My paternal grandfather was one of six - Flirt, Dick (my grandpa), Jenny, Kit, Dal and Jub. More formally, they were Colin, Duncan, Jean, Catherine, Donald and Angus, but the correspondence between them shows me no one used those names.

All four of their grandparents had been born in Scotland, and came to New South Wales under the assisted immigration schemes of the 1830s, starting in New England in northern New South Wales, and spreading over time east to the North Coast, including the Tweed River, which in places is part of the Queensland border (a separate colony until Federation in 1901) . They were taught mainly at the hand of their maternal grandmother, remembered as Granny McKillop, whose enthusiasm for whacking letters, numbers and Presbyterian principles into them with a switch means she’s the only one of my great great grandparents who’s survived in the oral lore of the family.

Of the six kids, Dal liked to write poetry, and got some published in the newspapers and magazines of the day.

As they all did, he grew up reading the bush poets of the era - tales of bushrangers, mateship, horsemanship, shearing, horse-teams, tall stories, swagmen and droving by Henry Lawson, Will H. Ogilvie, W.T. Goodge, Roderic Quinn and many many more including Harry ‘the Breaker’ Morant - but above all A.B. ‘Banjo’ Paterson. And behind his poems we meet a really nice young man, rather lacking in formal schooling, as they all were, but an omnivorous reader, as they all were, and always having something decent and cheerful to say.

He married his Nell (Ellen) in 1911, they had three kids, Dal worked among the timber, grew bananas, share-farmed, and then, as my dad wrote in a memoir of his own childhood -

“Donald [Dal] and Nellie came to see us [at Cudgen] one Saturday morning, he on his snorting big roan “Bill Bailey” and Nellie on a smaller creamy article. [Eight days later] he was dead. I remember the Booyong, coming up the river towards Murwillumbah from Tweed Heads, stopped opposite the house and gave some whistle blasts which caused Duncan [my grandpa] to rise and go to the bank, where he somehow received the message. Donald died of pneumonic flu in the plague of that year.”

His death on 22 June 1919, at the age of 32, was, his daughter Jean told me, the first death on the Tweed from influenza. They say the flu epidemic of 1919 killed between twenty-two and thirty million worldwide - two to three times the combatant deaths of World War 1. Dal was buried at Tweed Heads. Jean said that to her regret the grave is unmarked and no records survive from the 1919-1920 period to identify it - during the epidemic, they were burying them at such a rate that the paperwork never caught up.

Jean also lent me the three exercise books in which he wrote the fair copies of his poems, and to the ninety-six poems, five short stories and one play they contain, my digging around unearthed another eight poems.
 

Here’s a small sample. I make no claim that the poetry’s immortal - just that the voice behind it is that of a beaut human, someone I feel proud to have met, and to claim as a relative.

The spelling and punctuation are his own.

The first four were all written when he was 18.
 

‘Gillespie’s Anchor Roller’ refers to a brand of flour printed on a cotton flour-bag.

HARD TIMES

When “Gillespie’s Anchor Roller’s” shining through your cotton shirt
When “Gillespie’s Anchor Roller’s” on your knee
When “Gillespie’s flour bag” linen is the most important part
Of the trousers which when new were dungaree
When the women folk are patching & a-saving all they know
With a cheerful smiling face o’er that hurt
But a fellow doesn’t seem to take a labour-giver’s eye
With “Gillespie’s Anchor Roller” on his shirt.

When you’ve left the place you’re known in with but very little cash
Struck for better with your children & your wife
Why they said the place was booming when we set the sail for here
You could get a job as quick as saying “knife”
But you’ve used what little money that you had when first you came
And supplies are getting lower every day
You have asked for “tick” so often that when this consignment’s done
You are doubtful as to what the Grocer’ll say.

And of course he’s very civil “mister” here & “mister” there
This to chaps of inexperience sounds warm
But to those who understand it, it’s a very different thing
For they know it’s but the “calm” before the “storm”
When the horse hair stuffing’s bulging in a very homely style
From the saddle you have counterlined yourself
You were thinking as you did it it would last till times improved
And in consequence you’d save the bit of “pelf.”

