The Old Balmain House

by Graham Wilson

  Chapter 5 - Hannah

  With a new baby and a new house Hannah quickly settled into life in Balmain.

  The McVey house was being extended. The first rooms had been built from sawn timber brought across from the yard. Now, a team of masons worked at cutting sandstone and building a new wing, which faced north into the winter’s sun. From the front of the house the slope fell away, down a rock covered hill, to the harbour. A few hundred yards away was Goat Island, with a view past it, way up the harbour, looking beyond Port Jackson towards the ocean.

  On sunny winter mornings Hannah and Mary would sit there, in the shelter of the house, and gaze out quietly, soaking up the view, while baby Alison sat on Hannah’s knee and gurgled. Mary had a house keeper who kept the boys entertained in the kitchen with treats and games. As time went by Hannah returned to her dressmaking. Before long she had made four dresses in material Mary had given her. She gave the first one to Mary as a present.

  This brought tears to Mary’s eyes. “It is so beautifully made. It flatters me so well, and that delicate lacework is a perfect finishing touch. I feel you are the daughter I always wanted but never had.”

  Hannah gave Mary a hug. “You feel like the mother I left behind in Scotland too. You and Tom have been so kind”.

  They both sat in comfortable silence for a few minutes.

  Mary suddenly jumped up and left the room, returning a few minutes later with a small wrapped package. She handed it to Hannah. “This is a special thing I want you to have. My grandmother gave it to me as a wee girl. I hoped one day to have a daughter to pass it to. You are the daughter.”

  Hannah opened the package. Inside, wrapped in a silk handkerchief, was a tiny pale blue-green glass perfume bottle, encased in delicate silver filigree, and with a silver screw-on top.

  Tears came to Hannah's eyes. “It is so beautiful, I will treasure it forever and one day it will be little Alison’s.” She held it out to her daughter to touch.

  Alison grabbed for it. With the bottle grasped tightly in her small fingers she turned to them both, showing a bold smile, as if say “Yours, now mine.” Gently, Hannah removed the bottle from her grasp.

  As she held the bottle, resting in the palm of her hand, looking like a sea-coloured, silver encrusted jewel, she felt a huge and unexplained warmth and happiness wash over her. It is just because my life is so good, she thought. But holding this small bottle made it all so alive and precious to her. She saw Mary watching her curiously and knew it was indeed special.

  Then Mary told her its story, of the passing of it down through many generations of her family, each bequeathing their own joys along the way, so now it was like a treasure chest of happy memories.

  Hannah tried to give Mary the other dresses she had made, perhaps as gifts for her housekeeper or friends, but Mary would have none of it, saying “I know what we will do, this Saturday we will go up to Balmain village. We will ask the lady in the village shop if she will hang your dresses there for you, asking a pound for each. If she sells them, then that will be your money to buy material to make more.”

  That Saturday, when they came to the village, Mary was wearing her new dress. As they came into the shop Mrs Mills, the shopkeeper said. “Why Mary, what a beautiful dress, wherever did you get it?”

  Mary, with a smile full across her face, said “Why, Hannah here made it. See, she has brought three more which she hoped you might sell.

  Hannah unwrapped the dresses, taking each from its cloth wrapping.

  Mrs Mills held them to the light and admired them, one by one, all made of shimmery silk fabric with a delicate lace edging. “Oh my, these are really something special. Could I try this one on?” she said indicating to one that looked about her size.

  “Well, you’re welcome”, said Hannah. “I may have to take in the waist a little to have it look its best”.

  Before Hannah knew what happened all three dresses were sold; one to Mrs Mills and the other two to her two best friends who came visiting her shop five minutes later. Then she was taking further orders from the others who came into the shop and admired what she had made.

  Saturday, two weeks later, she returned with her next batch of dresses. She did fittings in the back room of the Mills shop, marking out the small adjustments, promising to bring back the final results the next Saturday.

  This started a steady business for the two ladies. Mary would cut the patterns and tack them together and Hannah would do the fine sewing. Soon they had enough orders to take on a girl to help. On fine summer mornings they would sit outside Mary’s house and work away, while they chatted, and Alison crawled around their legs. Alison often preferred to go to Mary instead of Hannah and clearly thought her a second mother or grandmother.

  Alison now had inch long, brown hair, with the start of a curl, which Mary tied up with a red ribbon. Mary had Tom make a small-wheeled garden cart. The boys would pull each other and Alison around in it, bumping over the rocks and roaring with mirth. As the days grew hot they would move into the verandah shade and work away. Soon enough Alison was one year old.

