The time came for us to catch the train to Mogumber and we all felt really excited. We knew nothing about Moore River, hadn’t heard much about it. All we knew was what they told us; that we were going to a mission. To us, we thought we were going to a place where there’d be lots of lovely little kids and that we were going to be really happy. Well, what a joke that turned out to be.
We got to Mogumber siding at about one or two o’clock in the morning. We got off the train and onto this old truck to go the eight mile ride out to the settlement.
When we got there they unlocked the dormitory to let us in, then showed us to our beds. Doris and I had the two beds in the middle. When we got in we could hear all this whispering, like little kids talking. We didn’t see Herbert again for a while because he was stuck over with the boys.
The next morning when I woke up I could hear birds singing. I peeped out from under the rug and all I could see were these little faces looking at me. I thought, ooooh, what’s this. I’d never seen so many faces
Anyway, we got up and went to have a wash. We never wore nighties in that place, we just slept in our shimmy and pants. We went off to wash our face and comb our hair, when all these kids came across and asked, ‘Where you come from?’ I told them we came from Roebourne and they didn’t much care about us, just walked off. See, they were South girls, they were all from country in the South.
Then these other girls came around and said, ‘Where you come from?’
‘I come from North,’ I told them.
‘Oh well,’ they said. ‘We come from North too.’ So the North took over then and looked after us.
On the very first morning we were there we were taken up to the office. Mr Brodie was the superintendent then, and his wife was the matron.
They spoke to us for a while about the rules and things like that, then Matron asked me if I knew who my father was. I told her yes, I did. Then she asked me, ‘Do you know the Flinders?’ and certain other people from Roebourne. I told her yes because they were all my father’s friends. In fact, Mrs Flinders said that if she had known I was going to be taken away I could have stayed with her and gone to school with her three daughters in Roebourne.
Anyway, this questioning went on for a while, and then they let us go. But afterwards they always called me Cassit. Matron would come along and she’d say, ‘Cassit! Cassit! Cassit! Don’t you go past me when I call you.’ I’d look at her and say, ‘I’m not Cassit, I’m Basset,’ but she’d never call me by my proper name.
It used to eat me a little bit, but then I found out that Mr Brodie had been a policeman up in Roebourne. See, they probably didn’t like me having my father’s name because he came from such a big family up there.
Well, now that I saw for myself what the settlement was really like, I just gave up all hope. I thought, there’s no way I’ll be going back home now.
Moore River was split into two main parts; the compound where all the kids and older girls were, and the camps, where all the married people and old people had to live.
The compound was set up just like a little town. At the bottom end of the main street was the Big House — that’s the superintendent’s quarters — and this faced the church which was at the top end of the street. In between, on either side, were all the other buildings, like the dormitories, dining room, sewing room, bakehouse and staff quarters. It was built up on a ridge, and down on the flats near the river were the camps where all the campies built their little places.
The superintendent and his wife were the head workers there. They had five sisters: one for the surgery, one for the dining room, the sewing room, the school and the girls’ dormitory. There was also a second boss who was in charge of the stables and fencing, outdoor things like that, and a third boss who went out with the woodcutters.
There were black trackers for policemen too, both Nor’westers and Sou’westers. But mostly they were Nor’westers because if they did anything wrong up on the North, like killing a bullock, they’d be sent down south away from their country. Their main job was to catch anyone who ran away, and they used to wear these old police uniforms with the brass buttons pulled off.
Us kids were all put up in the compound and it was a rule that we weren’t allowed to go down to the camps. They always tried to keep everything separate there. There were separate dormitories for boys and girls, and even to go into the dining room we were kept separate.
The dining room was shaped longwise, with the boys having steps up one way, and the girls having steps up the other. It was really horrible to eat in there because the cups and things were that dirty, and we had all these old tin mugs and plates left over from the First World War. The food was terrible; that’s the food we ate, not what the superintendent and white staff had. They had beautiful food; roasts, lovely stews, curries with rice, food like that. I know because I ended up working at the Big House, and they certainly didn’t have to eat like we did.