When you try to sell your neddy of a pretty decent stamp
And the stuff that she is made of isn’t waste
But they bid for half her value while the Squatter’s nags are rushed
And to stand amongst such “mongrels” she’s disgraced
But you mustn’t be downhearted you must keep your spirits up
You can swear by all the coin you might have had
Tho’ perhaps you mightn’t know it you can wager pretty strong
If the “Women” aren’t worse they’re just as bad.

But they never even grumble & they always make the best
Of everything (although it’s hard to do)
But the brave are not forgotten & you get a job at last
And from that a fellow mostly worries through
But it all goes in a lifetime it’s experience at worst
Gives to all your whims & vanities the sack
And while you live & labour you will not despise the man
With “Gillespie’s Anchor Roller” on his back.

     1905
 

The next one was published in the Richmond River Express of 19 April 1905. (This time the punctuation’s from the newspaper.)

IRVING BRIDGE

There are men of all sorts and sizes,
Come wearily over the ridge;
There are men of diverse enterprises,
Who will slumber tonight ’neath the bridge.

There are men who’d take work if they met it;
There are men if they met it who’d shy.
Too well known are the woes that beset it,
Made acquaintance in years long gone by.

There are men of a jocular bearing,
Despite their nomadic regime,
Who’ve accomplished the method of swearing,
As apprentices served their full time.

There are men who have took to the “pot” for
The ills that life’s rough way debar;
There are men if they worked who’d be shot, for
Anti-Sweating League members they are.

There are men who would scorn to be jolly,
With unreasonably cynical views,
Ever talking the land and its folly,
How chaps in his line don’t get fair “do’s”.

The Government’s errors detecting,
Idly tramping their manhood away;
To work for their living objecting,
Through the country they aimlessly stray.

But already they’re boiling the billy,
Possessions are spread on the grass;
Half reclining we see “Weary Willie”
Beholding his face in the glass.

Now it’s time that this drivel was pensioned,
In its worth scarce the size of a midge,
But you’ll find all the sorts I have mentioned
Camped constantly under the “Bridge”.

     1905
 

IN MEMORY OF THE BREAKER

He has penned his last rhyme rode his last bucking horse
He shall write to his “sweetheart” no more
And often “Australians” recall with remorse
How he died upon Africa’s shore

They say he was reckless in deed and in word
And they tell me his virtues were scant
No doubt there’s some truth in these things I have heard
But I’ll raise this o’er “Harry Morant”

There was never a “lad” ’neath the “Southern Cross”
Who could show him the way for to ride
And to “throw” him they reckon that never that horse
Drew a breath from without “Equine” hide

When he rode in a race he was mostly in front
While he counted a “buster” as naught
Ah, many a horseman he led in the hunt
He was always a “beggar” for sport

They say to his “Girls” that he oft broke a vow
Which upon his life’s sheet is a “smudge”
But he’s gone to his “Maker” and let us allow
That it isn’t for mortals to judge

But I’ve heard that he never turned “dog” on a mate
Tho’ he drank like the “devil” himself
And his ways often turned just a little from straight
And he squandered his hardly earned pelf

But he finished his gallop alas in disgrace
Over there upon Africa’s land
Where undaunted he’d fought with the foe face to face
At the head of his “dare-devil” band

’Till his last fatal step ’twas indeed a sad act
If he sinned, well, it cost him his life
He stood to a dead Mate’s true friendship compact
Who had died where foul murder was rife

They tried him by law in the “Military way”
Grim death was the sentence they passed
But he looked down their guns without fear or dismay
And stood firm as a stone to the last

Yes he stood like a man and unflinchingly met
Each leaden and life-stealing dart
Ere the echo subsided it carried regret
Into many a stern “Soldier’s” heart

Far away from his country they laid him at rest
Over there ’neath an African sun
And I hope that his sleep is as sound as the best
Now his buckjumping season is done

To the “Soldier” the “Rider” the “Boozer” the “Mate”,
To the “Rhymer” the “Wanderer” the “Beau”
To the man who unflinchingly stood to his fate
As he’d often times stood to the foe

They tell me that often he strayed from the “line”
They say that his virtues were scant -
But this rude wreath of verses in friendship I twine
To the “Memory of Harry Morant”

     1905
 

IN THE DAYS OF DEADWOOD DICK AND BUFFALO BILL

In the daylight breaking chill
It’s the form of “Buffalo Bill”
With his “pistols” and his “bowie-knife” complete
And his “lasso” hanging down
As the black curls from his crown
He’s a “rider” of renown
To judge his seat

