by Haynes, Jim
When the crowd rushed to see what was going on, there was the diminutive Auntie Una standing over an unconscious big lump of a bloke with a broken nose!
Slim never had audience trouble in that area again.
Barry Thornton’s daughter, Meryl Davis, has terrific yarns about those days and remembers Auntie Una saving her life when she swallowed a threepence.
‘She picked me up and shook it back out and saved my life,’ said Meryl, ‘I must have been three or four because I was sent off to school when I was five and left the tour. She was a fearsome lady!’
In later years, the show grew and Slim used better caravans and trucks. The famous Thunder and Lightning were two Internationals; Thunder was bigger than Lightning and they took the Slim Dusty Show all over Australia with Slim and Barry Thornton as the drivers.
When Slim took off his hat, he became a different person. Meryl remembers a story her father, Barry Thornton, told about one time he and Slim were repairing one of the trucks.
Slim was under one of the Internationals when a young reporter arrived and asked could he interview Slim Dusty.
Slim slid out from under the truck covered in grease and oil and dirt and said, ‘He’s not here, mate, come back in half an hour.’
He then went and cleaned up, put on the famous hat and waited for the reporter. They did the interview and the reporter never knew it was the same bloke.
Although they were stranded a few times, they never had many breakdowns.
‘We were only ever held up twice on the track,’ Slim remembered, ‘once at Rowena, a little town south of Walgett with no pub—fancy being stuck for four days in a town with no pub.
‘Another time we got stuck on a stretch up the top of Western Australia at a place called the Pardoo Sands, which was a big boggy flat below Roebourne.
‘There were trucks and tourists in caravans all stuck there with us and luckily for them we always carried supplies of fruit juices, tinned meats and things under the bunks in the caravans. We ended up supplying a lot of people with a bit of tucker.’
Slim, and wife Joy, always felt close to truckies. ‘We had a lot in common with the truck drivers in those early days. Just like the truckies, we had to really watch ourselves.
‘Some of those roads were pretty isolated in the mid to late sixties; the truck stops were at the old-time stations. They were pretty wild and woolly places.’
Slim remembered one of the trips across the Nullarbor.
‘We treasured Sunday nights when we’d pull our vans way off the road and park them in a circle.
‘One of these camps I remember well. We were about 80 or 90 miles out of Norseman and we’d pulled off the road to have our night off.
‘We had a good time, a barbecue and a few beers. The next afternoon in Norseman, one of the blokes on our tour said, ‘I can’t find my wallet, it must have fallen out when I was lounging around the fire last night.’
‘We couldn’t go back because we had a two and a half month tour ahead of us.
‘Well, we did our tour and, on the way back, we camped at the same spot. We drove to the spot and the coals from our camp fire were still there and right next to them was the wallet, and the money was still there.
JH
THE OPERA HOUSE
Bennelong Point or Wynyard?
The Sydney Opera House is built on Bennelong Point, the east bank of Sydney Cove. Bennelong was an Aborigine who lived there after being captured by Governor Phillip in 1789 and taken to the UK in 1792. When he returned, he was rejected by his two wives and lived on James Squire’s property at Ryde until he was killed in a tribal fight in 1813.
The first known concert on Bennelong Point was held in March 1791 when Bennelong and some friends provided an evening of entertainment for the Governor and his party.
Bennelong Point was a tidal island when the First Fleet arrived. The narrow strait was later filled in with rubble and connected to the shore when Francis Greenway built Fort Macquarie in 1817.
The fort was demolished in 1901 and a tram depot was constructed in the design of a fortress with ramparts in homage to the previous building. The depot operated from 1902 to 1955 and was demolished in 1958 to make way for the Opera House.
As early as 1947, Eugene Goossens, conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, had called for ‘a musical home for a symphony orchestra and an opera company’. In 1955, New South Wales Premier, Joe Cahill, announced a competition for the design of ‘an opera house’.
