by M J Lee
One time, he heard footsteps and slipped behind one of the metal stanchions. Three dark, hairy men walked slowly past without seeing him. Behind his hiding place was a large metal door with a red notice saying: DO NOT ENTER.
In for a penny, in for a pound, thought Harry. He lifted the metal lever locking the door and slipped through it. Nobody had ever been here before, Ginger would never find him.
He was in a darkened corridor with a high ceiling. Blinking red and white lights shone from the top of large metal boxes. He took a few steps, hearing his feet clang on the metal of the floor. There was another door at the end, fastened with a metal lever.
He lifted it up and opened the door. Instantly, a wall of sound attacked his ears. A metal thump beat beneath him, accompanied by the hiss of steam and the roar of a furnace. He stood there, letting the sound wash over him. And then he felt the heat, rising through the metal floor. His forehead broke out in a sweat.
‘What the bloody hell are you doing?’ said an accented voice, and someone grabbed his shoulder.
He tried to wriggle out of the grip, but the fingers were too strong.
‘I said, what are you doing down here? Can’t you read ze sign?’
The hand let him go and he backed against the wall.
‘Are you one of ze orphans?’
Harry felt himself touch a metal pipe. The man stepped forward. He was tall, with a dark beard and a dirty white cap.
‘I’m not an orphan. I’ve got a mum.’
‘Zohhhh, you ’ave a mother, do you?’ The man pronounced some words like they began with ‘zed’. ‘Zen why are you going to Australia?’
Harry didn’t know. He kept quiet, looking for a way to escape.
The man noticed his darting eyes. ‘No escape. Engine room is my world. Didn’t you see sign saying DO NOT ENTER?’
Harry nodded.
‘But you came in anyway?’
Harry nodded again.
The man’s voice softened. ‘You like breaking rules. A man after my own heart. Now you here, would you like to zee engines?’
Harry thought for a moment and nodded again.
‘Do you ever speak?’
Harry shook his head.
‘Is a no or a yes?’
‘It’s a maybe.’
‘Good, I like maybes. Come and I will show you engines.’ The man turned left down some metal stairs. Harry followed him. The sound grew louder all the time as they descended.
‘What is your name, little Englishman?’
‘Harry.’
‘A good name, ’Arry.’
‘Suits me.’
‘I’m sure it does.’
They reached the bottom and stepped into a large room. In the middle, four large metal shafts were going up and down and round and round, glinting in the light hanging from the ceiling. Two men stood checking out a panel of flickering gauges.
‘Lads, zis is ’Arry. Come to see engines. Well, what do you zee, ’Arry?’
Harry gazed at the shafts and the gauges, the boilers and the turbines. His mouth and his eyes opened wide.
‘She was built 1925, in Barrow in north England. Do you know how big is she?’
Harry remembered the figures he had read. ‘Twenty thousand tons, eighty feet in width and six hundred feet long.’
‘Very good, pretty close. Come over here.’ He beckoned him over to a guard rail.
Harry looked down to see a row of sweating men shovelling coal into the open mouths of fires. Each time one of the furnaces was opened, a blast of warm air rose to brush past Harry’s nose.
‘Men shovel coal into fifty-six furnaces to keep six turbines filled wiz steam.’
‘Do they drive the prop… prop… proplars?’
‘Exactly. And propellers drive ship. It’s zimple, ’Arry. Zat’s how we get to Australia. Remember, when you in the world above, looking over stern and seeing white wake, it’s my men’s sweat zat drives ship forwards.’
Harry touched his heart like he had been taught to do by Mr Beggs. ‘I’ll remember.’
‘Good, now you must go back up to the top. If Captain catches you down here, he’ll string you up from yardarm. And we wouldn’t want zat, would we?’
Harry didn’t know where the yardarm was, but it didn’t sound a nice place to be strung up from.
‘Would you like to be ship’s engineer when you grow up, Harry?’
‘Do you mean me? Running a place like this with the engines and the boilers and the men shovelling coal into the fires?’
‘Of course, who else would I mean?’
Harry eyed the gleaming metal and the shiny, flickering gauges. ‘But I...’
‘If I – a German from Hamburg with no parents – can do it, you can too.’
Harry smiled and nodded.
‘Good. Ralph will show you how to get back topside. Look after yourself, ’Arry.’
As Harry walked up the stairs of the Engine Room, he glanced back at the man with the dirty cap. The man waved and then turned to stare into his gauges.
Harry never told anybody about the trip down to the Engine Room, not even Little Tom. Before they reached Australia, he went twice more through the forbidden door. Each time, he chatted to Friedrich, the Chief Engineer, and his men.
It was on the last trip, when he had spent five minutes shovelling coal into the fire, that he said to Friedrich, ‘I want to be an engineer like you when I grow up.’
‘You won’t see much of world, ’Arry, not in dark and dirt of an engine room.’
At that moment, it didn’t matter to Harry.
