by David Vernon
The red-faced preacher was led from the pulpit by prison warders, while the red-coated guards tried to maintain order by stopping the women from their protest. Their efforts appeared somewhat ineffectual, probably because they were enjoying the show as much as the Governor’s wife appeared to be. It took some time, but eventually order was restored.
Lady Jane was taken on a tour of the facilities while Franklin conferred with the warden and the affronted clergyman. An hour later, the Governor returned to his wife, took her arm stiffly and they walked in a dignified manner, followed by an apologetic entourage of prison officials to their coach. It was not until the coach had left the confines of the prison that Franklin started to laugh uncontrollably.
“John, are you alright?”
He finally managed to compose himself enough to speak.
“The sight of all those women baring their arses at that bombastic oaf was just too much. “
“But you looked so stern at the time.”
“I’m the Governor; I represent His Majesty King George. I could hardly be seen enjoying such a spectacle.”
After he had composed himself, Lady Jane asked him what would happen to the women.
“Of course, Bedford was adamant in his demands that these whores and prostitutes be severely punished for their impieties. He ranted that this only proved that everything he was saying about these women was correct and that the ringleaders would have to be severely punished. I managed to calm him down with some empty platitudes which, to my surprise he seemed to accept. Bedford was dispatched to his chapel, I remained to confer with the warden. I was able to convince him that this was a spontaneous act. There were no ringleaders and he couldn’t possibly punish all of the women.”
“It seems you did a fine day’s work, Sir John. And here you were saying you were always being blocked by civil servants. “
“Well, one good thing may come of today’s act of defiance.”
“And what might that be?”
“After this I’ll no longer be remembered as the explorer who ate his boots, but as the Lieutenant-Governor who faced three hundred bare female arses.”
Historical note: Five years later, in 1841 Franklin was recalled from his post in Van Diemen’s Land. It is suggested that this was due to conflicts with the local civil servants due to his humane ideals and attempts to reform the penal colony. He returned to arctic exploration. In 1845 he perished on his final expedition, while attempting to chart the North West passage. There are a number of places named in his honour in Tasmania, most notably the Franklin River.
Harold Mally lives and writes in Sydney. Some of his stories have won awards and appeared in publications such as Blue Crow, Eclecticism, Page Seventeen, Scribe, Slippery When Wet, Splatter, 21D and [untitled] . One appeared in a previous Stringybark anthology, The Bridge. While he usually just makes stuff up, Act of Defiance is his first attempt at historical fiction.
New World
— Valerie Volk
Robert Sedley stared miserably after the ship as the white sails vanished on the horizon. He had watched it from the shoreline for far too long, he knew. But it was the last link with Hetty. Now she was really gone.
Around him the bustle continued, though most people had retrieved their goods and found their way to one of the primitive hotels that had already sprung up in the settlement. People were determined to make good — and there were other ways of making money than taking up the land they had been promised. A lodging-house keeper could do well out of new arrivals alone.
As for a tavern keeper… good money there. Hard-working men who came into Adelaide town for goods and provisions welcomed a friendly place to sit and talk a while.
But not for him, thought Robert. No place to rear children. Now, without Hetty, he would have to be the one who thought about that. Such small mites, Jemmy and Oscar, to be without a mother, he grieved. But should they be left alone? Aye, there’s the rub, he mused. Do I leave them alone? Do I stay alone myself?
Captain Wilkins had talked to him with great understanding before the body sewn in sail cloth had slipped over the ship’s side. He too had lost a wife, he’d said. He could well understand Robert’s feelings, but he also knew the hardships of a man without a mother for his children, especially in the rigours of a new land.
“If you wish it, you can return to England with us,” he had offered. But Robert had shaken his head. He knew there was nothing for him at home. Except memories, and they would be more terrible back there, he sensed. Home without Hetty? Unthinkable. Unbearable. But what to do instead?
No shortage of willing women. That had been made quite clear already on shipboard. Not that he hadn’t been glad of their help after Hetty …
Abruptly, he turned, unwilling to face again the thought of that terrible time, made even worse by the well-meaning help all those women had offered. And here was one of them.
Although her voice was shrill and the accent unpleasant, Maria Barlow was a good woman. Robert tipped his hat — I’ll have to get a cap like all the others, he thought — and made the effort to smile.
“A good morning to ye, Mr Sedley. And I see the brig has started on the homeward trip.”
“A very short stay for provisioning, Ma’am. The Captain said they would not be in port for long.”
“If ye can call this god-forsaken place a port!” she snorted. Really, thought Robert, she is not a pleasant woman. Is this what I want for my children? For Oscar, barely two, with his mop of golden curls, which Mrs Barlow had viewed so disapprovingly. “It’s time the bairn has that hair cut back to Christian length,” she had said. “I can do it for ye,” she had offered with enthusiasm, and only with difficulty had he resisted.