Out of 233 entries from thirty-two countries, Jørn Utzon won first prize in 1957 and work began in 1959. The first performance at the Opera House was a concert given for the workers by Paul Robeson in 1960, thirteen years before it opened. Utzon resigned from the project in 1966.
The first test concert, in December 1972, was the Sydney Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Bernard Heinze. The first opera staged was War and Peace by Prokofiev on 28 September 1973 and the first public concert in the Concert Hall the next evening was Birgit Nilsson singing Wagner with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under Charles Mackerras.
On 20 October 1973, Queen Elizabeth finally opened the Opera House. The final cost was $102 million.
Premier Joe Cahill had to be talked out of building the opera house in ‘a better location for transport’, near Wynyard Station!
JH
AUSSIES AT WAR
This section merely contains a bunch of yarns—a mix of factual stories and apocryphal yarns about our involvement in the Boer War, World War I and World War II.
It’s a grab bag of yarns about Australians at war in roughly chronological order. I have made no attempt to be comprehensive or to balance the stories, yarns and anecdotes into equal sections for each major conflict.
The only real invasion of our continent occurred with British settlement and we have no borders with any other nation. Yet Australia has a remarkably ‘war-conscious’ heritage. Perhaps this is because the Boer War and World War I occurred just before and after Federation. The Boer War was the first time we thought of our soldiers as ‘Australian’ rather than residents of separate colonies.
The experience at Anzac Cove has been called a defining moment for our nation, a baptism of blood and fire that gave birth to the concept of an Australia that was no longer a British colony but a nation apart whose attitudes and interests could be quite different from those of Britain.
In World War II, the threat of invasion emphasised our geographical distance from Europe and forced us to accept the idea that we were culturally different from Britain. Many of these yarns demonstrate that cultural difference
THE FIGHTING 29
The Boer War was the first time Aussies fought as ‘Australians’, as our nation federated and was born during the course of the conflict.
The first contingents sent to fight in South Africa were raised by the Australian colonies in response to the outbreak of war in 1899. Mostly these contingents were men in the militia of the various colonial forces.
The next lot to go were what were called the ‘bushmen’ contingents, recruited from more diverse sources and paid for by public subscription or by gifts from wealthy individuals.
The next groups to be recruited were the ‘Imperial bushmen’ contingents, which were raised in a similar way, but paid for by the government in London.
Then there were ‘draft contingents’, which were raised by the state governments after Federation on behalf of the new Commonwealth government, which as yet didn’t have the infrastructure to do so.
A group of New South Wales horsemen had set off for London to train at the Cavalry School, Aldershot, in February 1899, and some of them helped defeat the Boers at Elandslaagte on 21 October 1899, as part of the Irregular Troops of the Imperial Light Horse.
The New South Wales Lancers landed at Cape Town on 2 November 1899. Most of this contingent joined General John French’s force at Colesberg, in the Border District of the Cape Colony.
Twenty-nine of the Lancers, however, led by
Lieutenant John Osborne, were sent as part of an advance force of seventy-two to take part in the Battles of Belmont and Graspan and went into action as part of Field Marshall Methuen’s force on 23 November 1899.
Two days later, the same twenty-nine men were part of the follow-up action to Belmont, the hard-fought Battle of Graspan Siding. Methuen bungled both battles and there were heavy losses and fierce hand-to-hand fighting at Graspan. The Lancers held a small gully against a determined Boer advance and earned the nickname ‘the Fighting 29’.
About 16,000 Australians fought in the Boer War. They were under British command and contingents were often broken up and attached to British forces.
Towards the end of the war, Australian Commonwealth horse contingents were raised by the new federal government. These contingents fought in the counter-offensive of 1900, when the Boer capitals fell, and then on through the guerrilla phases of the war, which lasted until 1902.
During the Boer War, 282 Australians died in action or from wounds sustained in battle, while 286 died from disease and another 38 died in accidents or of unknown causes.
Six Australians received the Victoria Cross during the fighting in South Africa.
