Saturday

David and dad had need to remove a tree from our front yard last week.  As the chainsaw rang out noisily I couldn't help but think of my grandfather, his father, his great-grandfather.  From the time they arrived in Australia in the 1830's his family have lived in the same area in northern New South Wales.  They were timber cutters for generations.  This is a photograph of my grandfather when he was a teenager (on the left).  His brother is on the right, and was killed a few months after I was born when he was struck by a felled tree.

Thinking of cutting down trees in the early 19th century (even bigger than the one in the photograph) with an axe amazes me.  While listening to the noise of the chainsaw I tried to picture thick bush, and the sound of the axe hitting the trunk of the tree, ring barked and ready to fall, the crash and rustle as it hits the ground.  No doubt shouts of warning as the tree begins to fall.

In a history of the area where they lived I read the following account:

"As the autumn of 1861 merged into winter, Coorumbung became a scene of busy activity.  The first small-scale land sales had already taken place, and no time was being lost in clearing the land and erecting permanent dwellings. On each successive day the bushlands rang with the sharp resonant peal of axes, the grinding thunder of crashing trees, and the triumphant shouts of men, women and children.  In those days the atmosphere was pungent with the fresh aroma of slaughtered treetops, and saturated with the clean white smoke of burning gum leaves.  These were exhausting but exciting days for the newly arrived settlers - the Blackfords, the Malones, the Deaves and others who inadvertently were welding a scattered, half-baked community into a prosperous village.

But a price had to be paid by those pioneers, the price of a few lives lost in the early struggles with the environment.  The first recorded tragedy occurred one Tuesday late in the month of July 1861...  Suddenly the tree uttered a warning crack and commenced to fall swiftly.  Mrs Blackford called to her children to come away, but tragically her fourteen year old daughter, Mary, ran towards the creek and directly in the path of the crashing giant... Nearby settlers rushed to the spot as the alarm was spread around.  Mrs Sophia Deaves hurried down from her house, where she had been preparing the evening meal, to comfort the frightened mother, while the bewildered young axeman ran to fetch help from the menfolk.  Three men, James Armitage, John Grant and Henry Murdoch came from their huts to assist in removing the offending branch of the tree, but the girl was already dead."

Sophia Deaves was my great-great-great grandmother and James Armitage my great-great-great grandfather.  Their great grandchildren married and had a baby - my mum!  :)

It is nice to read of an account of one day in their lives and imagine what happened, how they reacted and what their surroundings were.  I think of the bark slab hut Sophia was cooking in when she heard the screams.  I imagine it like this...



Australian stories.  Tim Winton, Paul Kelly,  William McInness and Peter Garrett  are Australian artists who in my opinion have the ability to write beautifully about the everyday in Australian life.  They make me proud of Australian culture.  I have a book of short stories by Tim Winton, one which is called 'My Father's Axe'. I look forward to reading it - all brought about by the sound of a chainsaw! :)

"He could swing an axe, my father. And that axe is gone. He taught me how to split wood though I could never do it like him, those long, rhythmic semi-circular movements like a ballet dancer's warm-up." 'My Father's Axe', Scission, Tim Winton.