  For her birthday they declared a family picnic, with Tom and Mary the official grandparents. Presents were given all round and John Buller and Millicent, his wife, rowed over to join them with their two children as well.

  By now they had rented a small shop in the town to sell their dresses and do fittings. Their business prospered although the hours of work for Hannah and Mary were long.

  Life settled into a comfortable, happy routine, long days of hard work for the men, with an easy silence of companionship and competence. They worked side by side; a mixture of dour Scottish hard work combined with laughter and humour at the world and its demands; the shipowner who swore he needed a refit in 3 days though he had no money to pay, the dark skinned aboriginal man who came to their yard with a whole dead kangaroo, carried slung over his shoulder.

  He offered it to them in return for an axe. “My name Jimmy. You gime this fella haxe, I givum you dis kangaroo for yo dinner.”

  Instead Tom took a lump of offcut steel. Indicating with his arm he said to Jimmy. “Here I give you a broom to sweep the foundry floor. Then I will make you your own haxe.”

  He placed the iron in the forge and, when the floor was swept, he called Jimmy over. “Here, you work these bellows, we need to get that iron bright red.” Once it was glowing he pulled it out with tongs. With deft hammer blows he shaped the head of an axe, and made a hole for the handle. Then he found a timber handle and drove it in, before plunging it into cold water. He gave the axe to Jimmy saying, “More better you takem that kangaroo home to your family for dinner. They might be hungry.”

  Over the water, at Balmain, days of work, mixed with companionship, continued for Hannah and her children, with Mary.

  Sundays were special days. Everyone slept late then ate a Scottish breakfast of thick porridge, with slabs of buttered toast, black and white pudding and sometimes fresh boiled eggs and haggis. Then they all walked to the Presbyterian Church at the top of the hill, commanding the horizon. Archibald Junior rode on his Dad’s shoulders while Alison sat on Tom’s shoulders or toddled along next to Mary. James walked solemnly alongside his Dad, showing that he, of all the children, was too grown up to be carried.

  After church the routine of a combined family dinner at the McVey house continued, now a spacious sandstone house with a paved terrace, the edge of which fell away down a steep rock strewn hillside to the sparkling water of Sydney Harbour. A large heavy timber table sat here. It comfortably sat a dozen or more in a shaded corner. On Sundays they all gathered at it, often with other guests, for a roast dinner. The Buller’s were regulars too and the children played together as the adults enjoyed a long lunch.

  In the mid afternoon, as the other satiated guests departed, Hannah and Archibald would often leave their children playing under the watchful eye of Tom, who, pipe in mouth and gazing across the harbour, would tell the children stories of his sea days. Hannah a
nd Archibald would walk together in the fading afternoons for an hour or two, enjoying this time alone together.

  Their early years of marriage had been hard; the poverty, the death of little John, and leaving behind so many family and friends; all had taken a toll on their happiness together. Now, in this time and space, their bond to one another grew strong again, with a renewed contentment and affection between them.

  Often they walked around the point to the east, beyond their own house and sat on the rocky headland where it looked across to Sydney town, with the windmills of Millers Point standing silhouette on the skyline nearest them, and several new houses being built in front in Argyle Place.

  They both loved the way the harbour sparkled in the sunlight, most particularly on clear winter’s days. They took pleasure watching the coming and going of the ships and small boats from the wharves which lined the western edge of the town. They sensed the poignancy of departures back to England and across the wide Pacific to New Zealand and America. They felt for the hopes and fears of the new arrivals to this strange land. Sitting in this place brought them a sense of connection to their distant families who they wondered if they would ever see again.

  However the early, sharp pangs of loss were fading as their own family filled the hollow space and their contentment with one another regrew. Often they sat silent and contemplative with their hands joined, looking together across the water; other times they would sit half facing, gazing intently at one another, sharing the hopes and fears of their new life. As Arch gazed at Hannah with her steady hazel green eyes he felt a huge love well up. When she smiled it was as if a sunbeam washed her face. She in turn looked at his dark steady features and knew her life was good.

  Sometimes a canoe with black skinned occupants came along the near shore, glistening ebony bodies and fishing spears in hand as they speared fat cod, snapper and other unknown fish. The cries of delight at successful capture always gave them a sense of joy. The aborigines they saw at the edges of town often seemed people of quiet despair, unable to deal with their changed life; here they were proud people in charge of their destiny.