At dinnertime we used to have this soup, only I couldn’t eat it because it was just like dishwater. None of us could eat it, we’d just try and pick through the best of it. We used to make up on the semolina — that’s what they used to give us for breakfast — no sugar on it of course. We’d have semolina and a piece of bread’n’dripping for breakfast. Well that would be our fill for the day because we couldn’t eat the soup.
One day I was asked to go up to the kitchen to relieve because one of the girls was sick. Luckily I only had to do it twice; I couldn’t stand what I saw there. The food for the compound was cooked by the girls. They’d have one of the nurses — well, they were all called nurses — up there instructing the girls. There were two coppers: one for the soup, and one for the tea. The water would be all boiled up in a copper, and they had this great big shearer’s teapot, with tea stewed and stewed up in it.
For the soup they’d cook up these awful sheep heads. First they’d skin them, but never take the eyes out, then they’d split them down the middle, give them a quick rinse and throw them in the copper. Sometimes those sheep heads had bott-fly in their noses but they wouldn’t worry about that. They’d just throw it in and we’d see that in our soup.
It was all so dirty. You’d think those nurses would have been more alert, could have done things properly. But they didn’t care. I suppose they were told, ‘Just anything will do those natives.’
I couldn’t eat the soup before I worked there, but when I saw this I definitely couldn’t eat it. See, I wasn’t brought up like that. My mother was a beautiful cook and we ate lovely meals back home. I think they did things like this to deliberately lower us; well, degrade us really.
The girls’ dormitory was an old weatherboard place with a verandah halfway around. It had all different wings under the one main roof. The mothers’ wing was out on the verandah at the back, and around five or six of them would be there at a time. See, most of the older girls that went out to work were pregnant when they came back in.
Inside the dormitory was the little kids’ dorm, the washroom, and the other two parts were for the rest of us girls. We were all locked in at night but the doors between each wing were left open.
In the girls’ dormitory we had an old matron-mother, old dormitory mother they called her. We called her Nanna Leyland, and she was a beautiful old lady you know, but strict too.
She’d be next door in a room to the side, and she wouldn’t yell at us if we made any noise, she’d use her stick. She had a big stick, and she’d hit the wall three times. I tell you what, you’d hear a pin drop. Then you’d hear her coming across the floor, walking stick going; toong toong toong.
When she got to the door she’d say, ‘Galahs live outside — people live inside. I’m looking after little kids next door and they need their sleep. If I hear another word I won’t hit the wall, I’ll come in and crack every head in this room. So just keep quiet.’ And she would have done it too!
Just off the side of our dormitory was the pan-room. In there they just had the one night pan for all of us, and we had only enough room to wriggle our way in and sit down. It was in our part of the dorm and sometimes the girls used to come in a hurry and mess the floor trying to get there in the dark, poor things. It was usually the little ones, and for the rest of the night we’d have to walk on water.
On the windows of the girls’ dormitory they had wire mesh to stop you from getting out, and a trellis around the verandah. Although they always locked the girls’ door, the boys were left free. The boys used to come and talk to the girls at night through the window, but if Matron or someone came along they’d run underneath the building to hide. When the superintendent woke up to what was happening, he had a stone wall put around the bottom of the girls’ dormitory to stop the boys from hiding underneath.
Even though Nanna Leyland was really strict, she was a lovely lady to us too. When I got in favour with her I used to live like a queen. See, she used to give us her dog, Brindle, to go bush and get a kangaroo for her. There’d be me, Melba, Ruth and another Melba, and we’d go out along the river hunting, just us girls, taking the butcher’s knife and everything. Then after we’d given her the brush kangaroo, she’d make a beautiful big stew and a damper for those girls that did the hunting for her. She’d bring in that special food at night, because even though she had her own camp outside, she was always locked up in the compound at night.
Sometimes, too, we used to go across to old Bill Kimberley and old Mary — that was the policeman and his wife — and they’d have a bit of brush kangaroo or something. The boys’ dormitory was built up high, you could walk right under it and sit down, and that’s where Bill and Mary lived. They just had a few sheets of iron put this way and that, and they’d have their fire out in the open. See, where the girls had Nanna Leyland as a dormitory-mother, the boys were kept in line by one of the trackers.
