The Call of the Outback, page 22
After a time, my father received his long-awaited promotion and Ernestine Hill’s book gradually resumed its place on the dining room table, where it would sometimes be picked up. The reading aloud had stopped and, since I could read quite well by then, my attention had turned from Loneliness to The Wind in the Willows.
In later years, The Great Australian Loneliness became one of those nomads that found safe refuge in my book cabinet.
I had always been intrigued by the photo of Ernestine Hill on the back jacket flap of my edition. I often wondered who this woman could be, but most people knew very little about her.
This account of her life has come from many sources, including her own newspaper articles, letters to friends and family and two very rare interviews she gave to a young and upcoming journalist called Joan Pilgrim about her travels through Australia. I have tried to imagine what her life was like by following her paper trail.
Some parts of my narrative are romanticised versions of the truth, because there is no one left to provide an actual account. They are my own version of what could have happened. Most of the text, however, is based on the known facts.
Notes
To avoid repetition, Ernestine Hill has been abbreviated to EH throughout.
Prologue: Alice Springs, 1933
The prologue is my own imagined account, based on John Antill Pockley’s Journal: Flight of Ducks, an online documentary developed by Simon Pockley in 1995. It revolves around the 1933 journal of Simon’s father, John Antill Pockley: www.duckdigital.net/FOD/
xi ‘… ascertain [how they] were able …’: ‘Doctors to study Aborigines’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA), 4 January 1933, p. 8.
xi ‘paint the “dead heart” ’: Ria Murch, Arthur Murch: An artist’s life 1902–1989, Ruskin Rowe Press, Avalon Beach, 1997, chapter 5.
xii ‘she had already passed judgement’: Ibid.
1 The Foster-Lynams
4 ‘Remember the music’: ‘Blind Tom’, The Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld), 17 July 1897, p. 125.
4 ‘eternal fitness of things’: Ibid.
7 ‘She was happy in Townsville’: EH, Letter to Wirlie Moore, 1964, Papers of Mrs W. Moore, John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland, M296.
2 Child genius
12 ‘the nuns “had tried to take the credit” ’: EH, Letter to Coy Bateson, 1941, undated, Fryer Library, University of Queensland Library, UQFL18.
12 ‘he would have been in gaol’: T.P. Boland, James Duhig, University of Queensland Press, St Lucia (Qld), 1987.
13 ‘permit ankles being seen’: ‘Genius unspoilt’, Sunday Times (Sydney, NSW), 3 February 1918, p. 13.
14 ‘shy as a Wonga pigeon’: Ibid.
14 ‘claim of genius’: ‘New star hailed: Queensland’s girl poet’, Weekly Times (Melbourne, Vic), 2 February 1918.
14 ‘overfond and proud mother’: ‘Genius unspoilt’.
14 ‘crush her ambition’: ‘New star hailed’.
3 J.F. Archibald and Smith’s Weekly
15 ‘Stott & Hoare’s … where Ernestine wanted to study’: ‘Training brings a job’, The Argus (Melbourne, Vic), 7 January 1935, p. 5.
16 ‘deadly monotonous affair’: ‘New star hailed: Queensland’s girl poet’, Weekly Times (Melbourne, Vic), 2 February 1918.
16 ‘just the thing’: Author interview with Louise Campbell, March 2015.
17 ‘These are stirring times’: Letter, EH to Timothy Keleher, April 1918, Papers of Timothy Keleher, State Library of Queensland, OM 73-73.
17 ‘chase a career in writing’: Letter, Timothy Keleher to EH, 1918, Papers of Timothy Keleher, State Library of Queensland, OM 73-73.
22 ‘soler and heeler of paragraphs’: Claude McKay, ‘A living legend’, The Sunday Herald (Sydney, NSW), [date unknown] 1919, p. 12.
22 ‘chuckle at the world’: Ibid.
22 ‘If I must die’: Josie Vine, Australian Journalism Monographs, vol. 12, 2010, p. 14.
4 Robert Clyde Packer
23 ‘love of her life’: Email, Louise Campbell to author, 10 October 2005.
27 ‘This charming, unspoilt, gifted daughter’: ‘Genius unspoilt’, Sunday Times (Sydney, NSW), 3 February 1918, p. 13.
30 ‘skinny and sinister’: Sharne Wolff, ‘Sam Fullbrook: Delicate Beauty review’, The Guardian (Australia edition), 9 April 2014.
5 Tasmania
35 ‘Fancy, Mum, the lights in the city’: Joan Pilgrim, ‘Around Australia with Ernestine Hill’, The Land (Sydney, NSW), 24 October 1947.
36 ‘the lights of a city on the hillside’: Ibid.