  Another year passed. Alison was now two and full of chat, talking and singing in a small clear voice. She had a full head of brown curly hair, showing a splash of gold mixed with red flecked highlights, which fell into ringlets that sparkled in the sun.

  She was a strange mix of fun and seriousness. Sometimes, in the midst of her play, she would say incredibly deep things, as if seen through other eyes which had lived long before. Arch and Hannah then felt she was the wise one amongst them, almost the long grown adult, though still their delightful little girl-child, who ragged her brothers with mock-serious antics.

  James, now seven, felt very grown up. Sometimes, on a Saturday, he would go off with his Dad, both taking an oar on the row boat, and head over to the yard to help for a half day.

  Hannah loved to sing as she worked in the kitchen, fixing dinner, waiting for Archibald’s return from work. Archibald Junior would sing with her as he helped do the chores, his high voice blending with hers. It would bring a smile and at times tears to Archibald’s face, as the beauty of them both, working side by side, with their song, entranced his return.

  Archibald Junior loved to sit on his Dad’s knee after dinner saying “Da, tell me a story from the yards”, and he would tell of a new boat in the harbour or of a job he had done. Archibald Junior was most like his Hannah and, when he looked at his son, with his wide serious eyes, so like hers, he felt his heart melt.

  As Alison grew she became almost inseparable from Mary. She would pack her lunch on days when Hannah was busy at work and say. “It’s time I went and saw my Gran Mary.” Off she would go, skipping up the path, brown hair ringlets in pigtails bobbing. Later in the afternoon, when Hannah came across, she would find the two of them together, sometimes sitting and talking like grownups, the 3 year old and her ruddy faced Gran Mary. Other times they would be found at work together, weeding vegetables in the garden, making dolls clothes, cooking, or perhaps, working together to draw a picture of a ship in the harbour.

  On Alison’s first day of school she insisted both Mary and Hannah come with her, one holding each hand. She walked with them up to the school gate and then gave each a kiss and hug before she ran off to join her friends.

  As the years rolled on two more babies came to Hannah; first a daughter, Hannah, to bear her own name, a bright sunny child with straight blond hair, like Hannah’s own had been as a child, and which contrasted to Alison’s brown hair, with gold and red flecks, and ringed in tight curls. As each new child came, so also came a new fullness and depth to Hannah and Arch’s life together; a love that was multiplied both between them and with each of these new children.

  By 1847 the engineering firm had grown too large for the yard at Mace’s wharf and plans were made to move to a new yard in Gas Lane, below Millers Point. Even though the business still belonged to Tom, Archibald and John Buller were like his sons and business partners and, more and more, they ran the business. Tom was happy to work away on the specific jobs he did best, new ship castings and ship repairs. His twenty plus years had built him a huge network among the ship captains who came to Sydney Harbour. Often he was their first port of call, both to catch up on the news and to organise the urgent repairs needed to continue voyages.

  It was one day in May, just before they moved to new premises, when Archibald came back to the yard, after having been out on a ship to work out its refit. The other workers were having their lunch, John was not in for the day, and there was no sign of Tom.

  Archibald walked around to the back of the forge and saw Tom, lying on his side, looking dazed. He helped Tom to his feet but had to support him.

  Tom mumbled, “Got dizzy and lost my balance.” Archibald sat Tom in a chair and called a doctor. The doctor said that Tom had had a turn and needed to go home to bed.

  They brought him home to Mary. Over the next month it became clear that Tom’s hard working days were over so he called his solicitor. The new firm, Rodgers and Buller, was established to continue the business, in Gas Lane off Kent St North and just a short row across from Balmain.

  Now, when Archibald came home, he would find Tom sitting on his verandah, with his pipe, and Alison on his knee, as he told her stories of the ships he could see, their captains and their voyages. Sometimes Hannah and Mary would be there too, but often just his daughter and the engineer, wrapped in their own world of the harbour, ships and imaginings.

  In 1848, when Alison was six, Hannah had another child, Alexander, dark like his father. During the pregnancy she found herself very tired. Alexander was a big baby. His birth was hard and took a long time. He had to be turned by the midwife and Hannah bled much more than with her others. She was very pale and weak after the birth and the doctor and midwife were both concerned for her.

  However she was happy that Alexander had survived the birth, looked just like his father, and soon was thriving. Now, with a cow for milk, he fed well, even if his mother’s milk was little.