Newsletter V1994 April 1994

Newsletter V1994 April 1994 Not a Poor Sort of Memory [Of the 27 Newsletters issued since 1980, four have long before moving to another in what was called 'Tent included observations of life at Duntroon as seen City', near where General Bridges' Grave was to be. through very young eyes. They covered periods ranging About a year later, we were back where we started but from 1914 to 1960. In this issue are recorded this time it was a weatherboard cottage, one of several reminiscences of an earlier time. that had been put up where the tents had been. You Marie Grace Archer (now Mrs Stoyles) was born at came into the house through a big open living area. On Tufnell Park in London on 7 December 1907 and the right were two bedrooms. Behind the living room arrived at Duntroon with her parents just before the first were the kitchen and bathroom. The lavatory and the intake of staff cadets. About 1923, her family moved to laundry were in the back yard. There were verandahs Goulburn where, in 1923 with the aid of a scholarship, back and front. Because the slope was steep there were she learnt to fly. During the War of 1939-45 she enlisted eight steps to the back garden, where vegetables were in the Womens Royal Australian Air Force. Mrs Stoyles grown. Inside the house, wood was needed for the stove now lives in the Goodwin Retirement Village in Farrer, and fireplace. You just helped yourself from the pile the A.C.T. where, in conversation with Brigadier G.D. College provided. A 'Coolgardie Safe' and a pipe on Solomon (1938), she recalled some of her memories of the southern side of the house for the butter helped keep that time. This is how she told it. Ed.] the food in reasonable condition. It must have been during 1912 that six public I was three and a half when I arrived at Duntroon in servants came to work in the Territory and to live at June 191 1. A year or so before, I had been very ill with Duntroon. They shared a building which had a passage pneumonia and the doctor in London, where we had down the centre. On each side were three rooms used as been living, told my parents that my lungs were in such bedrooms or offices. There was the usual brown lino, a state that they should take me to a dry climate. He iron bedsteads and oak furniture. Mr Muir is the only suggested the south of France, India or Australia. It name I recall. Mum became their housekeeper until seems that my mother said she didn't fancy 'those they moved to Acton, near the racecourse. They were froggies' or 'living among the natives' but Australia not at Duntroon for long but when King O'Malley, the would be all right. My father's brother had emigrated Minister for Home Affairs, came to see how they were there in 1899. He liked the place and was still in getting on, he said they were being well looked after. Melbourne. So off we went. We reached there around Christmas 19 10. I had my third birthday at sea. By early 1914 my mother had become very homesick Financially we were not well off. My father, Frank for London. When she left in the autumn, she expected Archer, who was nearly forty at the time, had been a tea to be away for no more than four months but following taster and then a steward on the P & 0 Line. He became the outbreak of war, ocean liners were requisitioned and a Purser. Between trips he went on walking trips around we did not get back to Australia for nearly a year. In England. He always was a keen traveller but had no 1910 we had travelled by way of the Cape but this time thought of coming to Duntroon until he saw a we came through Suez where we could hear the sound Melbourne newspaper advertisement for the position of of guns and see the night sky lit up. For a small girl it Steward in the Cadets' Mess at the Royal Military was all very exciting. Back at Duntroon, Dad was now College. His application was accepted and, with my living in another cottage of the same type, but further mother and me, he arrived there a few days before the along the row. first cadets entered the College. Later, as the number of By now I was seven and a half and had not yet been Cadets grew, he became Leading Steward and then to school, which was on the border of what is now the Chief Steward before he resigned in 1923. Australian Defence Force Academy territory. The What is my first memory? That is easy. Beside the headmaster was Mr Jones and Miss Casey the infants' road on the slope of Mt Pleasant, behind and to the left teacher. He had to teach three classes and was a very of the present Military Instruction Block, there were good and patient man. I had a lot of catching up to do some tents. One of them was our first home. On a night but by spending only six months in each of the first four when there was a full moon I heard my mother say in classes I managed to do so by the time I finished 5th panic, Wake up, Frank, wake up! Silhouetted on the tent class. Pupils came from beyond Duntroon and four or wall was a strange shape, and outside a munching sort five sulkies were often drawn up outside the school. I of noise. It was only a stray cow but Mum was a remember the Hosking and the Gilchrist boys from the Londoner and unprepared to meet a cow under these College. Tom Gilchrist and I were in the same class and circumstances. It is not much of a memory, I suppose, I met him again when my son, Brian, and I were at the but I have never forgotten it. We were not in that tent 75th Anniversary Parade in 1986. Marie with her parents Frank & Hannah Archer My best friends were Jean Grant, who lived at flowers as well and when the daffodils were in bloom I Duntroon, and Annie Dunn whose father was in charge was allowed to take some home. of the old Power House at Kingston, from where she Then there were the concerts given by the cadets two used to walk to school. It must have been quite a walk or three times a year and on other occasions by but no one was concerned about it in those days. There members of the staff. When women's dresses were was not much to do after school but, two or three times needed by the cadets they were often sent by mothers a week, children were welcome to go to the and sisters and adjusted by my mother. The items gymnasium, where an instructor helped them cope with seemed very good and I have never forgotten the cadet the wall bars and the ropes and to do simple exercises. who sang a ballad which began, I shot an arrow into the air. He had a beautiful voice. At the end of the year a As an only child I was an avid reader and was staff dance was held in the Cadets' Mess and I recall encouraged by my parents, who were fond of books having gone there with my parents. Usually once a themselves. A favourite of mine was Black Beauty. month there were films in the lecture theatre, 'Charlie Perhaps that story led to Dad's arranging that I should Chaplins' and the like. They were something to look learn to ride a horse. The Riding Master himself taught forward to but perhaps the most spectacular display was me. Before long I was able to ride around Duntroon on to be seen during the summer from our front verandah. a pony. That reminds me of Mr Sheehan, the Cashier, Usually it came after a very hot day. We could see the who chose to have dinner at our place each day. I think line of the Tinderrys, away towards Michelago. Soon he was a member of the Sergeants' Mess but he also they and the hills nearer Queanbeyan would become visited the Officers' Mess from time to time. He had obscured by rain but not before the violent flashes of made friends with people outside Duntroon and lightning, accompanied by great claps of thunder, lit up suggested to my parents that I should ride with him to the sky. some of those who lived nearby. Nothing came of that My father was a remarkable man and around the but sometimes during school holidays he would take College had a most unusual nickname, 'Old me in a car when he went to pay public servants in Plantagenet'. I don't know why. He was a splendid Acton and Yarralumla, where the shrubbery for the organiser. I never heard him swear, raise his voice or Territory was being developed. Of course there were lose his temper. I gave him a good chance to do so one When about eight years old, Marie posed in front of what is, most likely, part of the OfJicer Training School which was then sited at Duntroon. night when I was sitting on his knee. He fell asleep and I went home on holidays. The convent was run tightly.

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