36 ‘one of the worst floods’: Phil & Matt Stephens, The Flood of 1929, Launceston Historical Society. http://launcestonhistory.org.au/history-of-launceston/notable-events-in-launceston/the-flood-of-1929/
6 On the road, 1930
40 ‘sharpened pencils’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 17.
41 ‘This week’s best tale’: ‘This week’s best tale: The background’, Western Mail (Perth, WA), 6 February 1930, p. 8.
43 ‘like a tapestry’: The Great Australian Loneliness, p. 18.
43 ‘laughably like a clipped poodle’: Ibid.
43 ‘fragment of a rainbow’: Ibid.
44 ‘a broken-down store’: Ibid., p. 27.
45 ‘Some sources say that the death rate’: ‘Australia’s Pearling History’. http://www.australia.gov.au/aboutaustralia/australian-story/australias-pearling-industry
7 M.P. Durack
50 ‘I’m heading for Auvergne’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 123.
51 ‘The Victoria River Depot Races’: Ibid.
52 ‘a baby crocodile, a pony or a galah’: Brenda Niall, True North: The story of Mary and Elizabeth Durack, Text Publishing, Melbourne, 2012, p. 9.
54 ‘Reg “was rabidly communist” ’: Letter, EH to Mary Durack, August 1944, J S Battye Library of West Australian History, Private Archives, MN 0071 Acc 7273A.
55 ‘an agricultural adviser’: The Great Australian Loneliness, p. 124.
55 ‘he would need to stay for some time’: Letter, Jack Lovegro to Robert Easton, 8 March 1932, J S Battye Library of West Australian History, Private Archives, MN 1826 Acc 5408A.
55 ‘you’ll have to take the train’: The Great Australian Loneliness, p. 124.
55 ‘It takes a great measure of courage’: Notes from Michael Patrick Durack (MPD) diary, J S Battye Library of West Australian History, Private Archives, MN 0071 Acc 7273A.
56 ‘those fascinating big rivers’: Letter, EH to Elizabeth Durack, 2 February 1939, J S Battye Library of West Australian History, Private Archives, MN 0071 Acc 7273A.
8 Victoria Downs and Darwin
58 ‘ingenuity displayed’: Kevin Kenneally, Exploration and Botany: The W.R. Easton 1921 Expedition, talk given to the Kimberley Society, Broome, 4 December 2013. http://www.kimberleysociety.org/images/kimbsoc--eeniawadoo.pdf
58 ‘It is primitive to travel’: Ibid.
58 ‘very well-spoken and charming’: EH, letter to MPD, JS Battye Library of West Australian History, Private Archives, MN 0071 Acc 7273A.
58 ‘an old dingo hunter’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 125.
59 ‘He’ll be the bloke shouting the odds’: Ibid., p. 127.
61 ‘Darwin is hell and heaven’: Ibid., p. 196.
62 ‘Everyone holding a ticket’: Tess Lea, Darwin, New South Books, Sydney, 2014, p. 20.
62 ‘yellow people’: EH, ‘The tragedy of Henry Lee’, Sunday Times (Perth, WA), 4 January 1931, p. 7.
63 ‘Darwin is not a good place’: The Great Australian Loneliness, p. 197.
63 ‘getting her copy to the post office’: Ibid., p. 189.
63 ‘philologist from Philadelphia University’: Ibid., p. 199.
63 ‘Gerhardt Laves, as it turned out, had been a student’: Gerhardt Laves Collection: www.anu.edu.au/linguistics/nash/aust/laves/index.html
64 ‘It was a place where the roads’: The Great Australian Loneliness, p. 199.
9 Land, sea and ‘Blue Moon’
68 ‘fighting over a bite of Smith’s Weekly’: W.J. Carey, ‘Letter to the editor’, The West Australian (Perth, WA), 3 September 1931, p. 11.
68 ‘Up north, he wrote’: EH, ‘A disgrace to Australia’, West Australian (Perth, WA), 30 September 1933, p. 4.
68 ‘Numerous other remarkable happenings have occurred’: Ibid.
69 ‘ “patriotic and truer” Kendall’: EH, ‘Gordon and Kendall’, The West Australian (Perth, WA), 7 October 1931, p. 4.
69 ‘spasmodic travelling’: Letter, EH to Henrietta Drake-Brockman, 1949, Papers of Henrietta Drake-Brockman, National Library of Australia, MS 1634.
71 ‘film script … “Blue Moon” ’: Registrar of Copyrights Commonwealth of Australia, 30 April 1932.
10 Adrienne Lesire
74 ‘balloon pantaloons’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 276.
76 ‘This was the story Ernestine wrote’: EH, ‘Where Australians bow to Allah’, Northern Standard (Darwin, NT), 7 October 1932, p. 11.
78 ‘a test case’: ‘The marriage ceremony’, Kalgoorlie Western Argus (Kalgoorlie, WA), 11 June 1907, p. 36.
