Botany Boys

By Dell Brand

A group of mates from the Sydney suburb of Botany answer the call from king and country and go away to fight in the first world war. Far from the adventure they imagined, the five years of the conflict bring challenge, fear and loss but also lighter moments and some unexpected romance.
The boys shoulder distinctive responsibilities in Gallipoli and France. Boney creeps out under the cover of darkness to rescue helpless souls as an ambulance driver, Ced uses his engineering skills to design tunnels and lay explosives until he is captured and experiences the perils of being a prisoner-of-war behind the front line, Frank leads a team operating a howitzer, Harry becomes a spy-catcher in England and Simmo takes to the skies as a daring fighter pilot. Clara and Maggie, Australian nurses, work in Cairo and on Lemnos before joining a hospital ship bound for England. Jeanne, a French pastrycook, volunteers as a V.A.D. in Rouen.
Based on true accounts of the war, these Botany boys experience the daily horrors of those years and, in the process, learn the value of mateship and the cost involved in striving to preserve a way of life they believe cannot be compromised.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dell Brand
• Release date: Jun 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463437841

Dell Brand

Dell Brand grew up in Sydney, attending North Sydney Girls High School, Sydney University (BEd & MA) and Wollongong University (PhD). She taught in state high schools during her working life, teaching Physical and Health Education. She was recognised with the Minister’s Award for Excellence in Teaching and the Outstanding Achievement in Education Award from the Australian College of Education.She has always had a keen interest in children with challenging behaviours, and worked for a number of years with a wilderness-enhanced program aimed at turning around young people’s lives. This formed the basis of her thesis. As a teacher in this program, she involved herself in many of her recreational passions including abseiling, rock-climbing, wilderness trekking, canyoning and canoeing. In recent years, she has developed a particular interest in family history and history in general.Dell is also a part-time journalist and has been published by a number of editors in Australia and abroad. She wrote her first children’s book, History’s a Mystery, in 2010. Due to its success, three more followed. She uses her own travel experiences to write first-hand about places she has seen and people she has met. Some of these places find their way into her books.Now she is writing adult novels and her first two, ‘A Voice to be Heard’ and ‘Cry to the Wind’ are set in early Melbourne.Dell loves the outdoors, especially the wilderness. In her younger years she was a keen swimmer and an A grade squash player. She now enjoys all outdoor pursuits and tries to play golf regularly. She has a wonderful family, with two grown-up children and five funtastic grandchildren. She lives on the south coast of New South Wales.

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Chapter 1

Botany, New South Wales

August, 1902

Boney took off towards his bedroom, the dread of what was to come forcing him to run. He knew what he had to do for he’d done it countless times before. He always hated it. But he had to make the terrible sounds go away. He slammed the door.

Breathing heavily, he pulled open his wardrobe, a heavy mahogany monstrosity inherited from his long-dead grandparents and, hastily shoving aside his odd assortment of past and present treasures, climbed inside. He drew the door closed again and sat, gulping great gollops of musty air, his eyes screwed shut and his hands clamped down firmly over his ears.

Downstairs his parents’ argument would be escalating exactly as it always did. There would be shouting and words screamed that he was forbidden to use and soon it would become worse. Cups would be smashed, plates of food upended and chairs thrown. Boney waited for the crashes to come, noises that couldn’t be drowned by his hands and the thick mahogany door.

He resigned himself to spending the night in his wardrobe. It would take a while for the fight to work through to its conclusion and for his father to stumble away and collapse onto his bed, ready to sleep off the whisky and the beer. His mum would most likely stay in the sitting room, doing little to clean up the mess and managing a little sleep on the couch. She would be tired, having been up before five and at work all day, on her feet, endlessly sweeping the floor of cardboard scraps in a box-making factory in Redfern.

How Boney hated his father. One of these days he’d stand up to him, stop him from hitting his mother, maybe even kill him. But not yet. He couldn’t do it yet. He was still too small, too puny.

