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 Rob Williams Part Two Interviewee: Rob Williams, born 1936 Interviewer: Frank Heimans, Date of Interview: 21 May 2002 Place of Interview: Roughley House Transcription: Catherine Sapir, June, 2006 |
This room here, this little adjunct to the main bedroom, I suppose you would call it a second bedroom, apart from it’s very weird sort of shape as a window, it’s also got a very low ceiling. Wouldn’t it have been hot in summer?
I can’t remember it because we were usually down here Christmas. Sometimes when I can remember being here when it was cold, I think the house always used to be open a lot with the verandah, that door on the side and the back doors and windows were always open so I think we used to get breezes coming off the mountains. I can remember in the winter it sometimes was quite cold. You could look out here and see the snow on the hills because there were no buildings between us in the line of view to the mountains. Those houses you see there now, they weren’t there at that time, so you would look out and you would see the Blue Mountains which is of course why everyone came to live in Dural and a lot of them actually built where the view was. I used to sit here and look out this window, it was my window, and watch people coming in because they would come in from that side on the left and the dogs would all bark and down the back there were the horses so there were a lot of things going on at that time.
When Clive
had the chickens, the shed that’s over there on the left, underneath the
big fig tree he used to store a lot of the chicken feed. We used to mix
it up into a sort of a porridge. I loved the smell of it, you would walk
in there and you would have this deep rich porridge smell and he’s still
got the old lucerne cutter, that wheel thing, and as a special treat I
was allowed to turn that. You would put the lucerne into the top and it
would just chop it up into chaff.
Of course it was not paved or anything like that. A lot of the sheds were
in much better condition than they are just at the moment but I used to
find great places to go and play hide and seek and to find things to do
in there. I was never bored in this house.
So who used to actually sleep in these rooms then?
Well I think in this one, if I came here by myself, I sometimes used to sleep in this one but I think when mum and dad came down, quite often dad used to stay up north because he was working on the farm on the pineapples or the timber, mum would come down with me. Mum would sleep in this room and I would sleep in the other room next door. That’s the way I remember it.
So how many people would sleep here at the one time?
I think about 5 or 6. I don’t remember anyone else being here when we were here. When we were here we were the only ones staying here.
So there was Clive, there was you and your mum and who else.
My grandmother and sometimes dad would come down. There’d be the three of us plus the two of them, so there’d be about 5 usually.
So it was really Clive and his parents that lived here was it?
Yes. I can remember Vi, Viney. I can remember her but sadly she was only married a few months before she died but I have one memory of her. They had gone into town, she and Clive, and they came back and they bought me a pack of stamps. A country called Tanatouva which is now part of Mongolia but nobody had ever heard of this place and Clive had had a big collection of very very old stamps going right back to the time of when they were all the states, before Federation, and he gave me the stamp collection and I kept it for quite a few years and I was studying at University and I got tired of it so I gave it to my mother and she kept it for years and years and years and she built it up until there were several thousand. I think, on last count, there was something like 90,000 stamps in the collection which was huge, but when you think the base of the collection is this old states thing which must be worth quite a bit of money even though people don’t collect stamps anymore.
This kitchen. This was Clive’s kitchen and I think this is not what I remember but I think this is where a lot of people did a lot of their thing. The two rooms that I seem always to remember being in were the two back ones and this door was always open out into the yard, so we hardly every saw anyone come through the front door. All the visitors came through one or two of the back rooms. I seem to think, looking at this, I can remember my grandmother cooking in the other room so I can’t remember what this was used for but I think this was probably an eating room or where they did a lot of the housework and stuff. But two of the things I can remember are the frogs and the dogs and the koalas because these were door stops and I loved these, especially the frogs.
This is another kitchen, isn’t it. Is this the second kitchen in the house?
I can’t remember it as a kitchen in the very old days. I’m wondering what it was used for because I don’t think they would have had the two kitchens. I think they’ve kept gran’s old kitchen as it is and Clive used this so I think possibly this may have been an extra thing, it’s got a chimney, it might have been sort of a back parlour but I seem to remember we spent a lot of time in here so maybe it was things like ironing or stuff like that, but the frogs I used to take out into the garden and play races with these things I thought they were great, I loved those. So I was really quite pleased when I came in and found them still sitting here and in pretty good condition, haven’t been damaged. The koala bears I wasn’t so fond of, it must have been the colour that I liked about the frogs. So it’s another smallish room but I can’t really remember what we used this one for but I remember that that’s the way we came into this house, through this door, more than the other room, this is the one we used.