Some people liked the trackers and some didn’t. It’s just the same as every other place I suppose. My mate Dorothy didn’t like Bluey, they just couldn’t see eye to eye. He used to stand at the door to the dormitory and usher us girls in, and Dorothy would have a go at him, you know, give him a good stir. So she’d be there stirring him up, and one day he said, ‘Dorothy Nannup, get in that formatory or I’ll hit you over the stick with a head!’ Well, look, we just roared laughing, she didn’t have an answer for that. I tell you, we used to have funny little instances like that. It never used to be running smooth at all.
That old Bluey had a vegie garden and he used to supply the compound with soup vegetables. The girls used to sneak down, get in there, and pinch a few of these vegies. They’d tie their belts tight and stuff carrots, turnips or whatever they could get down their tops. Then they’d crawl through the fence, get across the river and wash them, then have a good old feed. They’d bring some back to us too, to have in the dormitory when we were locked in at night. See, we were always hungry, but I’d never do anything like that — I just couldn’t.
Life in Moore River had a real routine to it. Every Saturday morning Sister Stewart would line us all up, boys on one side, and girls on the other. She’d stand at the top of one line and another sister would stand at the other. They’d have these big chemist bottles full of Epsom salts and everyone would get a big glassful. It’d be down with the Epsom and then you’d get a lolly to wash the taste away.
We hated it, and instead of getting in the front of the line we’d all push to get at the back. But sooner or later it would be your turn, and I tell you, they’d make sure you swallowed it all before you got your lolly.
We also used to have drill down on the playground. That was just like the aerobics they do today. The playground was just a big sandy area on the flat, behind the church and next to the boob. The boob was the prison. We’d wear the same clothes for that, nothing special, and usually it was the schoolteacher who took us. I don’t know what the big girls did, whether they did drill somewhere else, but this was only for us younger ones.
We had to play sports too, and I used to like playing boys’ hockey. We never had proper hockey sticks though. We used to go down the river and find crooked sticks, then put them in the fire so they’d tighten up. Sometimes we’d get wire and tie it on the end to make it look like a real hockey stick, and we’d run around having a good old time.
Doris, Herbert and I were sent to Moore River in August, and the first Christmas we had there was in 1925. I always remember that Christmas morning because these beautiful voices were singing, coming down from the church. I woke up and heard these beautiful voices floating down over the compound. ‘Doris, Doris, quick, wake up,’ I said. ‘The angels are coming!’ I really thought it must have been angels to sound like that.
All the girls in the dormitory jumped up and went to the verandah. The dormitory was all blocked off with a trellis but we could just see through to the outside. I looked and saw these girls standing out there in the middle of the street, between the two dormitories, singing.
It was the girls’ choir, and I could see the two Darby girls, Dinah Hall and several others. They sang, ‘Christians Awake’ and ‘Oh, Come All Ye Faithful’. They really made the ranges ring, and that’s the only time Mogumber was ever beautiful.
I was going to school in the settlement up until that Christmas, and for a couple of months after. But I can truly say that they never taught me anything in all that time.
I’d finished up to grade three at the school in Toolbrunup, and that was as high as Moore River went. So when the teacher was busy she’d get me to go out and keep the infants occupied while she taught the bigger class.
Moore River did nothing for me by way of schooling; I had to learn through experience and picking up little bits here and there on my own. Really, all I ever did there was work. I had chores to do before school and chores to do after. I tell you, they never allowed me to be idle.
I was still going to school when they decided to show us a movie. We all went up to the church, men and boys on one side and girls and grown up ladies on the other. This was a Charlie Chaplin movie and you know how funny he is.