78 ‘Gool paid the defendant’s fine’: Ibid.
78 ‘beautiful, green-eyed’: ‘Where Australians bow to Allah’.
79 ‘the most hair-raising thriller’: The Great Australian Loneliness, p. 274.
79 ‘I have so much respect’: Letter, EH to Coy Bateson, 1945, Fryer Library, University of Queensland Library, UQFL18.
11 Daisy Bates
82 ‘Daisy had no money’: EH, Kabbarli: A personal memoir of Daisy Bates, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1973, p. 108.
83 ‘veil attached to keep out the flies’: Ibid., p. 96.
86 ‘photograph of a toddler with ringlets’: Ibid., p. 27.
86 ‘mother who, he felt, had abandoned him’: Ibid.
87 ‘had become an impediment’: Ibid.
87 ‘marriage must have seemed’: Ibid.
88 ‘Daisy had made such claims’: Bob Reece, Daisy Bates: Grand dame of the desert, National Library of Australia, Canberra, 2007, p. 8.
88 ‘Theodor Strehlow, who accused her’: Ibid., p. 87.
88 ‘some sensational copy’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 254.
12 Jake and Minnie
89 ‘Minnie Berrington’: Sue Britt, ‘Coober Pedy street and road names: Santing Drive’, Coober Pedy Regional Times (Coober Pedy, Qld), 20 December 2012, p. 4.
89 ‘women could go down holes’: Minnie Berrington, Stones of Fire, Robertson & Mullens, Melbourne, 1958, p. 10.
89 ‘Jacob (Jake) Santing’s’: ‘Coober Pedy Street and road names: Santing Drive’.
90 ‘She didn’t really know if he could read English’: Ibid., p. 30.
91 ‘considered one of the blokes’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 261.
94 ‘described by other journalists as shy’: ‘Genius unspoilt’, Sunday Times (Sydney, NSW), 3 February 1918, p. 13.
95 ‘Take your pick—about 500 miles’: Andrew Denton, interview with Ted Egan on Enough Rope, ABC TV, 2 August 2004.
96 ‘There’s nothing here’: EH, ‘Human moles of Cooper Pedy’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA), 16 December 1933, p. 9.
97 ‘I ride with whatever comes along’: The Great Australian Loneliness, p. 7.
13 Gold fever
98 ‘It was a one-man town’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 301.
98 ‘she felt a little like the Queen of Sheba’: Ibid., p. 303.
99 ‘loudly ungracious “bah” ’: Ibid., p. 308.
100 ‘Heinrich had become very attached’: EH, ‘Man with the green umbrella’, The Mail (Adelaide, SA), 22 October 1932, p. 2.
100 ‘After counting “one, two” ’: Ibid.
102 ‘Joe Kilgariff … showed her his fist full of gold’: The Great Australian Loneliness, p. 309.
102 ‘dig for hidden treasure’: Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Penguin, London, 2002, p. 132.
103 ‘The Advertiser had already run a headline’: ‘Gold boom: Granites field trading at fever pitch’, Recorder (Port Pirie, SA), 4 October 1932, p. 1.
104 ‘official record of the Granites gold rush’: David Laws Logbook, in F.E. Baume, Tragedy Track: The story of the Granites, Frank C. Johnson, Sydney, 1933, p. 40.
104 ‘Ernestine’s first article about the rush’: EH, ‘Granites is gold city in embryo’, The Mail (Adelaide, SA), 15 October 1932, p. 3.
104 ‘a police station, post office’: EH, ‘New township’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA), 4 February 1933, p. 16.
14 Eric Baume
106 ‘Some brokers on the Melbourne Stock Exchange’: ‘Speculation in the Granites: Melbourne brokers view it with disfavour’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA), 17 September 1932, p. 16.
106 ‘F.B. Stephens’: ‘The Granites boom’, Barrier Miner (Broken Hill, NSW), 19 September 1932, p. 2.
106 ‘indications that it was a gold area’: Ibid.
107 ‘Her stories had a punch’: F.E. Baume, Tragedy Track: The story of the Granites, Frank C. Johnson, Sydney, 1933, p. 8.
107 ‘it wasn’t for her to question’: Ibid.
108 ‘devoted servant’: Arthur Manning, Larger Than Life: The story of Eric Baume, A.H. & A.W. Reed, Sydney, 1967, p. 56.
109 ‘a party consisting of Mr Baume’: ‘Madigan Party’, Barrier Miner (Broken Hill, NSW), 2 November 1932, p. 2.
110 ‘In short … Alice Springs.’: Tragedy Track, p. 2.
110 ‘The party was excellently funded’: ‘Desert gold or Granites mirage’, The Daily Telegraph (Sydney, NSW), 12 October 1932, p. 1.
110 ‘They [the Sunday Sun] must be desperate’: Tragedy Track, p. 8.