Hours later Boney awoke, roused by the faint sounds of a cock heralding the new day. His body was cramped from the night in the wardrobe and he desperately needed the toilet. Cautiously he pushed the door ajar, listening for any sounds in the house. All was quiet, deathly quiet. He uncurled a little in his hidey-hole, stretching his arms and legs as best he could then shaking them before easing himself out of the cupboard and onto his feet.

He tiptoed past the door of his parents’ bedroom, seeing the dishevelled sheets of a rough night and his father’s clothes strewn on the floor. Relieved that the room was empty, he continued on past the sitting room. This too was empty but he wasn’t concerned as his mum had usually gone to work by the time he awoke. His bladder reminded him of his mission and he headed out the back door, carelessly letting it slam behind him. Streaks of early morning light shafted through the small stand of gum trees behind the house. Dew sparkled on the leaves and a kookaburra stared down at him and began to laugh. Boney didn’t feel like laughing. The grass was cold and wet between his toes and the morning felt blue. He made a beeline for the dunny further up the backyard.

It was only after he was done with the thunderbox that he remembered it was Saturday and wondered for the first time where his mum was. It was odd that she was not home. His father would have set an alarm and gone off to Randwick on the early tram to earn some extra money. On race days he was a bookie’s off-sider, earning what he called his drinking money. Boney and his mum never saw much of his father’s wages and none of the extra: if they didn’t go on the horses or the dogs then they went on booze.

It was his mum’s job that mostly paid the rent and kept them in food and there was never any spare. Boney found that hard sometimes, needing to invent excuses to his mates. He never bought lollies or accepted invitations to the pictures when his friends’ parents asked. Yet he knew he was not that much worse off than everybody else, only a little. Nearly everyone in Botany was poor. Not wearing shoes to school and wearing the same shorts and shirt every day didn’t matter. Lots of kids did that.

Boney was lonely much of the time. He loved his mum but longed to have normal parents, ones who didn’t fight, and maybe a brother or sister. Ced, his best mate, had a brother and heaps of sisters. Sometimes Boney wanted to tell him about what happened at home but he never did because Ced had his own problems. His mum had died when he was six and now his dad was ill. The thought of losing his mum scared Boney. He knew he’d be better off without his father but he couldn’t imagine life without his mum. She was his rock, his anchor. It was she who had taught him to hide in the cupboard. She had made him promise to always go there when his father came home drunk.

Thinking of his mum made him wonder again where she was. He walked back to the house and went into the kitchen. It was a shambles. Chairs were upturned, the tablecloth had been wrenched from the table and was lying on the floor, scrunched up with smashed plates, food and cutlery in a congealed mess. Flies lifted and buzzed as Boney entered and he brushed them away as they tried to land on his face in greeting.

He couldn’t work out where she could be. He tried to remember if she’d told him anything but could not come up with an answer. Absent-mindedly, he began cleaning up the mess; something he’d helped do many times before.

He continued working, knowing it would be a nice surprise when she returned to have the kitchen shipshape again. It was almost back to normal when there was a knock on the back door.

‘Douggie, are you there?’

He looked up to see the concerned face of their neighbour, Mrs. Blackmore. ‘Yes, Mrs. Blackmore, I’m here.’

She always called him by his real name, never his nickname of Boney.

‘Do you know where my mum is?’

‘Yes, Douggie. She’s in the hospital. Mr. Blackmore took her in by tram this morning. We think her arm’s broke. If you like, you can come in to me for some breakfast.’

‘Will she be all right?’

‘Yes, I believe so. They’ll probably put her arm in plaster and send her home. Do you know what happened? I heard lots of yelling last night.’

‘I’m not sure.’ Boney didn’t want to be disloyal. His mum had always told him that what goes on in the family stays in the family.

‘Well, you come in when you’re ready. My chooks have been laying real good this week so I can rustle you up some scrambled eggs on toast.’

