Mother of Ten (16 page)

It
is only through the writing of
Mother of Ten
that I have come to realise
how important it has been for Bertie, Audrey and Noel to know more about their
mother and to connect with her other children. They were thrown asunder in the
world. Any additional piece of knowledge about their roots and any extra family
member they know about helps to anchor them and reassure them of their worth as
human beings and family members. Even this small comfort would have been denied
them had Mum not revealed her secret by leaving the relevant papers where my
sister and I were sure to find them after her death.

I
asked Mum’s friend Cathy, who is now an Indigenous Pastoral Care Officer, if
she had known my mother’s secret but she said she had not. However, she does
recall a conversation when Myrtle seemed to want to tell her something. Perhaps
Mum had reached that point where, with the right prompting, she might have
shared her secret. Sometimes in later years separated mothers feel able to talk
about their loss.

Cheryl
King, in
Releasing the Past,
states, ‘I have tried for so long to bury
my loss deep within myself and have not shared it with anyone until the last
few years. It will always be with me. My first son will always be a part of me,
just as he is a part of my other two children.’

However,
Mum did not open up to her friend. Cathy regrets that at that time she did not
have the skills to ask the right questions that might have opened the door for
Myrtle to reveal what was buried in her heart.

Although
Bertie, Audrey and Noel all bear a physical likeness to their father, I have
noticed that they have each inherited qualities from their mother. In Bertie I
observed the same quiet humility and gentleness that Mum had.  In Audrey I
see Mum’s sense of fun. Noel’s habit of using jokes and laughter as a shield
against deeper emotions is classic Myrtle. All three have demonstrated the same
lack of bitterness that I witnessed in our mother. They have all inherited
Mum’s strength of character and ability to move through pain and adversity to
live their lives outside the shadowlands of their childhoods and beyond the
ghosts that might otherwise haunt them.

Mother
of Ten
is a memoir in that it is a historical account written from personal knowledge.
I have used my memories, the memories of others and family documents. However,
I have also used imagination and supposition to fill in the gaps. Along with
the stories of her first three children, I wanted to give you a glimpse of what
it was like for my mother living in near isolation and poverty in the
Australian bush rearing seven children while also enduring the consequences of
separation from her first three children.

I
have not told you about my mother because I think she was extraordinary but
because she was an ordinary woman with a secret. Many ordinary women hide
extraordinary secrets. I think that is especially true of women in earlier
times. Sadly, what happened to Myrtle and her children was common to many women
and children. It is because my mother is typical of women of her time that I
think her life is worthy of study. Her story gives us all a window into the
world of mothers and children who suffered the same awful loss.

I
would like to think that other mothers with secrets might feel more able to
share them with their families after reading Myrtle’s story. Although revealing
a secret can be an extremely difficult thing to do, it can be helpful. At the
NSW Senate Inquiry one mother made this comment:

“I
have found the inquiry to be most beneficial. A part of my life that was kept
hidden for years was now being freely discussed in a public forum and the shame
and stigma around my son’s birth and adoption has begun to dissipate as I have
been able to discuss my experiences and feelings, of which grief and rage have
been the most difficult to process.”

It
is not only the teller of the secret who can benefit from releasing the story
of lost children but also all those affected by it in any way, including the
children and grandchildren and all future generations. One of the most
significant and beneficial results of the publication of
Whisper My Secret
was that Bertie, Audrey and Noel learned that their mother was not the evil
woman she was made out to be. Not only that but their children, Myrtle’s grandchildren,
now have a new version of their grandmother to hand down to future generations.
Not even a million sales of the book could equal the value of that.

Real
names for people who were given pseudonyms in this book are as follows:

Etti
Webb
: Antonia
(Toni)
Webb.                     

Henry
Bishop
:
Keith Dopper.

Agnes
Bishop
:
Eva Dopper.

John
Bishop
:
Charles Dopper.

Bertie
Bishop
:
Kenny Dopper.

Audrey
Bishop
:
Valerie Dopper.

