by Anne Connor
Bess gave birth to a baby girl with dark hair and blue eyes. She was small and peaky. Jock named her, ‘Let’s call her Bridget, my mother’s second name.’
Little Bridget didn’t feed well from the beginning and grizzled during her waking hours. She lost weight and had dark rings under her eyes. Bess sat for hours with the baby at her breast, trying to feed her, but Bridget lost interest. It was as if she didn’t have the strength to suckle. At six weeks, the infant was admitted to hospital. Bess and Jock sat in a stark waiting room with grey walls, grey linoleum and hard wooden chairs. My mother needed to feed and told the nurse her breasts were leaking and ached, and she asked if it was possible for her to nurse.
‘Doctor will be out in a moment. He’s examining the baby now,’ was the curt response.
After waiting hours, the doctor emerged. Bess hadn’t seen this man before. He was a specialist. My parents followed him along a corridor past a nursery where rows and rows of babies slept. They were ushered into a tiny room.
‘There’s no easy way to say this,’ the doctor said. ‘Your baby has a hole in the heart and it will be a matter of days before we lose her. I am surprised she has lasted this long. It’s best you both go home, try to sleep and come back in the morning. You may have a long few days ahead of you.’
Before sun-up, Bess and Jock walked arm in arm in silence back to the hospital. People were making their way to work and the warm January air was a signpost another scorcher was on its way. Jock pushed open the heavy front door of the hospital and they made their way to the room where they spent hours waiting the previous evening. It wasn’t long before they were ushered through to another small room.
Bridget had died during the night. When Bess asked to see her baby, to hold her, to say goodbye, she was told Bridget’s body had been dispensed with. She put her head in her hands and howled – a long primeval animal sound – then rocked back and forth crying, ‘No, no, no.’ Jock sat motionless, silent, staring into nothingness; both in their separate pain, unable to reach out to the other.
The next day, Jock cycled to work and went through the motions of operating the looms. He spoke to no-one. Bess stayed with her parents until Jock collected her after work. Tom and Mary had taken away the cot, pram, baby clothes and any evidence of little Bridget. The Anne Street cottage looked as it had when the couple moved in as newlyweds. Except now the joy of new marriage and beginnings had been replaced with sadness, grief and silence. Bridget’s aroma lingered on their bedspread. Bess had placed her there after bath time, propped herself up on one elbow and gazed into her newborn’s eyes. Her nightdress reeked of breast milk. Home alone, she found these personal relics and breathed in what was left of Bridget, buried her face in the nightgown and bedspread and cried, sobbed, howled, her tears blending with Bridget’s scent. In time, the sour milk smell became too much and the nightgown was eventually laundered. Not the bedspread, though. Bess hung on as long as possible to any trace of her baby girl and would lie face down on the candlewick, breathing in Bridget’s sweet baby aroma, until one day, there was no outward trace of Bridget left. The eiderdown just smelled like an eiderdown.
Bridget was rarely mentioned when I was growing up. I knew she died a few weeks after birth and shared the same birthday as me – bookend girls in a family of six children. A short time before Mum died, I asked her about the death of her firstborn. I told her the pain of losing a child was unimaginable. She cried during the telling of this story. I cried with her for myriad reasons, for the loss of the sister I didn’t know, for Mum’s hurt and as one mother with another.
3 September 1939
Once a week, Bess and Jock had tea at Mary and Tom’s house and then afterwards Tom insisted they sit in the lounge room and listen to the wireless, whether it was the ABC News or a serial. This was the rhythm of the evening and no discussion otherwise was entered into. On this night, the Prime Minister Robert Menzies was to address the nation.
Mary had cooked corned beef with potatoes, peas and beans from the garden. The sisters washed up the dishes while Tom and Jock smoked in the lounge room. Frank had found a job cutting sugarcane in Queensland and the house appeared empty to Bess without her little brother’s jokes and antics. She loved spending time with her sisters and missed their chats and giggles. Tilly had a crush on a new boy and Honor was still pondering whether she should get serious with Ralph or not. Bess had felt signs of pregnancy but kept it to herself. Tales of Tilly’s latest beau and gossip from the dances were a welcomed distraction and tonic for her.