Nanna Leyand used to always wear this hat and her and a couple of the old ladies were sitting in front of us. A lot of the people there had never seen a movie before, especially these old ones. Anyway, the thing went on, flickering away, when this motor car came full ball down the street towards us. Poor old Nanna went, aaarrrgghh, and ducked right down. Oh, look, it was such a laugh, funnier than the movie. Every now and again this motor car would come around the corner and Nanna and these old ladies would duck. Us little girls sitting behind her were killing ourselves laughing, but we couldn’t laugh out loud or she would have thumped us.
That’s the only movie I can recall them ever showing us. We had a couple of slide nights too, religious ones, but those soon fell by the wayside.
I hadn’t been at the settlement long when I got a letter from Jessie Hornsey. Miss Greenwood had married while we were with the Campbells and her name became Mrs Hornsey. When we were at Pallingup we used to ride over to her place and do odd jobs. Anyway, she wrote to me and asked if I’d come and work for her. Mr Brodie knew all about it, because everybody’s letter that was written into that place was read before it was given out. He didn’t say anything to me when I got the letter but he called me into his office a couple of days later.
‘Do you really want to go and work for Mrs Hornsey?’ he asked.
I said that I’d like to because she’d written and asked me.
‘But,’ he said, ‘you can’t go because we’ve got another job lined up for you.’
Well I don’t know what that job was but I never went to it. I think they just wouldn’t let me go to Mrs Hornsey’s because they wanted to disconnect people from their past. I was still at school at this time, but not long after they needed girls in the sewing room so they put me there to work. So whether that was the other job he was talking about or not, I don’t know.
All the girls who were taken out of school and sent down to the sewing room, were started off on button holing and things like that. We had no choice about working there and we were never paid for it. We’d work a full week, then we’d go down every Saturday morning to clean the machines, brush them and oil them up ready for Monday. Then they’d come along with a little block of chocolate for us and that was our pay.
Every so often, Mr Neville, or an outside visitor, used to come up to the settlement. Whenever Mr Neville came everything had to be spit and polish — we’d have to really clean the place up, and sometimes we had to get into lines for when he arrived.
The best thing about someone from the outside coming was we’d get to eat better food, something special, in case whoever it was came into the dining room and had a look around. But this was only once in a blue moon. I remember hearing around the place that the Prince of Wales wanted to come up to the settlement but Mr Neville put him off. ‘No,’ he said. ‘You don’t want to go there. They’re cannibals.’ I don’t know if this is true — it’s just what I heard.
One time when Mr Neville came we were all in the sewing room, and he was standing talking to the sewing mistress. They were talking about education and other things, and I heard him say, ‘Ohh, it’s all right, as long as they can write their name and count money … that’s all the education they need.’ Well, I think that tells you all he thought of us.
When I think back to the time I spent at Mogumber, I think about how they always had me working, never left me free. Every morning I’d get up and go to breakfast, then I’d go straight over to the office. A boy named Edward and I used to work in the store weighing up the rations — like sugar, tea, flour — and handing it out to the camp people.
When Nanna Leyland came to get her rations I’d always put a little extra in and hand it over myself. I gave her a tin of baking powder once, just a little tin. I stuck it in with the flour so you couldn’t see it. Sometimes I’d give her a little bit extra rice or salt or whatever, because that’s how we would work it. She’d have extra and then she’d cook something to bring into the dormitory and feed us at night.
After I’d finished up in the store in the mornings I’d go straight down to the sewing room. Then at about five o’clock I’d be finished there, and I’d go up to the office to trim the lamps. I used to do the lamps for the girls’ dormitory — they had to be trimmed every night and put in each wing before tea.
One night I finished trimming the lamps and I took them off to the dormitory. When I got there a girl was standing on the steps waiting for me. She was deliberately blocking my way, so I looked up at her and asked her to please get out of the road. She moved aside, but when I walked into the room she shoved me in the back. I didn’t take any notice of that, I just walked into the dormitory and took all the lamps to their different places. But as I was walking out she stood in the doorway.
‘You’ve been talking about me,’ she said.
‘You?’ I was surprised.
‘Yeah me, and what have you got to say about it now?’
‘Oh,’ I said, ‘tell me what I said about you then?’
‘I know what you said about me.’
