I was born in Nowra, NSW, in 1932. I was 18 months old when I and my two brothers were taken from our parents. I do not remember where my parents were living at the time, however I ended up being placed in Bomaderry Children’s Home with my two brothers Leslie and Warren. Les was about six years of age and Warren four.
I remember when I was about four years old the officials said that Les was far too old for the children’s home and therefore decided to send him and Warren to Kinchela Boys Home. They sent the three of us together and I am glad they did not split us up.
It was not so bad at the start, as I was the youngest of about 50 or 60 children and too young to go to school.
Each day would start at about 6am. Firstly, I will explain the roster. Every person had a duty to perform, either cleaning the kitchen, dormitory, toilets, dining room or laundry, but if you were on dairy duties, you would have to start at 5am because there were about 40 cows to milk.
We were never supplied with shoes and in winter when we had to go and milk the cows, we would make the cows get up off the ground and we would stand where they had been lying down to warm our feet, because we were not allowed to make fires to keep us warm. Other days we would stand in cow droppings to warm our feet.
We had to wear shorts and shirts both summer and winter. The only time we were given shoes was when we went to the show.
I remember being unable to wear shoes because my feet were so hard and cracked and sore from not being allowed to wear shoes all year. I used to go to the kitchen to steal some fat to rub on the soles of my feet. At times they were so cracked that they would bleed.
The rules were very strict and if you did anything wrong you would be caned with a cane three foot long. This would start with one strike of the can and would increase to up to as many as 12 strikes of the cane.
If a person did anything wrong in the evening or maybe late at night they would not cane you until early next morning when it was really cold and the caning would hurt more. Sometimes we would get up through the night to steal the cane and cut pieces off it so it would not hurt so much.
There was another attendant who used to have a stock whip and would make us take our pants off to be whipped. By gee, that used to hurt.
I remember two boys ran away from the home. They were caught and brought back then the rest of us boys had to line up about three feet apart and these two boys were made to crawl between our legs and we all had to hit them on the backside real hard and if we didn’t hit them hard enough, then we had to go through the same punishment ourselves.
There was a fruit orchard there and fruit would fall on the ground and go rotten, but if you were caught eating the fruit, you would be punished. The punishment for this was to be made to sit in the tree all night. I remember being caught eating the fruit and having to endure this punishment.
I remember one time we were playing hockey and I was way down the other end of the field and because of the distance I never heard the whistle blow, so I was the last one to get through the turnstile. I was grabbed by an attendant who screwed my arm behind my back and ran me 20 to 30 yards in this position. This resulted in my arm becoming so swollen that they had to cut the sleeve off my pyjama shirt to take it off.
I was put in Kempsey Hospital for a few months but it got worse so they sent me to Camperdown Children’s Hospital where I stayed for 18 months. A doctor operated on my shoulder, which had gone bad. They had to put a tube in my shoulder to drain all the stuff out of it. I had to wear an aeroplane splint on it all the time I was there.
I still suffer with it, especially in the cold winter months. I believe this was due to the neglect we were made to suffer. I still have scars on my shoulder, front and back.
At meal times you were made to eat everything which was put on your plate, whether you liked it or not. I sometimes used to carry a paper bag in my pocket to put the food in that I didn’t like eating. I remember one food called English Spinach used to make me sick.
There was one time I decided to escape so I ran away but they soon caught up with me and brought me back. Next morning the attendant got me in front of all the other kids and he made me stick my head between his legs while he pulled my pants off and whacked the hell out of me. He just went on and on so I bit him on the leg. He never put my head there again.
Some of the buildings were high enough to crawl under and sit there, so I made a shanghai and I used to shoot at the attendants to hit them with the stones from my shanghai. That was one way for me to get some revenge on them for all the beatings I got from them.
They were so very cruel to us and these things have scarred my memory for life because I would never, ever forget those years.