When the ABC News music wafted into the kitchen the sisters rushed into the lounge room. Bess squeezed in next to Jock just in time. Do stay tuned for an important message from the Prime Minister of Australia Robert Menzies:
My fellow Australians. It is my melancholy duty to inform you, officially, that, in the consequence of the persistence by Germany in her invasion of Poland, Great Britain has declared war upon her, and that, as a result, Australia is also at war …
‘Oh no,’ said Mary. ‘We’ve lived through losing our boys in one war and now another.’ As an afterthought, she said, ‘I hope Frank doesn’t enlist.’
‘We’ll be alright, won’t we?’ asked Tilly. ‘They won’t bomb us, will they?’
‘Of course not, you stupid girl,’ said Tom. ‘Germany’s at war with England, not Australia.’ Tom stood up and switched off the wireless. ‘Pig-iron Bob has no right to dump us into someone else’s war.’
Jock looked up at him. ‘My brothers will join up, there is no doubt, and maybe my sisters too, to nurse the wounded.’ All eyes turned to him as the realisation of what war meant sank in.
Bess held Jock’s hand then turned her attention to her father. She had never stood up to Tom before, but that night she had no fear. ‘That someone else’s war is my husband’s and your son-in-law’s family.’
Tom coloured, ran his fingers through his hair, walked over to where Jock was sitting and put his hand on his shoulder. ‘Sorry, son, I don’t think of you as anyone else but one of us.’ His uncustomary regard for Jock didn’t go unnoticed and the women in the room exchanged glances.
Jock was torn as to where his responsibilities lay. He knew he had to join up; but how to tell Bess? She had dealt with enough with little Bridget’s death. He saw the pain on her face when her gaze lingered on babies in prams and mothers’ arms. At the thought of Bridget, tears welled in his eyes. He blinked hard and swallowed. How will she cope now losing her husband to the army?
AUSTRALIA AT WAR! loomed the headline from the wire rack on his ride to work; posters had been stuck to lampposts along La Trobe Terrace urging men to enlist. ‘They didn’t waste much time,’ Jock said to himself. His thoughts raced. My brothers and lads I know back home will be joining up to fight and I’m on the other side of the world married with a good job and a second family. My first priority is Bess, but I know I should fight for England.
He rode to the mill and slipped his front wheel into the bike stand. War-talk was rife as he made his way to the weaving room. He was thankful for the noise from the looms. It offered him time to think and work out what he should do.
Bess’ pregnancy was confirmed a few weeks after the Prime Minister’s announcement. Jock was thrilled with the news, but more undecided as to enlist or not. He had received letters from home telling him his two younger brothers were fighting in France. Much to Mary’s grief, Frank had enlisted and was in the first shipment of men sent to Mount Martha for training. Ralph had joined up too.
On Christmas Eve, Tom collapsed while working in his shed. Mary found him on the floor behind a stack of wooden boxes. He died hours later from a massive heart attack. The funeral took place the following week at the same church Jock and Bess had been married in six years earlier. A large congregation attended and Jock was one of the six pallbearers who carried Tom’s coffin. With the weight of the wooden box on his shoulders, his thoughts went to the time when his father died. He had been too young to carry him from the church but
remembered walking behind the pallbearers that day and hearing his mother next to him crying as they made their way out of the church into the icy wind.
Tom was buried in the Geelong Eastern Cemetery. The fact that no representative from Tom’s side attended was not lost on Jock. It made him even more mindful of his family back in England, with thoughts of them at war never far away.
Sadness hung over the Clarence Street house and Mary stayed in bed most days. Honor and Tilly took turns in taking their mother meals and they’d try to coax her to help with a patchwork quilt or join them for a walk along the foreshore. Bess visited daily and one morning sat on her mother’s bed and placed Mary’s hand on her stomach as the baby kicked.
‘Feel this, Mum,’ she said.
It was in the evenings when Honor and Tilly missed their father the most. Mary had banned the radio. It had become impossible for her to separate hearing the wireless from Tom. For her, the two were entwined.
