Ravenswood Dreaming, page 60
John and Arthur sat down on the bank of the river to have a chat and watch for a while. It turned out that Arthur knew them quite well. They and a few others including women and children travelled up and down the river throughout the finer months hunting, spearing fish, gathering eggs and the like to feed the members of their group. When the rains came they left the district and moved inland to the foothills where the grass and other new growth attracted kangaroo and other game. Sometimes they travelled south of the Southern Estuary where a string of lakes and wetlands attracted waterfowl migratory birds and ducks. Many years ago, after many of their people were killed by the soldier men, they had shifted to this area for more extended periods. Down there, hidden away, they did not come into contact with white men and they felt safer. There was not as much food but there were fewer of them to feed.
The older people were gone now and these two men were of the next generation who had grown up alongside the white settlers.
John noticed they were strong looking men, obviously well nourished. They were clothed only in a pair of trousers tied at the waste, of debatable colour and design, brown, grey, stained, torn. They each had a very long spear held ready to launch. Several other spears lay on the bank of the river out of the way, together with two kangaroo skin cloaks. The spears were, John estimated, about 15 feet long, quite slender and of uniform thickness, straight as an arrow, with a close barb carved or fitted about one or two inches up from the point.
The two men were a picture of concentration. So poised and still they could have been statues carved from wood or rock. They reminded John of the men he had met on the walk from Clarence to Fremantle when he was about sixteen. (Except those men were practically naked.) They were spearing fish and cooking them over a fire on the beach They had offered him some which he accepted. He had given them in return the last of his bag of flour. John was lost in thought for a moment.
Suddenly without the slightest warning one of them plunged his spear into the river. It penetrated about two thirds of its length below the surface leaving about one third still within the reach of its owner, who carefully, hand-over- hand, retrieved the spear to reveal a large silver king fish impaled on the point.
The two men conversed briefly while inspecting the now very still fish.
John and Arthur stood up and walked over to get a closer look. The spear had entered towards the back of the head and gone all the way through and was protruding from the fish’s throat. Death would have been instant. John was impressed and thought he should say something.
Well done! he said, well done!
The spear thrower nodded his head in acknowledgement but did not speak.
John turned to Arthur for help. What is the man’s name?
This man who caught the fish is Kepool, Arthur indicated.
Kepool John repeated.
By this time Kepool had slid the still impaled fish up the full length of the spear to avoid trying to pull the barb back through the fish’s head. He then walked over and lifted the corner of one of the cloaks and placed the fish across the spare spears next to two others that they must have speared earlier. He then turned and walked back to face John. Vaguely indicating with his finger and smiling ever so slightly he said, You Captain?
John nodded and held out his hand, Yes I am Captain Thomas, I am pleased to meet you.
The Aboriginal man at first looked down at John’s hand and then to John’s relief grasped it firmly. Welcome to Joweelingup, he said in very good English
John thought it best to try to keep the conversation going. You are very skilled with the spear.
Kepool nodded in agreement. The old men taught us a long time past. The Binjareb people have fished in this river for many lifetimes. This resonated with John and he nodded.
It is good that you can keep fishing.
Yes it is good, Kepool agreed.
Your friend’s name is……..
His name is Moorang.
At the mention of his name the other man looked up and waved but kept on fishing.
I have speared two, he explained, he has only speared one. He will not go back to the camp until he has caught another one because the others will say I am the better fisherman.
Kepool, there has been some talk that there will be much rain this Makuru (Aboriginal name for the cold wet time in June and July) How high will the water come up?
Yes Captain, so the old people say. The water will come up to here. He indicated a mark about two feet up the trunk of a tree which was growing quite high up. It has done this before when I was very small.
John assumed a surprised and worried look, what do you think of that Arthur?
Well if it is going to rise that much there is nothing we can do to stop it. We will just have to be prepared.
We will meet again Kepool, John raised his hand, Moorang, good luck and goodbye. Moorang waved his hand.
Later, after the evening meal they discussed the Aboriginal prediction that the winter rains would be heavier and would last longer. This would cause the Murray River to overflow its banks and cover the surrounding land to a depth of two feet or more.
Arthur Kerridge thought that the warning should be taken seriously. He had observed them closely and was amazed at how they could read signs and predict conditions to do with the natural environment. They understood the cycle of the seasons, they observed the coming and going of the birds and its relationship to the start of the rain and the beginning of the dry season. They knew where certain animals would be and where to find water. They could follow an animal or a man when there were no visible signs. This warning, he said, had to be taken seriously.