Noel
Bishop
:
Allan Dopper.

1:
In doing the research for the sequel I discovered that the information in
Whisper
My Secret
about the death of Myrtle’s adoptive father was incorrect. An
aunt told me that James Webb shot himself after being diagnosed with throat
cancer. Her description of the shooting and the aftermath was so detailed that
I am sure she had first-hand knowledge of such an event. However, it appears
that she must have been relating what happened to someone other than James
Webb. I have since discovered from family records collated by Percy Munchenberg
that James Webb died of leukaemia in 1931. Percy tells me that it was Myrtle’s
grandfather, Freidrich Krautz, who suffered with throat cancer, although he did
not shoot himself. Percy suggests he ‘probably died from malnutrition or
starvation’.

Another
correction concerns Myrtle’s arrival in Orbost in the 1940s. I assumed she
travelled to Orbost by train. However, as passenger trains to Orbost ceased in
1935, Myrtle probably arrived by coach.

2:
Some readers of
Whisper My Secret
expressed disappointment that,
although the book was listed in the memoir/biography category, it seemed to be
fictionalised. I understand readers who were disappointed because their
expectations of a biography were not met. The original publishers, Zeus
Publications, categorised it as a non-fiction novel. Because of the way I have
chosen to present my mother’s story the book is a difficult one to accurately
categorise. It is listed in the biography/memoir category at Amazon for lack of
a better option. My aim was to tell my mother’s secret, to try to reconstruct
how and why it might have happened. I am not a historian or a biographer. I am
a storyteller so I wrote a story; a story that is essentially true.

My
mother was separated from her first three children in circumstances as outlined
in
Whisper My Secret
. I put the story together using what facts I did
have and filled in the gaps with information from my mother’s papers, documents
from Australian government archives, supposition, imagination, anecdotal
evidence from some of the people who were around at the time, and my knowledge
of my mother (and my father).

Ballarat:
Ballarat
has important historical significance apart from the Gold Rush because it is
where the Eureka Stockade took place on December 3rd, 1854. The gold miners of
Ballarat rebelled against British colonial authority, specifically the
expensive and compulsory Miner’s Licence. Miners, police and soldiers were
killed in the battle which eventually resulted in the Miner’s Licence being
reduced from £8 per year to £1 per year and licensed miners were also given the
right to vote. The Eureka Rebellion or Eureka Stockade is considered a key
event in the development of Australian democracy and Australian identity and the
principles of mateship, demonstrated by the gold diggers. The term ‘digger’ was
later adopted by the ANZAC soldiers in World War I.

bastard
file:
a
file used for sharpening and smoothing which has cutting teeth along a flat
edge and one pointed end.

 
blackfella
:
an Australian Aborigine or Torres Strait Islander. We used this word when I was
growing up as a statement of fact and sometimes with affection but not as a
racist slur. However, some modern ‘do-gooders’ seem intent on casting this word
in a negative light claiming its use to be racist against Australian
Aborigines; ironic really since it is Aboriginal English.

chook
house
:
chicken coop

care-leaver
: someone who grew up in
what was called 'care' (institutions such as orphanages) but who now has left
that 'care'.

dunny:
a colloquial term for
an outside toilet.
The
word evolved from ‘dunnekin’ meaning ‘dung-house’ in a British dialect.

fair
dinkum:
(colloquial)
an assertion of truth of genuineness.

Jacky:
Jacky’s behaviour
should not be seen as a reflection on the Kurnai people. I remember them as
gentle, kind people who did no harm to anyone. However, as with all communities
of human beings, there are individuals who deviate from the norm. (Jacky and
Lizzie are pseudonyms as I felt it would not be appropriate to use their real
names.)

knacker
: a person who buys old
horses for slaughter.

Kurnai:
(sometimes spelt Gunai
or Gurnai)
The Aborigines of East Gippsland belonged to the Kurnai tribe
which comprised five clans.

perve:
colloquial for pervert.

smoko:
a
colloquial word for a tea-break.