Jock had taken on the man of the house role and helped out where required. He’d trim the high branches in the trees, clean out the gutters or shift any heavy items Mary needed moved. As the months passed, she gained weight and cooked for her family again. In time, the sound of the wireless floated through the house as the women tried to get on with life without the towering presence of Tom Brown.
It was four in the morning when Bess shook Jock by the shoulder. ‘It’s time.’
He ran to the telephone box on the corner and phoned for a taxi. By the time he returned, Bess was on her hands and knees panting. ‘Get Mum, the baby’s coming.’ Mary delivered her first grandson on the kitchen floor of Jock and Bess’ cottage. Cleary Thomas Connor weighed eight pounds, three ounces. The midwife visited the next day and gave the ‘all clear’ to the baby boy.
As the weeks passed, Cleary fed and slept well. He put on weight and Bess grew more in love with him every day. Her mother and sisters visited with pots of soup, baked cakes and knitted baby clothes. On their walks with little Cleary sleeping in the pram, Jock noticed the lack of civilian men in the streets. Factories were now beginning to hire women.
Jock stood in the doorway taking in the sweet domestic scene in front of him. Bess stood barefoot on the linoleum, stirring a pot on the stove singing to Cleary lying on a blanket in a sunny patch on the floor. She turned.
‘Hello, love. What’s up, you look as if your dog’s died?’
‘I’ve joined up,’ Jock said. ‘Leave Wednesday.’ He made an attempt to smile.
Bess felt she was supposed to reciprocate with goodwill but didn’t know how. She picked Cleary up from the floor. Afternoon sun threw golden lights on his baby curls and he chuckled as he was lifted into the air. She placed him in the wooden highchair, mixed boiled potato and pumpkin in a chipped white enamel mug and plopped a teaspoon of butter into the mash.
‘Just be eighteen months pet, no longer than that,’ he said. ‘There’ll be regular money.’
‘You’ve got regular money at the mill, now.’
Bess mixed the vegetables in a gentle rhythm at first, but the more Jock talked of leaving, the escapades ahead of him and catching up with Frank and Ralph, the harder and faster she stirred. The sound of the fork clinked against the enamel mug. Jock walked over to his wife, slipped his arm around her waist and tried to make a joke of it.
‘Pet, you’re mixing the baby’s food not ringing a chook’s neck.’
Bess was silent.
‘Well, maybe twelve months, love.’
‘This is out of the blue, how long had you been thinking of this?’
‘Since Menzies’ announcement last year.’
‘Last year!’ She spun around to look at him. ‘You didn’t mention it – I didn’t know you were thinking of enlisting.’
‘I know, pet. There didn’t appear to be the right time; you were pregnant, Tom died, then Cleary was born. And it’s something a man has to think about on his own.’
‘Oh is that right? So I don’t have a say. Is that what you’re saying?’
‘I didn’t mean that, love.’ Jock walked over to the kitchen window, looked out onto the back garden. He thought of England and his brothers fighting. He moved to where Bess was standing and took the enamel mug and placed it on the table. He held her hands. ‘It’s just, well … it’s England that’s at war, Bess – my country. It will be alright love, I promise. I’ll be back before you know, pet.’
She was left with the aroma of Craven As mixed and the smell of his woollen army coat. She held Cleary on her left hip as she waved and did her best to smile. Bess hugged her son tighter and feared for her husband’s safety. She missed him even as she watched him walk up Anne Street towards the Geelong Railway Station.
‘I’ll write, pet,’ he said, walking backwards along the footpath. ‘I’ll write.’
THE WAR
July 1941
THE GHAN SNAKED NORTH through the central Australian desert on its way to Alice Springs, the end of the line. Soldiers squeezed in anywhere possible, on the floor, even in the luggage racks. Jock had managed a window seat.
Talk of enemy reconnaissance planes flying at night meant the train stopped at dusk. The Ghan pulled up in what appeared to Jock the middle of nowhere. When he jumped to the ground, a cloud of red dust covered his army boots and socks. It was a relief to stretch his legs after being cramped for so long. He walked to the front of the train and rolled off large tin drums from the open-topped carriages. Sticks Malone and Stan Stainsbury searched for fuel – dried twigs and dead bushes.