At another form I look
On the cover of a book
And recognition dawns upon me quick
In a wild and rugged spot
There a ruffian lies shot
Which proclaims a victory hot
To “Deadwood Dick”

And my thoughts drift back again
To the rough bridge o’er the drain
Where we joined our comrades on their way to school
Still I feel the couch grass sweet
Underneath my bootless feet
Oh; a hungry beast’s retreat
Where shades were cool

And one “mate” amongst the rest
Who an endless stock possessed
Of the “books” that I have mentioned on the top
Sounder reading we’d despise
While we gloried in their lies
When we’d finished our supplies
We used to swap.

I can mind the “Prairie Ranch”
And the “ancient Avalanche”
Who was living of his years the latter part
He in his infirmity
Could but carry bullets three
But when young and robust he
Had laughed at seven in his heart
. . .

Where are all the bare legged boys
Mates of early hopes and joys
And the Girls we used to bustle into ranks
They were mostly of the soil
Since where floods and heat waves spoil
On the farms they’ve started toil
Along the banks
. . .

While my “penny dreadful” friend
Does to his own school now attend
How I wonder if his memory ever fills
With a kindly lingering thought -
(While he counts their worth as naught)
For the “Deadwood Dicks” he’s bought
And “Buffalo Bills.”

1905
 

This one's written when he was 19.

“UNANSWERED”

In memory of Frank French, who was killed by a tree, while felling scrub, near Mullumbimby November 1905.

Shrieking & tearing asunder,
Branches & wreckage adrift -
Silence of death, & he’s under -
Crushed to an atom - short shift.

Why in the “deuce” is he stopping?
Call him to dinner again -
Coo-ee. No answer. No chopping -
Something has happened - that’s plain.

Let’s try a heavier lever -
Useless. The log must be rolled -
What of life’s harrowing fever - ?
Motionless - Mangled & cold.

Crushed from the feet to the crown, mate,
God, this would soften a churl -
Go tell the trooper in town, mate -
Write to his Mother, & Girl.

     1906
 

TWENTY YEARS TODAY

From timberland to ocean line,
No matter where you be,
Tough men, brown-handed mates of mine
In old adversity.
Good girls & men of younger years,
We toiled & danced away,
Now here’s a hand as manhood nears,
I’m twenty years to-day.

The weight of toil has left awhile,
And I remember now,
The “camp fire” song, the “trackless mile”
Amid the locusts’ row, -
The sheltered flats, where “campers” make
And tinkling horse-bells play -
And here’s a hand for friendship’s sake,
I’m twenty years to-day.

Then here’s a health to seasons flown,
And seasons yet to be -
To stalwart mates, who did their own
Rough share, & aided me -
To girls who lived the hardest lives,
And smiled when all was gray -
And here’s a health to those good wives -
I’m twenty years to-day.

The future holds the better days,
Where paths are widely set,
But with the battlers down the ways,
There’s one who’ll not forget.
Good girls & men of younger years,
We toiled & danced away,
Now, here’s a hand as manhood nears,
I’m twenty years today.

     30 August 1906
 

This last one was published in Steele Rudd’s Magazine of August 1907. (A plagiarised version cropped up in the Woman’s Budget of 14 January 1911, the scoundrel using the pseudonym “Monaro”.)

THE GULF BETWEEN

I took her hand, in Cockyland,
And she was wond’rous fair -
I was in truth, a boorish youth,
And she was debonair.

Her step was light, her eyes were bright,
Her cheeks were soft as silk,
Her hair would seem, a painter’s dream,
Her teeth were white as milk.

She talked of cows, their “whys & hows” -
(As dainty ladies know)
The choicest breeds - the rarest feeds -
But I was sheepish slow.

She spoke of pains, & suns, & rains
Which “God forgot to send” -
I grieved a tone, like hers should own,
A pessimistic blend.

I felt the stress, of ghoulishness,
And lack of courtesy,
For I descried, the gulf was wide -
That gulf, twixt her & me.

And sad to tell, I said farewell,
For tho’ her charms were rare,
I was, in truth, a boorish youth,
And she was debonair.

     1906