He knew what he wanted to do when he grew up and that was far more important to him.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
June 19, 2017
Didsbury, Manchester, England
Jayne Sinclair rechecked her saved results for all the Harolds born in Oldham in 1944. She went back to one of the original FreeBMD hits. There it was, staring her in the face and banging her about the head like a police truncheon.
‘How could you have missed it?’
She clicked on the result.
Births Sep 1944
Name of Child Name of Mother Birthplace Vol Page
Britton, Harold Burns Oldham 8d 978
The date range was correct. In the letters from the Beggses, they had written about a birthday in late August and here it was in the right quarter. But the giveaway was the surname of the mother: Burns. Freda must have used her grandmother’s Identity Card to register the birth. It wouldn’t have been a problem, there were no pictures on the wartime cards and nor were there any birth dates.
But why?
Perhaps her mother or father had asked her to. Or perhaps she felt shame at using her own surname, Duckworth, on the form. Or perhaps her grandmother had promised to look after the child and she thought it would be easy if they had the same name. Or simply because they wanted to keep the real mother’s name secret.
Jayne snapped off another chunk of chocolate and poured out her tea.
As with many things that happened in the past, she would never know. She could find the records if they existed. She could even track down people who were difficult to find and discover links where none had existed before. But human motivations, the secrets hidden in the human heart – well, they stayed buried in the past, locked in the memories of those who would never be able to reveal them.
At least she could now order the correct birth certificate and show it to Vera.
She completed the form on the GRO website for Harry, adding in Freda and Dora’s birth certificate, as well as Freda’s marriage certificate, just in case she needed them. All in all, the fees for the priority service came to £93.60. A pretty penny to add to the government’s coffers.
Within the next couple of days she would have all the certificates, including Harry’s, and would be able to show them to Vera. Her step mother’s long-vanished brother was slowly, inexorably, revealing himself.
Jayne added a splash of milk to her tea and b
rought the cup up to her lips. ‘Here’s to you, Harry, I hope we find you soon.’
Chapter Twenty-Eight
June 20, 2017
Didsbury, Manchester, England
The next morning Jayne woke bright and early, feeling strangely refreshed. It was always like this when she was making headway on a case. It was when she was blocked or couldn’t find a link that tiredness crept in like a thief in the night.
But this morning the sun was shining through the curtains, the birds were singing in the garden and, more importantly, she had two leads she needed to follow up. ‘I wish all mornings were like this,’ she said out loud as she bounded down the stairs.
Mr Smith was waiting for her outside the patio door. She opened it and he sauntered straight in, tail erect.
‘You’re back early this morning. Mrs Roberts’ cat at number nine not in the mood? Or has she gone off with the Tom in number twenty-three? Have you been jilted for a younger model?’
From his corner next to the bowl, the cat let out a plaintive miaow.
‘Poor thing. I guess it means you’re hungry.’ She took out a pouch of cat food and poured it into his bowl. Have to buy some more, she thought, he’s eating me out of house and home.
The cat attacked his food, purring quietly as he did so.
She chose a Roma capsule from the Nespresso rack and put it in the machine. The kitchen filled with the delightful aroma of coffee. ‘Time to get to work, Jayne, make an early start.’
She booted up her laptop and sat down with the espresso. Two leads to follow up; the Catholic Migrants Centre and the passenger lists for Australia. She checked the time on the wall: 7.14 a.m. Nobody would be at the Centre yet, so she’d call later.
‘Let’s attack the passenger lists first.’
She logged on to Findmypast, selected the A-Z of record sets and then typed in ‘Passenger Lists Leaving UK 1890-1960’. There were over 24 million records. She hoped he would be easy to find, but with a surname like Britton, the name under which he’d been registered, it shouldn’t be too difficult. She laughed to herself. ‘Thank God it isn’t Harry Smith.’
She typed his name in the search field, added a departure date of 1952, plus or minus two years, and finally chose Australia as the destination country to narrow the field even further.
She pressed ‘Search’ and crossed her fingers.
Just one hit. She was back on her roll.
She clicked on the result. Two rotating arrows stared back at her for a few moments before a page began to form on her screen. A passenger list typed on lined paper for the SS Otranto, leaving Tilbury on April 13, 1952.
At the top, in big, bold official letters, were the words:
NAMES AND DESCRIPTIONS OF BRITISH PASSENGERS EMBARKED AT THE PORT OF LONDON
Interesting. The word ‘British’ was in much bigger type, as if this was a badge of honour to distinguish these passengers from everybody else.
She scanned down the list of names, looking for a Harry. There it was.
Britton. Master H. ” ” ” ” ” ” ” 8 1
The compiler of the passenger list had saved himself the trouble of repeating information by adding ditto marks. She went back up to the top of the list, adding in the missing information.
Name Last Address Class Port Profession Age Country
Britton. H. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 8 England
Oldham, Lancs.
Jayne punched the air. She was sure it was him; the age and dates were correct, but the final confirmation was the address. It was the same home David Beggs had said was linked to his parents.