At sundown, men donned their greatcoats and huddled around fires lit low in rusty bins. Punctured drum lids hindered the warm glow being seen from the air. Jock rubbed his hands together and held them splayed over the heat. He pulled a cigarette from his coat pocket and placed it in his mouth.
Stan lit his own rollie then Jock’s, before throwing the match into the flames.
‘Third time unlucky. My old man used to say that. First strike the Turks see you. Second light they take aim. Third light, boom you’re dead.’ Stan sucked hard on his cigarette.
Sounds of the night enveloped them, the crackling fire, movement from animals in the bush and in the distance Aborigines singing accompanied by the clack-clack of their bilma.
‘Never thought I’d miss Ballarat,’ said Stan. Tall and muscular with a thin face, high cheekbones and receding hairline, Leonard ‘Stan’ Stainsbury threw his head back when he laughed. His smile crooked, adapted to hide a couple of missing teeth.
‘Been wanting to get away from my old man for years,’ Stan said as he stared at the drum. ‘Always picking on me he was. Telling me I was bone idle and useless.’ He pulled the lapels of his coat up around his ears to keep out the night chill.
‘Hated Ballarat, hated school; left school two days after I turned twelve.’ He drew on his cigarette, tilted his face towards the billion stars and blew smoke into the night air.
‘Helped Mum full-time then, packing and delivering the groceries on my bike. The old man got mad after a few bottles and lashed out at Mum for nothing. He’d make stuff up that she had or hadn’t done, so I’d stand in between them. “Hit me, you bludger,” I’d say. He did, plenty of times; that’s how I lost these two teeth.’ He lifted his top gum to expose the gap. ‘Until I got to sixteen and grew a good few inches in that year. He moved from me to my little sisters, Dulcie and Betty – couldn’t stand it. So I took to him with a pick handle. He skedaddled out of town and we haven’t seen him since.’
‘Remind me never to upset you then, mate,’ said Jock. ‘I’m not too partial to pick handles, myself.’
The men laughed in unison then stood in silence staring at the flames, a couple kicked the dirt.
‘My mum cried when I enlisted,’ said Stan.
‘So did mine,’ said Horry.
‘And mine,’ said Sticks Malone.
Jock remained silent with that familiar tightness in the pit of his stomach as he remembered his mother rolling over and pulling the blanket over h
er head the day he left England.
In the distance, Aborigines chanted. The men listened in silence to the soulful sound drifting through the darkness.
‘She told me, don’t end up like your father,’ Stan continued. ‘Mum reckoned the old man came back from the war different. Reckoned he didn’t drink and wasn’t violent before he left for Turkey. But ever since I can remember he always had a bottle or glass in his hand and she was often bruised or had a cut lip.’
The fire began to subside. Jock threw more sticks into the drum and kicked the rusty sides a couple of times to stir the embers. The smoke smelled of eucalyptus.
‘It was so different after he left, so good. After tea, we’d play cards – Mum, me, Dulcie and Betty together at the kitchen table with the wireless on, never frightened of the back screen door opening as before. I knew it’d be alright – me leaving – ’cause I found out the old man had died in a blue in Melbourne during an Anzac Day two-up game. Not sure whether Mum knew. I didn’t tell her. But I knew they’d be alright.’
Stan stared into the fire. They all did.
The clacking of the bilmas in the distance started up again.
‘Now look at me, out in the middle of Woop Woop on the way to Darwin with a pack of miserable bastards. Who’d have thought?’
Sticks Malone put his clenched fist to his mouth and cleared his throat. ‘My mum cried for a day. She went upstairs to her bedroom and when she came back down, she just stopped talking to me. She just went quiet. Her brother, my Uncle Harry, didn’t return from Flanders. I think it had something to do with that.’
Sticks stood at six foot four with long skinny legs. The army barbers lost the fight against his curly blonde hair. It sat in waves on top of his head and as it grew, corkscrew curls popped up. He was from New South Wales, the first son of a wealthy grazier. Educated at boarding school in Sydney, he was expected to go to university then take over the property from his father.