JH
GET HOLD OF THAT BRUSH
There is an old yarn about Lord Kitchener visiting a small field hospital during the Boer War.
There were only four beds in the small canvas hospital situated behind the lines, and Kitchener decided to boost morale by cheering up the four soldiers who occupied the beds.
In company with the commanding officer and the Field Ambulance officer, Kitchener entered the tent and smiled at the soldier in the first bed.
‘Hello there, young man,’ said the Field Marshal, ‘what regiment are you with?’
‘South Lancashires, sir,’ the soldier replied, briskly.
‘And what seems to be the trouble with you?’
‘Lost part of my leg and gangrene set in, sir,’ was the reply.
‘Dear, dear, that’s no good at all,’ replied Kitchener, ‘and what is the treatment?’
‘Take the tablets and scrub the affected parts three times a day with the brush, sir.’
‘That’s the way, lad, don’t despair, eh? Tell me, what’s your ambition now?’
‘To get back into action and fight for Queen and country, sir.’
‘Jolly good!’ was the Field Marshall’s reply, ‘that’s the spirit!’
The party moved to the next bed and found a very sad looking young soldier sitting up rather awkwardly, waiting to be addressed.
‘Hello, lad,’ said the Field Marshal, ‘and what regiment are you with?’
‘Loyal North Lancashires, sir,’ said the soldier.
‘And what seems to be the trouble with you?’
There was an embarrassed silence, and then the soldier replied softly, ‘I’m afraid I’ve had a rather bad case of pubic lice, sir, which resulted in a rather painful and nasty infection.’
‘Oh, dear, that’s . . . that’s dreadful,’ replied Kitchener sympathetically, ‘hard to get treatment while you’re busy fighting. I’m glad we got you in here to fix you up. Tell me, what’s the treatment?’
‘Take the tablets and scrub the affected parts three times a day with the brush, sir.’
‘Jolly good! Now, tell me, lad, what’s your ambition?’
‘To get back into action and fight for Queen and country, sir.’
‘That’s the spirit!’ said Kitchener and the party moved on.
In the next bed was a sergeant, a middle-aged veteran, lying on his side. The party moved around till they were facing him.
‘Hello,’ said Kitchener, ‘and what regiment are you with?’
‘Royal Artillery, sir,’ said the sergeant.
‘And what’s the trouble with you?’
‘Well, it’s a severe case of haemorrhoids, I’m afraid,’ replied the sergeant. ‘It’s constipation from the dry rations they said, what caused it.’
‘Oh, dear, that’s nasty!’ remarked Kitchener. ‘Tell me, what’s the treatment?’
‘Take the tablets and scrub the affected parts three times a day with the brush, sir.’
‘Jolly good! And what’s your ambition?’
‘To get back into action and fight for Queen and country, sir.’
‘That’s the way,’ said the Field Marshall.
Sitting there despondently in the last bed was an Aussie soldier who looked quite healthy.
‘And who have we here?’ asked Kitchener.
The soldier appeared to have trouble speaking. He swallowed twice and then answered, in a tiny, husky voice, ‘Private Riley, sir, Queensland Lighthorse.’
‘Ahhh, a young colonial chappie,’ said Kitchener, ‘ and why are you in here?’
‘Well, sir,’ croaked the bushman, ‘I’ve got a severe case of laryngitis—can hardly talk, and the officer thought it might be infectious, so he sent me here for a few days.’
‘Oh, dear, laryngitis, eh, that’s no good at all,’ replied Kitchener, ‘can’t have you fighting those Boers when you’re sick. Tell me, what’s the treatment?’
‘Take the tablets and scrub the affected parts three times a day with the brush.’
‘Jolly good show, that’s the way,’ said the Field Marshall. ‘Now, tell me, lad, what’s your ambition?’
The Aussie croaked his reply.
‘To get hold of that brush before those other bastards . . . sir.’