Elizabeth was inclined to agree. She remembered her father being amazed at the tracking ability of the Aborigines. They had helped to find stock that had got through the fence and wandered off into the bush. Once when a dog had killed some lambs, an Aboriginal man identified the dog by its footprints. He knew who owned it, then led them directly to it.
Finally they decided that if the river did flood as predicted then there was nothing they could do to prevent it. The best course of action was to be prepared. That meant shifting items and storing supplies that would be damaged or destroyed by water to higher ground or onto higher benches.
Towards the end of May they began shifting some items from the house and verandah into the barn which was further back from the river bank and on a slight rise. Bags of flour and wheat and other food stuff that they did not need to keep in the house, were stored in the loft and on extra benches hastily constructed against any bare walls. The flour and wheat occupied about half of the loft and the remainder was left for bedding should they have to vacate the house.
The children were called to a family meeting and informed that during the coming winter the river may flood and in that case they would have to live in the barn for a while until the water subsided. To the younger ones, that sounded like a lot of fun, sleeping in the loft in the barn. If they did have to shift, the boys, John, Joseph, James and George were instructed to look after their own clothes, shoes, and bedding first and then lend a hand with any other things that needed doing. The river and any other water would be out of bounds. Jane and Mary Ann who were eight and three respectively would be looked after by the adults.
At the start of June the rain was heavy but not unusually so. There was lots of water lying about and the river was high and flowing steadily. The wheat had been sown and by the end of the month the green shoots were showing.
By the middle of June, as predicted, the rain began to increase along the river. Higher up in the hills above the river’s flood plain it became steady and torrential. Word filtered down along the coast that other areas of the Colony were also experiencing heavy downpours. Every day sinister black clouds gathered in the south west and rolled across the coast. As they rose above the escarpment the rain fell in a blinding curtain of long crystal spears that that smashed into the river banks and the flat cleared earth. Each crystal cylinder exploded on impact causing a plume of sand and soil to erupt and be gathered up by the streams of water flowing towards the river.
That night there was no let up. It was as if the wind gave up the task and was unable to push the heavy clouds any further. A thick layer of solid blackness sat above the coast and the inlet and seemed unwilling or unable to climb over the escarpment. Sunrise was completely obscured and the hills above Pinjarah were smothered in mist. It seemed that the sky was gradually sinking and would envelope the Earth and all the while it rained.
The river, by mid-afternoon, had risen to the top of its banks. Fearing it would flood the surrounding country and threaten the house during the night, John made the decision to evacuate and move everything to the barn.
No encouragement was needed. The children set to the task like ants hurrying back and forth with their precious possessions. The two older boys and John with Arthur and Florence Kerridge shifted the kitchen paraphernalia, stove and oven, bath tub and various boxes and moveable furniture. Elizabeth stationed herself in the barn and supervised where the various items should be placed. By late afternoon when the light was fading the task was complete. Mrs Kerridge had set up a makeshift kitchen in one of the stalls nearest the main door and set a fire in the stove. They pretty soon realised that depending on the wind direction smoke could be a problem. In the next few days they decided that they would cut a hole in the wall and attach the chimney. Arthur and the two older boys were busy shifting wood from the verandah of the house to the barn.
John, who had gone down to check on the state of the river, entered the barn and sat on a box to take off his boots in favour of a more comfortable pair of slippers. Elizabeth finally finished organizing the sleeping arrangements in the loft and walked over to converse with her husband.
John, all seems to be in order here in the barn. How does the river look? John looked up from the task of undoing his boots. There is no change, the river is still at the top of its banks and flowing strongly. Quite a lot of debris is being carried along, fallen trees and branches, planks of wood and logs and boxes and barrels and a half submerged boat. I think we have done the right thing. Heavy rain further up the river is likely and it will flood sometime during the night.
Have you checked on the house Elizabeth inquired?
Yes, John nodded. There is nothing else to be done. We shall have to wait until daylight to see if anything has happened. I have left the doors on the ground floor open, so that flood water can enter and escape. Hopefully that will lessen any damage.
Mrs Kerridge had indicated that the evening meal was nearly ready so John and the boys set up the dining table and chairs over towards one corner and positioned the two settees and the lounge chairs adjacent to them. By this time Elizabeth had bathed the younger children and they sat at the table and ate their meal and then Elizabeth took them up into the loft and put them to bed. They did not object, to them it was one great big adventure and very exciting.
The boys had now finished shifting the wood and finally the rest of the family was able to sit down to a meal of soup and chicken pie which Mrs Kerridge had prepared during the afternoon in anticipation of the move to the barn. It was agreed that for the next few days the Kerridges would eat with the family and retire to their own bungalow in the evening.