‘Thank you, Mrs. Blackmore. I’ll come in as soon as I’ve finished here.’

After he’d eaten and avoided answering more questions by the curious Mrs. Blackmore, Boney returned home and resigned himself to waiting for his mum to come back. Ced called around, asking if he wanted to go to the park and kick a ball, but Boney told him no.

It was mid-afternoon when he heard the front door open and close. His mum came into the sitting room. Her head was bandaged and her left arm was in a sling. She smiled when she saw him.

‘Hello, darling. I hope you weren’t too worried about me.’

‘Mrs. Blackmore told me where you’d gone. Are you all right, Mum?’

‘Yes, darling, I’m fine. A little the worse for wear but nothing a few weeks won’t fix.’

‘Dad did this, didn’t he?’

‘Your father wasn’t himself last night.’

‘Mum, it’s not right. He shouldn’t hit you.’

‘I know.’

‘Why don’t you leave him?’

‘Oh, Douggie!’ She sighed, sat down and shook her head. ‘And go where? No, darling, I can’t leave him. He’s not always like this. Times have been especially hard lately.’

‘And what about now? You won’t be able to work with your arm in a sling.’

‘We’ll just have to tighten our belts for a few weeks.’

‘Maybe I can get a job with Mr. Simpson until you’re better. There must be jobs I can do at the tannery after school.’

She smiled down at her young son as she shook her head. ‘You have such a good heart, Douggie, but I’m afraid you’re only eight and far too young to get a job.’

Chapter 2

Botany, New South Wales

January, 1904

‘Cedric, come here so I can talk to you.’

The boy moved forward, holding himself steady as unshed tears brimmed. He daren’t blink or all would be lost.

His father’s hand moved deliberately across the bedsheet, seeking the hand of his younger son. ‘Ced, you know how much I love you, don’t you?’

The boy nodded, his face instantly losing the battle and tears coursing down his cheeks.

‘It’s all right to cry. I know you’ll be sad when I’m gone. It’s only natural that you’ll miss me and cry for me. That’s all right. But I want you to remember that I’m not afraid of dying. I know where I’m going and I know your mother is waiting there for me. God has a place ready for me.’

The boy nodded again, too afraid to speak.

‘And God will look after you too, son. Always remember that. He loves you and He will never leave you. You and Harry will keep living with the girls, the same as you are now. Your sisters will care for you both until you’re old enough to step out on your own. I know I don’t have to tell you to be a good boy; you’re that already. But take heed of them and do what they tell you. Don’t cause them any extra grief.’

He risked a response. ‘Yes, Papa.’

Eliza came up to the bed and slid her arms gently around her younger brother’s shoulders, seeking to ease the tension with the everyday. ‘You know we’ll take good care of them, Papa. Harry’s going to start working soon and Ced’s doing well in school and has lovely friends. They’ll be fine. We’ll get them to their cricket games and, when the football season starts, we’ll make sure they rejoin their teams.’

‘I want to start playing rugby union, Papa.’

His father patted his hand. ‘And you’ll be first-rate at it, son.’ He turned to his daughter. ‘I know the boys are in good hands, Eliza. I’m so grateful you and the other girls are here to care for them. They’re still just lads. Never for one moment did I think I wouldn’t be around to see them grow up.’

‘No one can help getting sick, Papa.’

-oOo-

Mark Miller passed away in the Coast Hospital later that month. Though he had been in ill-health for some time, his suffering ended only five months after the diagnosis of malignant liver cancer. He was forty-eight, leaving a life well-lived but too short by far.

His six children and their neighbours and friends filled and spilled out of St Matthew’s Anglican Church on Botany Road as they gathered for the funeral service. Later they would follow the Reverend Dempster to Botany Cemetery. After singing the opening hymn ‘Amazing Grace’, they sat and listened to the minister telling them what they already knew:

‘Today we are burying a father and a friend. We all knew Mark and know he was a hard-working man and a real good mate. He was loving husband to his darling Catherine and an excellent father to his six kids. He was a quality carpenter and a first-rate athlete until illness took him down. He deserved his reputation as one of Botany’s finest runners and many of us have watched him win foot races at Sir Joseph Banks or at Rosebery.’