JH
BEFORE GALLIPOLI—THERE WAS ELANDS RIVER
‘When the ballad makers of Australia seek for a subject, let them turn to Elands River . . .’ Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Elands River was a staging post on a rocky ridge in the Western Transvaal. A massive build up of stores accumulated there in 1900, to supply British columns moving through the area. The camp contained 1500 horses, oxen and mules, together with 100 wagons and enough supplies to maintain a force of 3000 for a month.
The Boers desperately wanted the supplies, which were valued at over £100,000. On 4 August 1900, Colonel De La Rey’s commando force of around 3000 men surrounded and laid siege to the post which was defended by 200 Rhodesian militiamen and 300 Australians from the various colonies, fighting as Australian Imperial Bushmen. There were 141 Queenslanders commanded by Major Walter Tunbridge, 105 from New South Wales, 42 Victorians, 9 Western Australians and 2 Tasmanians. Most of these men had never been shot at before.
Captain Butters led the Rhodesian contingent and the overall commander was the British Lieutenant Colonel, Charles Hore. He was suffering from malaria at the time.
The Boers had twelve modern artillery pieces, which pounded the post in its exposed position. They also had snipers positioned on three sides of the camp.
The defenders had one Maxim gun and one old seven-pound muzzle-loader. Unfortunately, the supplies at Eland River Post did not include ammunition. The defenders had just enough shells to take an occasional pot shot at the Boer guns and it was necessary to sneak out of the camp to scout the Boer gun positions.
Lieutenant James Annat scouted out several times with other Queenslanders and was fatally wounded after he’d succeeded in forcing one Boer gun crew to retire.
Over 2500 shells landed on the post during the first two days of the siege. Most of the 1500 horses, mules and oxen were killed in the horrific bombardment.
The one gun the defenders had was old and faulty. Major Tunbridge had to dismantle it for repairs and reassemble it four times during the siege. The shells they had were also damaged and Tunbridge spent days and nights reshaping them with a file.
On the third day, a force commanded by General Carrington arrived to relieve them but was driven back by the Boers and retreated all the way back to Mafeking. The men defending the post saw them come and go.
Five hundred men were trapped without cover under the blazing sun, with the stench of 1500 dead animals in the air. They had no access to water except by night patrol and they had seen their ‘rescuers’ retrea
t.
On 8 August, the Boer commander, De La Rey, sent a messenger under a flag of truce to advise that the whole area was in Boer hands. He offered to escort the force to the nearest British post provided that none of the supplies within the camp were destroyed, ‘in recognition of your courage in defence of your camp’. He even offered to let the officers retain their weapons.
There was a conference among the officers. Apparently Hore was willing to surrender and asked Butters and Tunbridge what they thought.
Butters said he could not go back to his Rhodesian troops who had fought so bravely and tell them to surrender. Tunbridge consulted the various Australian colonial forces’ officers and they made a written reply, which read:
If De La Rey wants our camp, why does he not come and take it? We will be pleased to meet him and his men, and promise them a great reception at the end of a toasting fork. Australians will never surrender. Australia forever!
Our nation was exactly eight months old at the time. The ‘Australians’ fighting were actually soldiers from different colonies who had left home before Federation.
A few days later, on 12 August, De La Rey sent a second offer of honourable surrender and safe passage. He was keen to get the stores without further bombardment and damage. Colonel Hore replied: ‘Even if I wished to surrender to you—and I don’t—I am commanding Australians who would cut my throat if I accepted your terms.’
Another relief column commanded by General Baden-Powell came within 30 kilometres of the besieged post from the east. But because headquarters thought it impossible that the garrison had held out and presumed that the Australians and Rhodesians had been killed or surrendered, Baden-Powell was ordered to turn back.
Finally, when a message from De La Rey to Boer Commander De Wet, stating that the garrison was still holding out, fell into the hands of one of Kitchener’s scouts, Kitchener himself, who had been leading a huge force of near 20,000 men chasing De Wet, detoured to Elands River and the siege was lifted.