Now
tell me a little bit about the garden that you had, your grandma.
Well there wasn’t very tall things. They actually put in rocks piled up to form like a wall and then put in a built up area behind it. She used to have some very rare plants because I can remember people coming from miles away to get cuttings of some of the plants. She had put violets in every little corner that she could get them so there were always masses of violets growing around there which I thought were great.
Out the side here you used to have the well, with the alligators. Where the aviary is now there used to be another shed, I’m pretty sure, and that was sort of like a store shed which is now gone and that was full of stuff that had been discarded or stored. Somebody has dumped it at some stage. They tell me that Clive buried a lot of the stuff out beyond the sheds. There used to be a dam where he used to water the horses. My cousin Nancy tells me that about 30 – 40 years ago, Clive filled it up with old furniture and old bits and pieces and filled it in so maybe there’s a lot of excavation work to be done out there.
Around the front, it wasn’t paved, it was just like a dirt path that went down to the front gate. There wasn’t a garden so much, they used to have grass around the trees but it was a nice cool walk. I can remember even on the hottest day you could walk down through the pines. It was always pleasant. It never seemed to be hot underneath the trees.
Out the back here they used to have the sites where all the sheds are. That was always full of the chicken stuff. He had one of those carts, (?) had the two horses, I don’t know what he used the horses for, it must have been when they had the orchards still at the far side because the main thing I can remember were the chickens. I used to love being able to feed the chickens and collect the eggs. That was a special treat.
Down
by the right hand side there was a pomegranate bush and that’s the only
place I’ve ever seen pomegranates. I was talking to somebody from the
Council and he said, what is a pomegranate because it was pretty rare
in those days. I don’t know if it was the taste of the fruit, I think
it was the colour that I used to like and when you peeled the skin off
you get that rich ruby red and they always seemed to be fruiting when
we were down here.
Do you remember what sort of plants were in her garden? Were they exotics or mainly natives?
I cannot honestly remember. The violets I remember very clearly because we always associated Gran with violets but I know that she must have had very strange plants because I said I can remember women walking up the front path, knocking on the door and saying I believe you’ve got such and such and Gran would go out with a pair of scissors and do some cuttings. Mum I can remember remarking about the range of plants that she used to have, so I think she probably had a lot of English style plants but probably went in for some more exotic ones as well, but I can’t visualise exactly what they are but I can see the rockery garden but I can’t remember what plants. I suppose also at that age who’s interested in plants when you’re a small boy and you’ve got lead soldiers. To me it was a place to play with my lead soldiers and have races with the stone frogs going around the corners.
The verandah on this side, I’ve got clear memories of playing out there and of Clive and Gran and mum sitting on the verandah by this with the door open, I suppose for the breeze, just keeping an eye on me that I didn’t get too near the well. This is where we used to sit because out the back there wasn’t any shady place you could see. You would think they would have sat more out the front because that tends to be shadier but I suppose they liked the privacy of sitting around the side.
There’s a big rather nice framed photograph of James Roughley the Second over there. Was he alive in your time?
Yes, see he is one of the ancestors, 1908 and this is my grandfather above the fireplace, this is Archibald who died in 1923 so you see he died 13 years after (?). Everyone talked about him but I had no knowledge of him whatsoever, so he was sort of like a shadow, whereas Gran was always here by herself. What’s interesting is, that while I was growing up, we were always told that these Roughleys were the first settlers in the area and we had been told about cutting all the planks by pit sawing and making the wooden shingles and their own nails and stuff and I grew up thinking these people were the first settlers in the area.
Now there used to be another very old house in the area, I don’t know what’s happened to it. We were told it was the second oldest house, now it appears to be the oldest one, so I think the other house must have gone. But it was only when I was fully grown up we discovered in fact they were convicts sent out here and I think this is typical of Australia, isn’t it, that you hid the fact that you had convict ancestors until it became fashionable and now everyone is mad keen to hunt back to see if they can find a convict in their ancestry.
How did they feel about being from convict origins. Did they ever talk about it?
They never talked about it. As I said, I must have been in my 20’s, maybe even in my 30’s before I found out that these people were not free settlers, which was a bit of surprise, because that’s the way I’d always thought of it. There’s a book out about the family ("A Loftier Race: the Roughley family, Pioneers of Dural" by June and Ken Roughley), you can trace them back, mum’s in it, I’m in it then when you read it and you sort of realise what these people were sent out for, you know you’d virtually get a slap over the knuckles from some of the people these days but then you take a handkerchief and you’re on your way to Australia.