The cat joined her in the excitement by rubbing his body against her chair on his way to find a place to sleep.
Finally, she had some good news for Vera. They were catching up with her long-lost brother.
Jayne returned to the shipping register. On either side of Harry’s name were eight others, all listed as being from the same home:
Anstey. C.M St Michael’s A Fremantle Nurse 24 Australia
Jones. K. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 10 England
Laurie. E. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 12 England
Livesey, T. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 10 England
Britton. H. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 8 England
Astley. J. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 8 England
Astley. D. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 11 England
Whatmough. F. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 8 England
Rice. G. St Michael’s A Fremantle Student 9 England
So these were the other children from the same home who had accompanied Harry to Australia. He didn’t travel alone, other children went with him. Were they all orphans? Or were they more like Harry, the illegitimate child of an unmarried mother? She didn’t know the answer, but she would try to find out.
There was one person who wasn’t a child. Miss Anstey, a nurse whose birthplace was given as Australia. Was she the guardian of the children during the voyage? Probably. She had the same address as the children. The home obviously employed her to look after them.
Out of curiosity, Jayne checked the page before on the passenger list. There were five more children here, this time from a different children’s home – St Joseph’s in Birmingham.
Lillis. J. St Joseph’s A Fremantle Student 11 England
Rafferty J. St Joseph’s A Fremantle Student 7 England
McGahey H. St Joseph’s A Fremantle Student 5 England
McNulty. J. St Joseph’s A Fremantle Student 6 England
Bunney. W. St Joseph’s A Fremantle Student 8 England
And above the listing, another four children and their guardian from the Fairbridge Society:
Grey. A. Fairbridge Society A Sydney Teacher 29 Australia
Bone. O. Fairbridge Society A Sydney Student 8 England
Camps. C. Fairbridge Society A Sydney Student 8 England
Hender. I. Fairbridge Society A Sydney Student 8 England
Done. M. Fairbridge Society A Sydney Student 8 England
Seventeen children on just two pages – what the hell was going on?
She spent the next couple of hours going through all the passengers on the SS Otranto for the voyage to Australia. It seemed most were migrant families heading out from England to Australia after the war in the assisted passage scheme. ‘Ten Quid Poms’, she remembered they were called. All looking for an escape from dreary post-war Britain and a new life in the sunshine and beaches of Australia.
But she counted twenty-seven children, some as young as four years old, travelling on the ship too. All sent by a variety of charities: Catholic orphanages, Fairbridge Schools, Barnado’s, and the Church of England.
From the back of her mind came a vague memory of something Gordon Brown had said in 2009, or was it 2010? She hadn’t paid much attention. At that time, her squad was in the middle of a homicide investigation in Moss Side; two rival drug gangs were fighting over turf, with one poor innocent bystander shot dead just because he happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. She had been working horrendous 20-hour days, dragging herself home to sleep for a few hours before going back to the nick once again. They got the bastards in the end, though. Put the shooter away for twenty years. Should have thrown away the key.
Quickly, she Googled Gordon Brown and child migrants. Within a second there appeared an article from BBC News on February 24, 2010:
Gordon Brown Apologises to Child Migrants Sent Abroad
…‘To all those former child migrants and their families... we are truly sorry. They were let down. We are sorry they were allowed to be sent away at the time when they were most vulnerable. We are sorry that instead of caring for them, this country turned its back.
‘And we are sorry that the voices of these children were not always heard, their cries for help not always heeded. And we are sorry that it has taken so long for this important day to come and for the full and unconditional apology that is justly deserved.’<
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Gordon Brown also said they were cruelly lied to and their childhoods ‘robbed’, and described the scheme as ‘shameful’ and ‘a deportation of the innocents’.
More than 130,000 children, aged between three and 14, were sent to Commonwealth countries…
Jayne stared at the screen in shock. ‘How come more people don’t know about this?’ She checked the figures again – 130,000 children sent to Commonwealth countries? She whistled audibly and the cat came running, thinking it was his lucky day; feeding time twice in one morning.
As she sat, staring at the screen, the phone rang beside her.
‘Hi Jayne, it’s Vera.’
‘Hi there. There’s some shocking news I’ve just discovered about Harry.’
‘Me too, Jayne. He didn’t go to Australia. My brother’s found some other letters. He was adopted after all.’
Chapter Twenty-Nine
May 28, 1952
On-board the SS Otranto, Fremantle harbour, Western Australia
The land crept up on them slowly.
Harry first noticed a change in the crew. They were more active, rushing here and there as if hurrying for a party. Then he leaned over the gang rail and noticed the sea had changed colour from a deep ocean blue to a darker, greyer green. The birds arrived soon afterwards, squawking and crowing as they danced in the slipstream of the funnels.
It was Ginger who first spotted land not long after breakfast. A light smudge, like the smear of ash across the forehead during Easter. Gradually edging closer and revealing layers of colour, hill tops and the beginnings of miniature trees.
