for it, this of course made him even more hostile and he told me to get out and take my dog with me and if I ever came back he would shoot me on sight. He made a lunge at me but I was too quick for him and he said just as well this gun is not loaded, give that ammunition to me and then see how smart you are, so with that I put the bag on the ground for him to get and walked away from home forever.
I left with only the clothes I was wearing and no money whatever but my dog was following behind me, the last I heard from my father was, I hope I never set eyes on you again which I didn't think was very kind after the way I had looked after him and the younger ones in the family and given all my money to him for household expenses too.
However I was now out on my own and as I walked away from home I realised I must find shelter for the oncoming night and decided to go to one of my married sisters who lived about five miles away on a small mixed farm. I arrived late in the afternoon but she could not agree that I could stay there until she talked it over with her husband who did not come in from his work until dark.
When my sister explained everything to him he made it quite clear that he didn't want me there at all, but under the circumstances I could stay for a few days until I could try to get a job somewhere.
On Saturday I was taken into Narracoorte to look for work and was lucky enough to get a position with Mrs Tidy a very old friend of our family from Benayeo who had a farm about seven miles out on the Penola Road. I began work there on the next day for five shillings a week and believe me I earned every bit of it, I won't go into all details of the various jobs I was expected to do but I knew I really couldn't do all that was expected of me no matter how hard I tried and I was only there for one month.
My eldest brother Alf was working for a Mr H Smith who had a farm about four miles out on the Locharber Road and he made arrangements for me to go and work out there with him, with the one pound that I got from my month's work he told me to go and buy myself some clothes which I did.
I started my new job with any thing but a good reference from my previous employer Mrs Tidy as when she drove me out there on the Sunday she remarked to my new boss that she hoped he would be able to get me to do more work for him than I had for her.
So I began my new job, firstly I had to get the cows in and milked before breakfast which was at 7.30am my brother Alf helped me that first morning just to get me used to the routine, we had 8 cows to milk which didn’t take us very long in fact Alf showed me how to do the separating before breakfast too and this was usually done afterwards. Next I was to cut enough wood for the house to last until the next day then when this was finished I was taken to the orchard to dig around trees until lunch time then back into the orchard until it was time to bring the cows in and milk and separate again before teatime any my brother was keeping me up to my job for the first couple of days too. The wages here were five shillings a week and after about a month when we had finished digging around the trees in the orchard Alf taught me to drive the team of five horses out to the paddock where we got the wood as he had his back heading behind the wagon so he could ride back home at night as when the wagon was loaded with wood I was sent off with it while he stayed behind to cut more wood for the next day and so this went on for about the next fortnight as we were getting in the winter supply of wood. This was very heavy work for me as Alf expected me to lift big pieces of wood the same as he could however I kept going until the wood was all in and then he taught me how to use a crosscut saw and I was kept going sawing up the big logs of she-oak we had brought in.
I rather like this place of employment as I had made friends with the boss’s grand-daughter who had come there to love and go to school at Miss Sharple’s School which was about a quarter of a mile away from the farm. Linda and I became really good pals and we had rigged up a swing in a shed of loose hay and our favourite pastime was to see who could swing the highest and then jump the fartherest but one day her Auntie came into the barn while she was collecting eggs and caught us and Linda was taken straight to he Grandfather to explain what we were doing in there and I also had to go on the mat before him but when I explained it was only innocent fun and that I had finished all my work beforehand everything was all right but after this Auntie was always snooping about and it wasn’t very long after this that Linda was sent back home again, she was then fourteen years old and her father had died not long before she came to the farm, when she came to say goodbye to me we were both very sad and she was weeping and said I will be back soon but it was not so and that was the last I ever saw of her but I heard after that she had joined up with a sideshow and was doing a high-kicking act which didn’t surprise me as she was very good at this.
