Australians at War Film Archive Ronald Halsall - Transcript of interview Date of interview: 22nd August 2003 http://australiansatwarfilmarchive.unsw.edu.au/archive/574 Tape 1 00:38 Ok. Tell us about your life story? Well my great grandfather came from England. He sailed from Liverpool in 1858 I think it was. He lobbed in Melbourne and settled there for a while, and then he went to Yea. Selected land at Yea. 01:00 He had been going along the Hume Highway or City Road as it was called in those days to Albury and he discovered…he noticed a very nice, little, running stream and it always seemed to have water in it, so he had an idea he’d like to shift his property or his selection. They were cutting up the stations at the time, so he put 01:30 in for the one over at Creighton Creek it was called. It ran beautiful water, about a foot deep and never ran dry. They were there for over 100 years. And it dried up twice in that time. A beautiful stream, still there today. Then he went on to Violet Town, that’s where the Land Office was situated in those days and they said, “No you’ve already had a selection you can’t go again.” But he said, “I’m going to put this in my young 02:00 son’s name,” who was about ten or twelve. So they did and he put it in his son’s name and it’s still in the Halsall name now. It’s out at Creighton which is half way between Longwood and Avenel on the Hume Highway. Ned Kelly used to come through there when he was shifting from, going through to his property when he shifted up to…when did he go? 02:30 Glenrowan. I can’t think of the name. Shall I still keep going? Can you stop and start easy? Just keep going. You’ll cut it out. Why can’t I think of the name…Gosford. Not Gosford. Greta. That’s where he lived for years and then he became a wanderer. 03:00 He had a few horses. There were a lot of Irish policemen in those days, probably related to you. They heard about this chap who they reckoned was stealing horses. And they hounded old Ned. His mother, they locked her up when she had a babe in arms. So the police…the big flat foots from Ireland didn’t get a very good name up there. 03:30 Of course, Ned shot about three or four of them out at that shootout, out at Mansfield on the creek, out there. That was the first chap he ever shot, I think. And they hounded him after that of course. Four years he was free for, to go up into New South Wales and rob the bank in 1888, I 04:00 think. And old Ned was well liked around there. A lot of people would help him. He’d say, “Where’s the police?” And they’d tell him. Kate Kelly too, that was Ned’s sister, she was a very popular girl around the place. They all seemed to want to help the Kellys. But anyhow he came to grief at 04:30 Glenrowan at that shootout at the hotel. Glenrowan was when he had the armour on. It’s been in the news lately. They’ve been testing it at the Lucas Heights electronic place. Did your grandfather know Ned Kelly? Yes he knew him. They always had beautiful horses, the Kelly gang. There were about three or four of them going through. Dan…Ned was the leader, and Dan was his 05:00 two in charge, and they used to ride…see when they landed in Victoria they came up to an old house and I think it might be still there, and then they went from there up to Avenel which is 22 mile, and then from there he used to ride up to Greta where he finally settled. 05:30 But they lived a few years at Avenel. As a matter of fact I think Ned’s son…no Ned wasn’t married, Ned’s grandfather saved a chap from drowning in Hugh’s Creek at Avenel. He was a popular boy down there then too. They used to ride through my grandfather’s and great grandfather’s selection. The boys…there was going to be a country dance on that night and they were calling out, 06:00 there were no phones or anything in those days. They used to have to call out to the bush. So they were hollering out to their girlfriends who lived miles away really. Three or four miles. They were hollering out. And he got very frightened one day, he said, “What’s going on?” He thought they were letting the police know they were riding through. They weren’t doing that at all. What’s the matter? 06:30 So old Ned baled them up see. Grandfather Sam Halsall and his brothers Mark and they explained to him what they were doing. And Ned said, “That’s alright boys, have a good night,” and rode on. And they used to see him on other times but he never stopped. 07:00 That was at Creighton about five miles south of... And your grandfather would tell you these stories? Yes. Grandfather would say… What would he say about them personally? Well he said, like a lot of people at the time, the police hounded them and they didn’t give them a chance. A bit like the present politicians, I think. 07:30 They thought the Kelly’s were a good mob. Just like themselves. Just trying to earn a living. They might have knocked off a cow or two, they’re still doing that. Where they mark them in the Northern Territory, who’s cows are whose. By helicopter now it would be harder. Where do we go from here? 08:00 Tell us about your father’s service in World War I? Oh yes. My Uncle George who was the second eldest of his family, he joined the Light Horse and I think he went over to Egypt and then to France. He never got to Gallipoli I don’t think. I don’t think he did any brave deeds. 08:30 One of our cousins did get a MM [Military Medal], Lesley Halsall. That would be my Dad’s cousin. He got an MM in France. Maygar who Dad trained with in the Light Horse around Seymour and that, they used have to camps. And Maygar, Lieutenant Maygar, and Major Freddie Tubb, later Major, he won his VC [Victoria Cross] at Lone Pine 09:00 with Corporal Burton. Burton and who else, there was three of them. But two of them came from Euroa. God, there we go, a black out. Doesn’t matter. Maygar got his VC in the Boer War in South Africa in about 1900 and he 09:30 got it for rescuing a chap under fire [Lieutenant Leslie Maygar, VC, Natal, 1901]. This chap had had his horse shot from under him. He was wounded and Major Freddie Tubb jumped on his horse and Maygar went out and brought the wounded fella in. It wasn’t Tubb. Tubb was at Lone Pine. Maygar, after the Boer War, he joined the Great War [First World War]. He was killed at the Charge 10:00 of the Light Brigade [Light Horse charge on Beersheba, Palestine] there. It was an aerial bomb. In the days when they used to grab the bomb and put it over the side of the cockpit and aim it. It was very unlucky to get hit by one of them. That’s where he met his Waterloo. And Burton was the brother of the chap who had the store, and I never knew him. And Tubb, he got his at Lone Pine [Lieutenant Frederick Tubb, VC, Lone Pine, 1915] which is a little spot 10:30 on the Gallipoli Peninsula. You’ve heard of Lone Pine probably. They kept building the barricades. They were getting knocked down by Turkish artillery and they’d build it up again. They were both killed…no, Burton was killed there, Tubby was killed later on fighting in France somewhere, I think. His parents came to Longwood in about 1890, 11:00 and his father was a school teacher and he taught my mother. At the old Longwood…see Longwood’s been shifted. The railway was put through in 1870. They shifted it away from the hills. Steam trains in those days couldn’t get up hills, so they took it down into the flat country, three mile west of where it was going through (UNCLEAR) 11:30 Hill and so forth. What about your father in World War I? My father didn’t do much I don’t think. He was trained up to go over there but he must have been pulled out. I don’t know what happened, I never asked Dad that. I presume because there was no other man on the farm, he had a quite a few acres by then, and I guess Dad was called out to work on the land. He grew sheep and that for the 12:00 bully beef and biscuits. But he was in the…in the last war he was in the Home Defence. And as you know they did start up and a lot of the old chaps formed up into battalions and did stunts and that in our defence.