But she had, at least, helped with Jemima’s long tangled tresses when he had battled these, and here there had been no mention of shearing. “Ah, the wee thing has her puir dead mither’s hair.” She did not seem to notice the shudder with which Robert had handed over the comb.
It was indeed Hetty’s hair, long and golden. Back in the old days they had laughed about it, he and Hetty, as they sat reading the new poems that Mr Browning had just published. That one poem, about the musician in Venice – what was it? The name came back to him — such a strange name for a poem, he had thought, ‘A Toccata of Galuppi’ but Hetty had explained it was a piece of music. He could remember the lines, because they had laughed. Dear God, had they really laughed?
Dear dead women with such hair too. What’s become of all the gold
Used to hang and brush their bosoms…?
What awful prescience had made her laugh? ‘Dear dead women’ – she had actually smiled at him, and asked “Will you remember me like this one day?”
Remember her? How could he ever forget. That hair, lank and matted with sweat, as she writhed and twitched in the grip of the fever that had laid her on the narrow bunk at the end of the women’s quarters. They had moved her there gently, away from the others, fearful lest the fever spread even further among the women. And there Robert could nurse her through those last awful days, for all feared too much contact with the sufferers.
She had known what the end would be, and no amount of hopeful talk from him had deceived her. “Keep my little ones away from me,” she had begged. “Not here. Do not let them risk this disease. I would not wish them to see me like this. You must help them remember me as I was, Robert. Promise me this.”
Her poor hands plucking feebly at the rough straw mattress they had laid her on, and the rough woollen blanket that they would soon wrap around her body, hiding from view the wasted face and the lank hair that mocked his memories.
He shivered suddenly. Hetty’s hair, brushing her bosom. Could he put another woman in her place?
But the children. He could not manage in this new raw place without a mother for the children. It would be hard work and long hours. Without great effort one would not carve a new farm out of the virgin scrub he had been shown. Those pictures might have been daunting, but b
eforehand he and Hetty had seen it as a challenge.
She had been as eager as he, when they read of the offers for emigrants who would make a new start in this new colony of free settlers. Mr Angus had been persuasive. “There are great opportunities for men who want to make a new land. This will be a colony of free men; there will be no convicts.” His eyes had shone at that public meeting he and Hetty had attended.
“We can do this, dear heart.” Her face too had been bright. “A new land for us and for our children. You will rise in the world, Robert. There will be opportunities for a man of your intelligence in a place like this that England, dear as she is, will never provide.” How her eyes too had shone.
In front of him, the sea swelled, while behind the clatter and clamour of the port swirled. Horses and carts were loaded, as last goods set off to their new homes. The bonneted women hushed chattering children. He could see his own two, wearing the black clothes that sympathetic mothers had hastily fashioned for them as the ship left Aden.
“Dinna fash!” Martha Barlow had been kindly. “We sh’ll make sure the bairns are proper clad before your puir lady goes to her rest.” So they all had all been suitably clothed to watch that sad long bag consigned over the side of the ship to the heaving waters below. It was the fifth burial for the voyage, for Henry Barlow had been the first of many to suffer from the fever, and the captain’s voice as he read the service was kindly, but perfunctory.
“Say more,” Robert had wanted to scream at him. “Say more. This was my wife; this was my love.” But it was soon over, and Widow Barlow took away the children to join her own fatherless brood.
Necessary, yes. Suitable, yes. But to replace Hetty with this coarse well-meaning woman! To hand their children to her care. To take her to his bed.
He shuddered.
She was standing near him, and he knew that there were words that needed to be spoken. Then, with an unexpected gentleness, she laid her hand on his arm, and said quite softly for a loud-voiced woman: “It is hard, I know. I know it too.”
They stood in silence, watching the heaving sea. But it was a companionable silence, and even comforting.
He turned to ask the question that she waited for.
Historical note: While there were a lack of women in all the convict colonies, South Australia was not often short of female free-settlers — much to the relief of fathers like Robert Sedley.
Valerie Volk is a long time writer whose career as a teacher, lecturer and education program administrator has for too many years deflected her from what she enjoys most — writing. Now at last she is combining a passion for travel with a third life as a writer. Her first collection of verse, In Due Season, won the national CALEB Prize for poetry in 2010.
Beechworth
— Thea Biesheuvel
The bright red pillars weep with the chilly morning mists. Carved symbols well up with tears and look at me through their tear drops. Together they form a bright frame for a vista of small temples and headstones; shrines built to the ancestors in far-off places after the burning towers had done their job and sent their spirits heavenwards.
Why had I come back to seek answers here?
Small temples contain oriental urns which are placed in front of yellowed photographs. They depict leathery Chinese men in their Sunday best and stocky young girls, staring out through wide, scared eyes at this strange world they’ve agreed to inhabit.
The slanted black eyes remain the sharpest surviving details on the photos and give me a vivid flashback to my son, Oliver, and his accusing eyes when he felt he had been misunderstood.