Farm work went on as usual but Alf had gone ploughing at Boolagoon which is about ten miles south-west of Narracoorte as my boss and a neighbouring farmer, Fred Welcome had decided to go into share farming and grow wheat out there so Alf and Fred were now doing the ploughing and seeding and I was left to do all the work on the farm and Mr Smith could not help at all as he had lost a foot just above the ankle while cutting hay with the binder. So now the Auntie whose name by the way was Teenie Mudge assumed the position of boss over me though Mr Smith had told me what he wanted me to do and it seemed very reasonable and for a couple of months every thing went along well. I felt very sorry for my boss as he had been a very active man but now only used to sit beside the fore and read, he was a stonemason by trade and had the job to build Struan House for the Robertson family which was about ten miles out on the Penola road before this accident happened.
Teenie was being very nice to me still (which I could not understand) and on Saturdays would often tell me to rake a hack and go into Narracoorte and not to bother to come home in time to milk as she would do it for me then she told me I could stay in there until the Sunday if I liked and this I did, only to be confronted by Mr Smith on the Monday wanting to know why I had gone off without his consent for the weekend when I told him Teenie had told me to go she was brought in and flatly denied any knowledge of it and even told him she had wondered what had kept me away, I called her a damn liar right there in front of him and I was ordered to stop using words like that at once but I still insisted that I was telling the truth but to no avail as I was given a week’s notice and did she ever give me a hectic week and told me that she had lied about it because I had beaten her over the Linda affair! At the end of the week I had my one week’s pay and that was all I had as I had drawn right up to buy a few new clothes the previous weekend so once again I left my job with only a small parcel of clothes and only five shillings in my pocket. I was driven into Narracoorte by none other that shall I say enemy! Teenie and was so annoyed with her that I never said a word to her all the way in nor did I say goodbye to her either. She had dropped me off in front of a baker’s shop and when I looked in the window I saw they were wanting a boy to start right away so in I went and applied for the job and got it.
I was given a list of my duties which was a full days work but I could also learn the trade if I cared to get up at 3.00am so I thought I may learn that later when I got settled into my new job.
My new boss was Mr John Campbell and my wages this time were to be six shillings a week and I had 350 loaves of bread to deliver to customers at three pence per loaf. The first week I hot very tired but after that got used to my delivery work but I could not keep my cash right no matter how I tried and I was told that he would have to keep any shortages out of my pay. I was happy about this as I was also now starting to learn the trade but try as I would I could not very often get my money right and with only six shillings to come I soon began to notice the deductions from it and then I realised that if I had any money over my boss would keep that too which I thought was very unfair so I decided to look for another job.
Once again I net my brother Alf (who always seemed to be on the lookout for my well being) and told him I was not too happy with my present job so he said to give notice as he had another one for me and this was out at Bald Hills as the wheat was ready for stripping.
Harvesting in those days was done with a box stripper and the wheat was cleaned with a had winnower, there were three other boys about my age and we were to drive a team of four horses in the strippers and we had to ride one of the horses at the back and keep them steered so that the stripper comb was full all the time now this was quite difficult as the crop was growing on some steep hills and going along the side of the hill the stripper would slip down the hill and get right away from the crop then we would have to take a swoop around and come back up onto it again. I was driving for Alf and he was always giving me a tongue banging about my driving and I was getting tired of always being in strife, so I asked the others how the were getting on with their drivers and we were all getting into the same trouble so we decided to have a meeting next day after we had harnessed and fed the horses, our beds were under a wagon with a tarpaulin over it so this is where we met.
Fred Welcome was really in charge of the whole gang and he was also the camp cook and expected us to come straight to tea as soon as we finished our work, this night he came looking for us, he didn’t have a whip the greasy tea towel he flicked us all with stung almost as much but when we told him why we were late he listened to our complaints and apologised. He told the strippers to have more consideration for us as we were all trying to do our best and after this things were much better.
One of the incidents I saw which I think is worthy of a mention here was a grand pull by one of Fred’s horses, as usual when there is a group of half a dozen fellows gathered in a camp there are some pretty tall stories told and this particular night after tea this was going on and one fellow was saying about some wonderful pulls he had seen.
Fred listened attentively then said those are very good pulls but U don’t think there is one of them that could pull more than my hose so to prove he is as good as I say I will hook him onto that wagon load of wheat that is ready to be taken away tomorrow and I say that he will pull that load at least six feel from where it stands now, of course there was a general laugh about this as the load would weigh six tons or just over and some of the men tried to talk him out of it.