Interesting little character isn’t he – Archibald Edwin Charles Roughley?
Yes he is. He’s got an interesting face I think and the look in the eyes is really quite good.
He looks a little bit like a raconteur, don’t you think?
Yes. Mum used to speak a little of him, but never very much. He was just that person who was my grandfather who was never here. On my father’s side of the family I had both grandparents but on this side it was just my grandmother. My grandmother hated having her photograph taken and I don’t think there are many photographs taken of her in existence. There’s a couple of her in the book but to get a photograph of Gran you had to sneak up on her and she didn’t like it. But, I think back home I actually may have one or two so I’m going to actually look them out and see if we can get them across to the Pines. I understand now a lot of people call it the Roughley House which to me is a shame because this house was always The Pines and I’d like to think that in the next few decades it is still going to be the Pines rather than the Roughley House.
This may well be my last trip out here. I’ve been coming out for getting on towards 60 years and when mum and dad were alive we used to come out quite regularly and they were living in Sydney at (?) for a while and they moved up to Alstonville on the north coast. Dad passed away two years ago and mum two or three years before that so we think this might possibly be our last trip to the Pines, so it’s nice to leave with a few memories.
Yes sure. Anything else that you can remember being here?
Oh gosh.
Not really. I’m just amazed at how much all of this has changed. We used
to come down by train from the north coast which used to take all day
and all night to get here and you would arrive covered with soot and cinders
from the steam train. To hell with the glamorous steam train, believe
me it didn’t exist in those days. Then we’d get the train out to Parramatta
and the bus from Parramatta out to here and it seemed to take forever.
You know, it was a major excursion to get here so it tells you how things
have altered in Australia but this was really the back of beyond.
This
was way, way outside Sydney so that, you know, it was rather nice for
that, it was quite an adventure getting here and when we arrived we had
Gran’s house and all these things that I could find and play with. It
was nice for a boy to come down and enjoy this, so I just hope other people
are going to enjoy walking around.
Now you said there were orchards here at the back. What fruit were they growing?
Oranges mainly I seem to remember. I’m not sure. I seem to have a vague memory of remembering orchards down there and if Clive had the horses it’s quite possible he did have the orchards in my time but I can just remember the chickens all the way down there. Several cages so there must have been anything up to 2000 chickens I think at some stage but mum always talked about orchards on the property and I think all around this area you used to see orange trees and I think a lot of those have gone now, you don’t see so many but there was a lot of fruit farming going on out here.
Was it sort of a tough life for the people here?
Oh sure. I’m sure it was. It wasn’t easy to get places really, I mean you could get the buses but I think they had to work very hard. I can always remember Clive, when you’ve got chickens you’re up and you’re working, you can’t take a day off to go anywhere, they’ve got to be fed and when he had the horses they had to be looked after and I can remember Clive sort of getting up very up early in the morning to mix up the feed and quite late at night we’d be going around closing all the things, collecting the eggs etc. and of course they didn’t have all the labour-saving gadgets in the kitchen. I seem to remember out there in the laundry, mum and Gran using the old scrubbing boards, you know, washing everything by hand. The big copper and getting the sheets out with a stick and the weight of those was really very, very heavy, I can remember.
So the things people just press a switch for now all used to have to be done by hand. Things like making butter, I think possibly before my time, but I can remember my mother talking about churning the butter, churning the milk to make the butter. No I think it mustn’t have been easy. My grandfather on my dad’s side he was from Wales, a town called Usk (?) and he went up to the north coast and got a block of land and when you think there’s Ballina you go inland a bit you’ve got the real bush. You’ve got a place called Bagerville (?) and that for a boy to arrive out from a place like Wales and suddenly find yourself miles from anywhere up there and here they had to make their own house you know, built it all by hand so it couldn’t have been too easy. The early Roughleys of course making this house, you know, we were saying at one stage that being down in a pit with a cross cut saw, the character at the bottom must have had a hell of a job of it with the sawdust coming down and it couldn’t have been easy work cross cutting those big logs to make the timbers hers.
It’s very good timber actually.
Well it’s lasting very well isn’t it. I think approximately 1850 the house was built, so it’s about 150 years or more.
Have you seen Clive on your visit here?