Snowy
River Bandit:
The
Snowy River Bandit roamed the bushland along the Bonang Highway in Victoria in
1940. Armed with two rifles he held up people and stores and stole foodstuffs
at Buchan, Goongerah, Tubbutt, Martin’s Creek and Sardine Creek. He was
arrested on 20 December 1940 and charged at Orbost before being transferred to
Bairnsdale District Hospital for treatment to a self -inflicted shoulder
injury.

His
name was Alan Torney. After escaping from an institution in Gouldburn, NSW he
had gone on the run and lived in the forests of East Gippsland surviving by
shooting kangaroos, sheep and rabbits until he started his robberies. He was
later certified insane and admitted to a mental hospital.

The
Riverina:
The
Riverina is an agricultural region of south-western NSW which has been home for
over 40 000 years to the Yorta Yorta people and the largest Aboriginal group in
NSW: the Wiradjuri people. The district is bordered on the south by the state
of Victoria and on the east by the Great Dividing Range.  The Great
Dividing Range, formed 300 million years ago when Australia was still part of
the ancient supercontinent of Gondwana, is one of the longest mountain ranges
in the world, stretching more than 3,500 kilometres (2,175 miles). The two
major rivers of the Riverina, the Murray (Australia’s largest river) and the
Murrumbidgee, acted as a source of food as well as a means of communication and
trade for the Aboriginal people. The Yorta Yorta and Wiradjuri people fished
for Murray cod and shellfish and used bark canoes for travel along the rivers.

The
bark canoes gave way to paddle steamers and barges used by Europeans in the
1850s. The rivers provided a transport route linking the Riverina to markets
along both rivers and to river ports in South Australia and Victoria.

Apart
from the riverboats, early explorers and ancient Aboriginal cultures,
bushrangers also added to the rich history of the Riverina region. Australia’s
infamous bushranger and folk hero, Ned Kelly, made what some consider his most
daring raid in the Riverina, in February 1879. After riding overland from north
east Victoria, Kelly and his gang stopped at Jerilderie and captured two local
policemen. They stripped the men of their uniforms and wore the uniforms to rob
the Bank of New South Wales. They then held the town captive for several days.
While in Jerilderie, Ned Kelly tried to have his 8000 word manifesto, now known
as the Jerilderie letter, published. The Jerilderie letter is a condemnation of
the colonial administration in Victoria and specifically the treatment of the
Irish. Being unable to find the local newspaper editor, Ned Kelly left the
letter with a member of the bank staff and departed, returning to Victoria with
£2,000 from the bank’s safe. Eighteen months later in a showdown with police at
Glenrowan, Ned Kelly was shot and arrested. On November 11, 1880 he was hanged
at Melbourne Gaol.

Only
forty years after the hanging of Ned Kelly my mother’s biological parents,
Alick and Vera Mills arrived in the Riverina.

Walla
Walla
:
an Aboriginal word meaning ‘place of many rocks’. The town was established by
people of German extraction. In the 1830s and 1840s large numbers of Germans
left the Kingdom of Prussia for Australia to escape religious persecution and
hoping for better fortunes. They formed communities in South Australia but when
farmland became in short supply some families made the six week journey over
600 miles (966 kilometres) to the Riverina in covered wagons and spring carts
to take advantage of land opportunities. Among them were Myrtle’s grandparents,
Doris and Freidrich Krautz, who made their way to Jindera in 1887, later
settling in Lavington which is now part of the city of Albury. Doris was a
descendant of Johann Friedrich Munchenberg who migrated from Prussia to South
Australia in 1839. Etti (Toni) Webb was the first child of Freidrich and Doris.

whitefella:
a
non-Aboriginal person of European descent. Like the term, ‘blackfella’, this is
an Aboriginal English term used when I was growing up without racist intent.

yakka
: colloquial word for
‘work’.
The
word evolved from ‘yaga’, which means work in the Yagara language (Aboriginal
group in the Brisbane region).