There was great excitement next morning when the team of five horses was harnessed up, Fred’s horse Jerry was to be included in the team and he took him by his short lead and put him in the shafts then got one of the other men to hold up the other shaft and all was ready for this great demonstration. Fred patted his neck and said come on Jerry and he gave a good attempt but the wagon didn’t move then Fred stood back further and said much louder this time, come on Jerry you can di it and everyone’s amazement he really got down to it and hung on until that load moved and once he had it going it was not hard to keep it going and he stuck to it and moved the load of wheat the six feet his owner said he would, what a pull and what a horse, everyone was astounded. At the end of a month the harvesting was finished and so I was looing for another job and I met my cousin Gavin Munn who was a bullock driver and had a job to cart goods from Narracoorte railway good shed to Apsley and needed some help so that suited me although it would all be new to me. Next morning we loaded up a mixed load of merchandise to be delivered to Mr Hoar (W.T.) the general storekeeper there and we got an early start as we had to get about six miles out from Narracoorte to camp for our first night. When we arrived Gavin gave me my first lesson at taking the yokes off the bullocks, a very awkward job for a start but he explained that he wanted me to get among them so they would become used to me.
After the team was unhitched two bullocks had bells strapped on their necks and I was given the job of taking them to the Hynam Station property where there was a lot of Sheoak trees and Gavin had gone ahead to lop limbs off them for food for his bullocks, after all this was done it was time to get wood and get a fire going to cook out tea and boil the billy and then to get our beds ready for the night but this was no trouble as we slept on the ground under the wagon and I can assure you that I had very little sleep as it was not very comfortable at all but it wasn’t a very long night because as soon as it was light enough to see I was told to get up and boil the billy and cook chops for breakfast while Gavin went away to find the bullocks and bring them back to be yoked up. I had the food ready when he returned with them and afterwards I had to roll up our swags and stow them away in the tuckerbox.
Gavin got me to walk along with him to show me how to drive the team and after a couple of hours under his instruction I was given the whip and told to drive them but this was after we had stopped for lunch and I had to get them going again I walked up along side them and tried all I had learned but they just stood there swishing their tails even when I spoke to them by name (as they all had names and knew them too). Gavin thought it was a great joke so came up beside me and got them going for me but as soon as he went back to the wagon they stopped again however after a few more days I was able to work them reasonably well and I was up and keen to get going each morning after I had done the usual swag rolling, tuckerbox packing and made a billy of tea that was always kept hanging on a hook on one side of our wagon with a waterbag on the opposite side or under the wagon depending on how hot it was that day, but the tea was the favourite and nearly always empty by lunch time, so now I was a bullock puncher but I didn’t seem able to master the bullocky language but I was not really sorry about that really.
We delivered the first load to Apsley and returned to Narracoorte for another mixed load and this one contained six hogsheads of whisky and Gavin remarked as we were loading it onto the outer side of our wagon there is a lot of joy in this load!