‘Well then, you tell me.’
But she wouldn’t tell me, so I told her to get out of the way, and she hit me. So I up and hit her back, I gave her the works. She was a bigger person than me, too, but I just lost my block.
There was another girl sitting there and she said, ‘Come on break it up, you two.’ But I was angry and I wouldn’t stop.
When I did let her go I said, ‘You tell me who told you I was talking about you?’
‘Ruby Windy told me,’ she said.
‘All right,’ I said, ‘I’ll go and bring Ruby back.’
As I was walking down the steps to go and get Ruby I said to her, ‘Are you going to face Ruby?’
‘No,’ she said.
‘Why?’ I asked her, but I knew why. ‘Well,’ I said, ‘you’ve got to face her,’ and I walked off around the corner.
When I found Ruby and told her she was furious. She came back with me to the dormitory, walked up the steps and said to this girl, ‘When did I tell you this?’ Well of course she couldn’t answer, so Ruby lifted her too.
Then the girl who had told us to let off fighting butted in and it was a free-for-all. It ended up us telling them that if they wanted to find anything to make a fight over, they’d better make sure they knew what they were talking about. See Ruby was a Nor’wester — she came from Carnarvon — and all us North people stuck up for each other. It was that kind of a place, you just had to stick up for one another.
The North and the South would have many a fight you know, they were terrible. They’d fight rather than have a feed — just like the Irish and the English. The two sides were a very strong thing. Northies were anyone from Carnarvon up. See, someone would make up a story that wasn’t even worth talking about and it’d spread and spread, until it was way out. Then that would be passed around and, before long, there’d be a fight over it.
One thing I was lucky about at Moore River was I never got a beating. Lots of girls got a thrashing but I never did. They used to take them down to the storeroom and the superintendent would belt them until they weed all over the floor. They never spared them, and in the afternoons I’d have to go down with a mop and mop it up.
So for those that got punished, the punishment was harsh. If girls ran away they’d send the trackers after them and they’d be brought back and their hair would be cut off, then they’d do time in the boob.
At the sewing room we used to make clothes for Forrest River Mission, and for Moore River as well. They never had to buy clothing for us, we made it all. It was terrible material too. But if you were a good worker, at Christmas they’d give you a piece of good material and you could make yourself a frock. Me and another girl, Dorothy Nannup, were really favoured — we used to get a piece and we’d make ourselves something nice to wear.
One morning me and Dorothy stepped outside to get into line for church and all these boys looked across and wolf-whistled and shouted. We had our new dresses on and they reckoned I was a butterfly and goodness knows what else. My dress was a plain one, but Dorothy, she made a flarey, flouncey one. When she’d spin around it would twirl out. Mine was more of a plain Jane sort of thing, but still, I made a good job of it.
Although there were awful things that went on at the settlement, and once you were there you were there until it suited them, good things used to happen too. I used to really enjoy going to church, and I loved swimming down at the river. Another one of the things I liked was going to the dances they held once a fortnight. The compound would have our dance on a Wednesday night, and the campies would have theirs on the Saturday.
Everybody looked forward to these dances. We’d wear the dresses we made, and get electric wires and do one another’s hair. Olive Harris was a good friend of mine and we used to go off to Nanna Leyland’s, or down to old Aunty Pat Rowe’s, and sit by the fire warming up our electric wires. When the wire gets hot enough you curl your hair around it and you end up with ringlets or lots of curls. Matron used to give us some hair clips, and we’d all get dressed up for the dance.
These old fellas from New Norcia — Charlie Bullfrog and Ben Jedda — used to come over. Old Charlie played the piano accordion and Ben played the violin. Oh, Ben was beautiful, he used to make that violin talk, and we’d all just get stuck into it. We used to love square dancing too you know. Four here, two over there and two there, and you promenade, and do this that and the other. Oh, it was beautiful. We enjoyed it so much we’d be saying, ‘Oohh, come on Wednesday night.’
Abridged from When the Pelican Laughed
Alice Nannup, Lauren Marsh and Stephen Kinnane, 1992.