That night they slept safe and warm in the loft. For John though it was a restless sleep. He kept waking and listening. All he could hear was the rain on the roof. The river itself made no sound.
During the night the river rose as had been expected. It flowed around and through the house, at its peak almost waist deep. Unfired mud bricks, wattle and daub and mud mortar were no match for the raging water. By sunrise it was evident that the walls of the house would be completely destroyed and washed away. The torrent of water flowed for three days before showing any sign of subsiding. By the end of the week the water had retreated enough to enable them to walk around the house, but was still flowing swiftly and dangerously. It was nearly impossible to move with safety as the mud and debris was piled up against walls, fence posts and tree stumps. John issued instructions that no one was to approach the river. Entering the remains of the house was not advisable as with the ground level walls almost completely gone any remaining structure could collapse.
Terrible as it was to see their house destroyed they were thankful that they had sufficient warning to move to the safety of the barn. Over the next few weeks they cleaned up as much as they could around the yard and salvaged what the could in the way of fence posts, but that was about all. After a few days John was quite philosophical. He and Elizabeth had always intended to build a more substantial house, now they would have to do it sooner.
The wheat crop was damaged as it was water logged for a week and some of the plants did not survive. The vegetable garden was also affected and some of the plants were washed away. The fowls, turkeys and ducks were inconvenienced but all managed to survive. The stock, cows, horses, sheep and goats all survived as they migrated through the gates to the back paddocks. Over all they thought themselves fortunate as other settlers less prepared and closer to the river lost everything including their furniture, equipment and personal belongings
The bridge across the Murray at Pinjarra lost its railing and some of the planks. Government and private buildings including the police station were flooded. On the Swan River many buildings were flooded and jetties and landings destroyed.
John and Elizabeth had sufficient capital and the shop, hotel, rentals and mortgage business back in Fremantle were paying them good dividends. Within two months they had commissioned a builder to construct a large two storied house of fourteen rooms further down-stream on higher ground. The house was to be made of kiln fired bricks made from clay sourced on the property. Limestone was burnt on the property to produce the mortar and the shingles for the roof and the timber used in the construction were cut from trees felled on the property. In addition they virtually rebuilt the barn turning it into a newly refurbished coach house and barn and over the next few years constructed several new outbuildings, replaced fences and cleared more land.
Early in 1864 the family moved into the new house now named Ravenswood Hall. The advent of the new house must have rekindled some old desires for within a month Elizabeth announced she was again pregnant.
During 1863 the boys and Arthur Kerridge practically ran the farm. John kept an eye on the construction of the house. With plenty of time on his hands John looked around for other activities to fill in each day. The Aboriginal people had returned to the district in the spring of 63 and John immediately sought out Kepool and Moorang, the two men who had warned them of the big wet that would come that Makuru. He took them up to see the remains of the old house and thanked them profusely. He wanted to reward them and up at the barn he procured four loaves of bread from Mrs Kerridge He also said that if they returned later in the week they could have some of the pig that they were going to slaughter. The men were very grateful and hurried off towards their camp further up the river. Some days later they returned with three large cobblers that they had speared in the estuary and John presented them with a forequarter of the pig. It was the beginning of a reciprocal unspoken agreement where they began to exchange gifts of food every few weeks.
1864 saw a leap forward in the development of the property. The new and much larger house accommodated their large family and allowed the children to develop independently and learn more skills around the farm. Arthur Kerridge assumed the role of instructor and foreman. Now he had a ready- made team. John Frederick was now 22 and Joseph 20 and the two of them were keen to learn and participate in the development of the property and its produce and stock. The cleared land was fenced and divided into paddocks which enabled them to diversify and rotate crops and stock and rest paddocks from grazing. They were now concentrating on wheat but at the same time began alternating with other grains. John was aware that there was a lucrative market for horses in Singapore so they purchased some breeding stock and added those to the cattle and goats.
John, meantime, was concentrating on building up the farm’s ability to transport produce and stock to markets. To this end he ordered a cart and a dray and purchased four draft horses and several rigs and hitch equipment. In addition he ordered a new covered four wheeled horse drawn buggy that would comfortably transport four people.
That took care of the transport on land. Next he turned his mind to one of the farm’s best features, the river frontage. He decided on two boats. The first a larger, shallow drafted, wide beamed skiff suitable for rowing and sailing. This would be used for transporting larger quantities of produce and supplies up and down the river and across the estuary to Mandurah. The second, a smaller narrow beamed skiff suitable for rowing. This would be useful for transporting up to four people up and down the river. The jetty and landing would need to be enlarged to accommodate these two boats.