Our first camp was as usual on the Red Hill about six miles out on the Hynam/Apsley road and in this vicinity was quite a lot of good rabbit trapping country and Gavin invited two of the trappers to join us that night after tea around the camp fire. While I was boiling the billy for tea he was very quiet and I wondered what he was up to and when I called him to tea he came around with a gallon billy full of whisky saying this is for tonight! We had a small drink each but I didn’t like it much, in fact it was the first time I had ever tasted it but later when the others came and began drinking they got me to join in and it turned out to be a very hilarious night with singing and dancing, Scottish of course under the circumstances! When we decided to break up the party at 2.30am one of the trappers had gone very quiet and was sitting by the fire and when he tried to stand up had lost the use of his legs and even when we stood him up he couldn’t do so, his legs would just fold up beneath him so he was just left there by the fire for the rest of the night and was very surprised when awakened by his mate the next morning when it was time to go around the traps. Gavin and I feeling pretty seedy yoked up the team said farewell to the two trappers and set off for Apsley, and anyone we met along the road was offered a good stiff whisky but we couldn’t get rid of all we had taken before we got there, so had to throw a lot away. After we had unloaded this time the storekeeper had a load of shearers’ supplies to go out to a station in off the Edenhope road so we were on our way again soon. On our first night out we had our usual camp on the ground under the wagon which wasn’t very comfortable at all and I really couldn’t get used to it so I told Gavin that I didn’t intend sticking to this rough bullocky’s way of life and he said he was sorry as I was getting on well with the driving and offered to make me up a camp stretcher out of two bags if I would stay with him as he had a lot of other carting to do and now that I could take charge of the team he could get up on the load and have a much needed rest and sleep and we used to do this, he would drive for a couple of hours and then hand over to me, but the whole thing just didn’t appeal to me at all, but before I finish up about my bullocky days I must tell you about the jaunted room at the place we were now going to. We arrived there late in the afternoon and the owner met us and decided not to unload that day so we turned the team out into a really good paddock of feed for the night, then he said how would you two like to come up to the house for tea and if you like you can sleep in the spare room for the night. There are two beds in there ready to get into and I think you will find them much more comfortable than the ground to sleep on, so of course we accepted this offer. This was a really nice old homestead and the owner showed us around the house and garden explaining about the previous owners he did not have the exact date of the building of the station but said that it was built in the very early days of settlement when the blacks were stull treacherous. We went to the kitchen for our tea and met the friendly cook/housekeeper (Mrs Smith) and afterwards were shown upstairs to our nice bedroom, neatly furnished with a single bed on either side and a dressing table and a chair also there, it looked out over the lovely garden of shrubs and trees which we had seen earlier, also lovely flowers within the distance a view of the huge red gums that grew profusely in that area and so we were very happy to be spending the night here, and after the really good meal we had been given followed by a nice chat with the other station workers we were only too pleased to retire for the night in such comfort. It didn’t take us long to get ready for bed, it was to be such a luxury after we had been sleeping on the ground for the last few weeks and we soon had the light out and I was almost asleep when there was a dragging noise as if something heavy was being pulled across the floor, Gavin sat up and said what are you up to? Just as I was about to ask him the same question, se we talked for a little and settled down again and once again the same noise began and this time we lit the lamp and decided that it might be someone sleeping in the room below playing tricks on us and Gavin went out on the stairs to see if there was anyone about but there was no one there, so once again we tried to go to sleep and this time we were able to do so without any further disturbance, as it was daylight when we woke again.
After a good breakfast next morning we went over to unload the wagon and found the boss and the two station hands there and while these two were carrying the goods and cases into the storeroom the boss asked us what sort of a night we had, did we find everything all right with our room, so Gavin said Yes, when we could get to sleep but I think someone was trying to play games with us, it had me wondering for a while and it certainly scared the boy here but it takes a lot to scare an old bullocky like me. However the boss assured us no one was playing pranks on us, then he called the two station hands over and we told them about the noises we had heard during the night and he also told us that there certainly wasn’t anyone in the room below us as he had locked that room himself just to make sure there could be no one in there while he tested out with we two strangers to find out if there really was something amiss with our bedroom, as others who slept there had also heard the same as us. Then he told the station hand to tell us the story as he knew it from his father who had told him never to sleep in that room because there had been a murder committed in there and the body had been dragged across the room then carried down the stairs and disposed of in the garden, he remembered hearing about it when he was a boy and had always been told the room was haunted! After a bit more discussion about our previous night’s experiences we all said our farewells and we set to and yoked up the team heading once more, and for my last time as a bullocky, to Narracoorte as I assured Gavin this time I was not going to continue with him, so he asked me if I would like to go to his father’s farm which was about eight miles from Apsley and work there for a while and then come back to him and I accepted this but I didn’t ever go back to him again.
Out at the farm I was working with my cousins Victor and Tommy Munn helping to make clay bricks for the walls of a shed they were building and also cutting timbers for the roof framing and splitting shingles for the roof, all these came from the bill-oaks which grew profusely in that area in those days, We soon had a good stack of bricks made and set out to dry in the sun and also the shingles stacked up so air could get through them to dry them out properly too. I helped with the building of this shed when all was ready and many years later went back to that farm and found the shed stull in very good order and still in use.