But these girls had men who spoke their language and were of their own culture. Oliver and I had no such common understanding. We had problems communicating. Only half of his genes are Chinese. He should have adapted to our Australian culture. I have not done that but I have had to merge quickly and unnoticed. By the time he was born multiculturalism took care of his differences so that these became bonus points for him. And then every Australian town developed its own Chinatown.
I can only wonder at how persuasive nuggets of gold must have been to our ancestors. Imagine a rich man, returned to take a bride. It took men some hard labour to win those nuggets from the streams circling these hilly fields and the township beyond. Beechworth is built on alluvial gold. When that became scarce, shafts were sunk. When these became too hard and dangerous to work, the miners moved on.
At the height of our gold rush, the Chinese Protectorate Office in Beechworth could count eight thousand Chinese gold diggers, mainly from what is now Yunnan province. I know there were others on other goldfields but Beechworth has the most extensive records.
There are major rivers coursing down from the Victorian Alps. These had to be diverted through channels and races to deliver water for gold panning. Water for the diggings also meant that vegetables could be grown along the way. Chinese families were quick to corner the market by building on their own need for fresh vegetables, just as they had grown in their homeland
I’m happy to look at my heritage and very proud of my green thumb but the mood of the cemetery is sombre. Depression settles like the misty rain. Too many tiny tombstones. The large ones with many names chiselled into them are even sadder. So many dead children. So many epidemics. And now I’m mourning my own son, Oliver.
Shaun, Oliver’s father, had been a fascinating creature. Milk skin and copper curls. His brilliant blue eyes flashed when animated. He had once thought I was exotic and different too. We were like layers of Old Gold chocolate and white fudge. His parents were delighted to meet me.
“You will civilise him,” his mother told me.
“He’ll settle at last,” his father said.
It was then that I felt a heavy burden pressing on my shoulders. I had thought he would help me feel at home. We had so many and such high expectations. No wonder our relationship fell apart. I had hoped that Shaun would understand the tug-of-war going on inside my head. In my head was my mother’s voice admonishing me and critical of all I allowed my husband to eliminate from my life. My Australian friends laughed at my mother’s strange ideas and rules. Shaun would eventually be openly antagonistic to my Chinese heritage. He had thought his son would look just like him.
“Once you have Chinese ancestry, all other ancestry is no good,” my mother taught us. “You can’t be half Chinese, or even quarter Chinese. You are always all Chinese.”
Oliver certainly looked all Chinese.
“You were born here, act Australian,” my husband shouted at me. “You’re not a Chink.”
I didn’t know who I was.
Although my husband was tolerated by my Chinese friends and family, he soon stopped pretending, drank more than was good for him and became more and more violent. I spoke to my mother-in-law and she apologised. My husband left soon after that. In contrast, my son was adopted as a true son of China and, like all Chinese boys, spoilt by his Chinese grandparents. He was their assurance of immortality. But we were to find out that he was mortal after all.
The plan for Oliver’s future grew organically, just like my herb garden. Small seeds were sown in fertile soil. Seeds such as his unchallenged academic achievements. Soil such as his adoring grandparents.
“Top student, Mrs. Young,” the class teacher would intone. “A hard-working boy.”
I knew he didn’t work hard. He had a good memory and relied on it.
“I’ll be alright; leave me alone,” were constant cries during his High School years. He wasn’t alright. He was bored and looked for more exciting things to do. I didn’t like his friends. They all ate and drank too much. They went out late at night.
He refused to study. He wanted to invest money and live on the dividends. I had no money to invest, but my parents did. There was no doubt that Oliver was good at this. They were pleased with him.
“He knows the value of money,” my mother said.
“He doesn’t know the value of hard work,” I said.
He applied
for a job in a merchant bank. They hired him. His young supervisor had alluded to possible visits to China.
“After all,” his supervisor said, “we need people like you. You look like them and can speak the language.”
I knew Oliver couldn’t speak Chinese other than my parents’ peasant polite phrases but I had hopes that he would learn to value his heritage and visit our ancestral places.
He was posted to New York first of all.
“Exciting,” he crowed. “The Big Apple.”
“The Big Apple has a worm at its core,” I said.
“Trust you. You don’t want me to succeed, do you?”
“How can you say that?” I shouted. “I’m your mother. Your father doesn’t care. I want you to show that you can settle into a good work habit.”
“Habit? Habit? Anyone would think I do hard drugs.”
“How do you know about hard drugs?”
“Your ancestors were opium addicts, Ma.”
“Only after the English forced it on them. Learn some history.”
“Don’t need to. I can Google it.”
He was gone for three months before a phone call informed me that he’d been posted to Shanghai. He didn’t come home first but went straight on from New York.
I had began growing exotic herbs and gained a certificate as an organic grower. That meant a lot of work to keep the plants free of bugs and the soil free of weeds. I loved the garden. All the news of the world and the gossip of the town passed me by when bent over my green charges. If only Oliver would respond so well to my care and attention, I thought.