No, Clive
died about two months ago. We had a call over in London from the solicitor
who got my number from my cousin, he rang, so Clive has just recently
passed away. I didn’t see him last time we were out because we weren’t
around here but I think the time before six years ago when we came out,
we saw him and he was still selling his honey and sitting out there and
all the dogs were racing around barking as we arrived but I think at that
stage you could still drive in because that’s the way they came in on
that laneway which goes down to the house behind.
That’s
the way everyone came in. This part over here with the visitor’s centre
I think was just chicken things, a bit of grass and a bit of garden but
nobody came in that way, there was no entrance that way.
It looks a sort of pretty garden isn’t it. It’s got some nice flowers.
Yes, well Gran was always out there, when she wasn’t in the kitchen she was always out in the garden and I think she was doing the gardening right up to the very end and when she became too ill to do it I think that took a lot out of her. I think she thought if she couldn’t have the garden maybe it was time to move on. At least that’s the way my mother always thought about it. If she couldn’t work in the kitchen and she couldn’t work out in the garden, there wasn’t much more point to it, so she said to my father when she was dying you know, I think I’m ready to go.
Did you feel very close to the family?
Oh yes, very. My grandmother on my father’s side was not the most approachable of women whereas Gran was a bubbling little thing. She was always joking. You’d start cracking jokes and she’d go along with it and she was such a lovely little thing and of course being the only grandson she spoilt me rotten. Clive, I can remember, he took me into town and we went to see Abbott and Costello a film which I thought in those days was hilarious, maybe not now but we used to have little gifts and things but I think the thing I liked here was having those little special jobs like making the chicken feed, collecting the eggs, being able to turn the lucerne cutter, walking the horses around to the watering hole, It was things like this which was one of the fun things to do when you came down here.
How do you remember Clive as a boy. Was he a normal boy. Was he a happy boy?
He was always very good to me when he was young. I think when he got older he got to be more of a reclusive sort of character and we weren’t so close in the last few years. Partly because I was overseas of course but when I was young he was always walking and talking and making time and sort of taking me with him and going around the chickens and the garden and doing odd jobs and things like that. That picture over the sideboard in the dining room with the hat, always saw Clive with the hat. Hard to imagine him without his hat, somehow, and of course he’s got his chickens with him. He was great.
Uncle Mick, he was the one we used to see. He retired to a retirement village down in Castle Hill. I always liked him. He’d been in the Airforce during the war and he was always very nice, very friendly and he is the father of Nancy and Heather, my two cousins. He married a lady from Scotland, Ayreshire and I think I must have been 9 years old before I could understand a word she said. She had this very thick Aireshire accent and I can remember saying to mum and dad, what did she say, what did she say? She was lovely and they have all passed on of course. Clive was the last one of our family.
So you feel a little sad with all these memories and these people all gone now?
Yes. As I said that probably this may well be the last time I’ll be here. I look around the house and I see it as it used to be. You know not with the restoration work and I can see the garden out there and the pine trees and the people around here – things change – but it’s nice to know people are looking after the house but I think one of the sad things about Australia is so many old properties, not necessarily as old as this one, but old properties are just pulled down and they put up a huge modern building. It seems they ought to do a little bit more about holding onto places like this.
So how do you feel about Clive giving this house to the Council and the Council looking after it?
I think it’s a great idea. I think they are to be commended for it. I have been talking to Mat McDonell (former Tourism Officer) who has been very helpful while I have been out here and I said when I get back I’m going to hunt through all the old family photographs we’ve got because I’m sure we’ve got photographs of the house and the way it used to be. And I said, we’ve got mum’s dolls that I think ought to be in the house. We’ve got it put away, it’s nice to have but what can it do except sit in a cupboard. It would be better if it was here.
Well it belongs here doesn’t it?
Absolutely. I think mum would like the idea of it being here so it will be something from her because, I hope I’ve still got it, but I can remember a photograph of my mother when she was very small, playing outside the house so if I’ve got that one, maybe that because I don’t think there’s a picture of her in the house and I’m not too sure about my grandmother, so I’m going to have a good hunt for that as well.
What is the strongest memory in your mind when you walk through here? What’s the one thing you remember more than the others?
Christmas for a start and I think the other thing, the cigarette cards on the wall because when you’re small that’s incredible. All sorts of fascinating things that were up there and it’s like when you look at a picture and you see something new and the next time you look at it was like that. You’d find a new card that you couldn’t remember having seen before. But I think Christmases. I used to look forward to Christmas down here, coming and spending it with the family with everyone together.
Well
it’s a very nice note to end on actually so thank you very much for the
interview. This is the end of the interview and the end of tape one of
the interview. Thank you.