After finished at my Uncle’s I went back to Narracoorte to my sister Mrs Gill Wright and it was while there in 1902 that my married brothers and sisters decided that our three younger sisters Maude, Mabel and Floss were not being well cared for by my father and brother Lewis who was now 14 was leaving home to get a job so the family met at our old home at Hynam and decided to take the girls away from father who was very upset by this. This was the first time I had seen him since he had chased me away from home as mentioned earlier in my story and even now he was not very happy to see me back again and I never saw him again until a few years later when he was in hospital very ill in fact too ill to even speak to me but I could see by his actions that he was asking for my forgiveness so I let him see his request was granted and very soon after that he quietly passed away and so I was the only member of his large family to be with him in those last few minutes of his life on this earth. (Father died September 1906). Back at Gill’s farm there was plenty of work to be done and I was helping out with fencing, shearing and harvesting and it was here that I learned under Gill’s instruction, to use the scythe, a lesson I never forgot for the rest of my life, after I had cut a strip around his crop paddock about six feet wide so the horses and binder could get in without trampling it down. While I was working here a neighbour about a mile away was Dr Gunning and his driver was going on holidays so he came to see if I would take his place for the next fortnight. I was to live at this house and be ready for a call all day or night so I went over with his driver to try myself at driving his horse which was quite flighty but I managed him quite well and I began my duties the next day.
The buggy was very comfortable, it was a hooded one and we had a beautiful weatherproof rug which had an extension flap that could be pulled right up to our necks in case we were driving into rain or windy weather. The Dr was a very kindly and understanding old man, then about 75 years old and when we were out in bad weather he would also hold his big umbrella up in front of us too so we were kept as dry as possible. The worst call we had was one very stormy night with very strong wind also rain and we had about eight miles to go in that at 2.30am and I had to wait outside in the freezing cold from about 3.10am until daylight, but it was a really good place to work and I was sorry when it ended after a fortnight.
After this, back to Narracoorte job-hunting again and I was very lucky because I went into the blacksmith’s shop owned by Bob Smith who was Mrs Tidy’s brother to see if there was any work at her farm again and he told me that Mr Findlater of Messamurry Station was equiring about a boy the previous day so he kindly lent me his horse so I could ride out the ten miles to see about it and I was employed there for the first time at fifteen shillings per week. Why I say for the first time is because I worked at this station on four different occasions and it was here that I made a very good friend in Geo V Bates who later became a leading racehorse trainer at Glenelg, also the bosses son Ned Findlater who bred racehorses which were trained by G.V.
I now became a general stationhand and was given my choice of a horse to be my own hack as we were to muster all stock on the station in preparation for a sale so it was a busy time especially with the sheep as each had to be caught and it’s teeth inspected to tell the age also they were checked for the quality of wool, the best being bought in for the sale as were the good horses, cows and heifers.
This all took quite some time to get organised and by the time the sale was held it was near shearing time so the usual work followed for that. I was kept on there for the next two years and it was quite like old times at shearing time but only in a small way compared to the other sheds I had worked in, viz Laurie Park and Hynam as Messamurry only ran about four thousand sheep so there were only four shearers and two extra hand required.
Note:
This is as far as my father who was Charles Henry Yusif Hansford wrote about his early life, the year would now have been approximately 1906. I believe he later worked at Platt Bros in Narracoorte where he learned the carpentering trade before going to Robe to live where he was married in 1912. Firstly in the Robe district he worked on the building of the South Eastern Drainage System in the Woakwine Ranges area as a navvy but later became a carpenter in the township.
During the Depression he became a shearer’s cook at Lake Hawdon Station a few miles out of Robe and when the shearing season finished he grew and provided vegetables to the local hotel, both of which occupations I feel reflected on his early days and family life in Hynam/Narracoorte area.
Source: Thelma Pillifeant
HOPE stemmata: from Ancrum to Apsley