111 ‘They showed no sign of violence’: Ibid., p. 29.
111 ‘every ounce of gold’: Eric Baume, ‘Loneliest goldfield’, The Daily News (Perth, WA), 19 November 1932, p. 11.
111 ‘People could find a handful of gold’: ‘The Madigan Report’, Sunday Sun (Sydney NSW), 4 December 1932.
112 ‘There was no gold in quantity’: Tragedy Track, p. 2.
113 ‘little Mrs Hill’: Ibid., p. 8.
113 ‘Turning gold fever into headlines’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 312.
15 Borroloola
115 ‘a cat and her four kittens’: Letter, EH to Mary Durack, 1952, J S Battye Library of West Australian History, Private Archives, MN 0071 Acc 7273A.
118 ‘sworn he would never take a woman’: EH, The Great Australian Loneliness, Jarrolds, London, 1937, p. 208.
118 ‘all my innocence’: Ibid.
118 ‘hung with cobwebs’: Ibid., p. 213.
118 ‘Ernestine stood marvelling’: Ibid., p. 215.
16 Perth
121 ‘He was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment’: ‘Defrauded persons who befriended him: How Frederick Hopkins impersonated Ernestine Hill’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA), 11 September 1933, p. 10.
121 ‘there were many more con men out there’: EH, ‘Outback confidence men’, Sunday Mail (Brisbane, Qld), 2 April 1933, p. 18.
122 ‘definitely a force of evil’: Letter, EH to Mary Durack, January 1943, J S Battye Library of West Australian History, Private Archives, MN 0071 Acc 7273A.
124 ‘Too much fellowship’: Letter, EH to Mary Durack, February 1946, J S Battye Library of West Australian History, Private Archives, MN 0071 Acc 7273A.
124 ‘I like quiet natures’: Letter, EH to Coy Bateson, 1941, Fryer Library, University of Queensland Library, UQFL18.
125 ‘Ewers told her not to worry’: J.K. Ewers, ‘Australian bookman’, The Daily News (Perth, WA), 1 April 1933, p. 18.
17 The Silver Gull, 1934
127 ‘Beatrice Grey was a dark-haired, slender and active woman’: ‘The woman and the yacht’, Sydney Morning Herald (Sydney, NSW), 17 May 1934, p. 11.
129 ‘an excellent cook’: EH, ‘Scouts on Silver Gull’, Sunday Mail (Brisbane, Qld), 18 March 1934, p. 25.
129 ‘brave and wonderful’: EH, ‘Thrilling voyage of Sea Scouts’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA), 12 March 1934, p. 18.
131 ‘Rugs, mattresses, pillows’: Sea Scout Reg Thompson, ‘Oil poured on sea’, The West Australian (Perth, WA), 9 May 1934.
131 ‘they were feared dead’: ‘Where is the Silver Gull?’, The Daily News (Perth, WA), 9 March 1934, p. 5.
18 Adelaide
133 ‘she never named Robert Packer’: Email, Louise Campbell to author, 10 October 2005.
134 ‘the love of her life’: Ibid.
134 ‘No record remains’: Ibid.
137 ‘poor as wood’: ‘Mrs Daisy Bates helps Aboriginals’, The News (Adelaide, SA), 24 May 1934, p. 12.
19 From Alice to Dumas
141 ‘Ernestine found the courtroom crowded’: EH, ‘Alice Springs Court today’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA), 6 February 1935, p. 17.
143 ‘The bush was alight’: EH, Kabbarli: A personal memoir of Daisy Bates, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1973, p. 134.
143 ‘expressing her concerns’: Ibid.
144 ‘a prickly bush’: Ibid., p. 137.
145 ‘He would be travelling from Melbourne’: ‘Utmost efforts: Mr Lyon’s pledge’, Canberra Times (Canberra, ACT), 22 February 1935.
146 ‘now Lyons might be willing’: Kabbarli, p. 137.
147 ‘hidden herself from sight’: Ibid.
147 ‘She believed that her work as the rescuer’: Bob Reece, Daisy Bates: Grand dame of the desert, National Library of Australia, Canberra, 2007, p. 113.
147 ‘I want only the best’: Kabbarli, p. 138.
148 ‘the morality of native and half-caste women’: Daisy Bates, The Passing of the Aborigines, John Murray, London, 1938, p. 93.
148 ‘It must be your book’: Daisy Bates: Grand dame of the desert, p. 115.
148 ‘all expenses the move incurred would be paid for’: Kabbarli, p. 136.
149 ‘joyous little interruptions from my own kind’: Elizabeth Salter, Daisy Bates, Coward, McCann & Geoghegan Inc, New York, 1972, p. 198.
150 ‘the manual labour of typing’: Kabbarli, p. 142.
150 ‘method and manner of writing’: Ibid., p. 141.
