Item 04: Memoirs of a Colonial Boy by Robert Joseph Stewart, ca. 1971 - Page 177
Primary tabs
Transcription
[Page 177]
88
Saving a part of one's earnings was considered an essential virtue in those days, so after paying my Father a pound a week for my board and lodging at home, I put most of the remainder into a savings account at the local branch of the N.S.W. State Savings Bank (since defunct). Every working day I had a five-mile ride on my horse across the town, and beyond, to the depot, so I had to be up very early to have my breakfast, catch and saddle Bruce, and be off in time to arrive at work at 9 a.m.
Over Christmas-New Year, the works closed down for ten days, and almost everyone, myself included, took the first train to Sydney. Anyone who had worked the full year was paid for the whole holiday, others were paid proportionately. About two months before Christmas, representatives of city tailoring firms came up to take orders from the navvies and measure them up for flashily cut suits of the very best cloths, to be delivered just before the shut-down. I remember returning in the train, second class, with most of the navvies, and when we reached Molong very early in the morning, two trays of steaming coffee, toast, and bacon and eggs were carried from the refreshment room into the First Class Sleeping car for two of our Irish gangers, still lying in their berths. Those were really the "good old days", when there was no involuntary unemployment, and often we were short of men, and had to apply urgently to the State Labour Exchange in Sydney to send some up to us.
Early in 1914 my appointment as a second-lieutenant in the Australian Military Forces, was notified in the Commonwealth Gazette and I was put in command of the Parkes 41st Infantry Detachment. Shortly afterwards, we attended our second eight-day camp at Liverpool, my officer's uniform having been made at Chorley's in George St just in time. It was still the old style with a "patrol" collar, the old Australian Infantry uniform, soon to be replaced by the open-neck collar-and-tie, style.
I now enjoyed the privilege of dining and wining in the Officers Mess, with all its strict formality. It was sheltered in a magnificent big double marquee made in India. I shared a tent in the Officers' Lines with an older officer, Dave Tasker,