Boney sat squashed between his father and mother in one of the pews at the back of the church. Another mate, Simmo, was close by with his parents. Boney could hear the women around him muffling sobs and he watched surreptitiously as they dabbed at their faces with handkerchiefs. The men were stony-faced but here and there he could see the glint of a tear. Ced’s dad had been a good man. Boney knew his best mate would be hurting bad and he wished he was up the front sitting beside him. Although he wouldn’t have the right words, at least he could let Ced know he was there for him. Life was so unfair. Why couldn’t it have been his father who had died?

He thought more about Ced. He was an orphan now, along with Harry and their four older sisters. Once upon a time they’d been a family but that had been before TB had taken their mum and now their dad was gone. Boney knew Ced’s parents had come out from England. He couldn’t remember Ced’s mum at all but his dad had always spoken with a funny accent. Ced had loved his dad. Boney had often been envious of that even though he had never said a word.

He listened in to the minister again.

‘The Millers came out to Australia in search of a better life and found it here in Botany. Mike got plenty of work and they settled into Banksia Street. They were just the same as plenty of other families here – hard-working and tough, making enough to scrape by on, their small weatherboard cottage no different to all the others in the street, their home overflowing with love and the busyness of life.’

Boney thought about that. Eight people living in a house no bigger than his. It must have been crowded, Ced’s dad and mum in one room, the four girls sharing the other and Harry and Ced out the back sleeping on a covered-in verandah. Families around here were mostly large like the Millers. Boney was lucky to have a bedroom all to himself.

The minister continued: ‘Mark’s four girls sitting here are all a credit to him. It was only last year I married Kate and wasn’t Mark proud of his girl that day!’ He winked at the man sitting beside Kate in the front row. ‘You’re a lucky man, Phillip Kent!’ Then, looking at each of the girls in turn, he continued, ‘Kate and Julia, Louisa and Eliza, I know you’ll continue to look out for your brothers, these two young rascals here.’ His gaze shifted to the boys. ‘Harry and Ced, your father loved you dearly and I know you’ll do your best to honour his memory.’

The Reverend stopped speaking, called for the next hymn and sat down. As the congregation dutifully began singing, he considered these six kids now left without parents. The boys were the greatest worry and he knew Harry was the more difficult one. The family fondly called him their ‘little black sheep’, for he was always getting into scrapes and fights. School was a struggle for him, probably more from disinterest than inability, and the friends he chose were always the wrong ones. The rector had made an occasional house call to try and sort him out and he knew the local constable had done the same.

It was funny how two boys could be so different. Cedric was just the opposite, never causing the least concern. Ced was a sensitive and bright boy, well-liked by his mates and teachers. His grades from the Botany school were always above average and his friends were all from hard-working local families. He’d spotted some of these friends here today, sitting in the back rows – Douggie Rathbone and Tommy Simpson, better known as Boney and Simmo, along with others.

The rector knew them all. Boney’s dad was a fisherman and didn’t come to church much but the other families all came regularly. Simmo’s father owned a tannery in partnership with Mr. Etherden who had recently been elected mayor. Then there was Jim Dearnley, called Shortie because of his long legs, who helped out in his father’s grocery store after school and Teddy Fortesque, who’s dad was a builder.

The Miller kids would be all right. The older girls would care for the boys and the neighbours would chip in. Botany was a close-knit community and there’d always be someone to look out for them, himself included. The rector loved his parish. Certainly there were a few problems, like the Rathbones, but what neighbourhood didn’t have these?

He stood up as the hymn finished and continued to lead the service.

-oOo-

Ced and his mates lived within shouting distance of each other and the local school and had known each other all their lives, playing sport together and doing all the usual things boys did – fishing, swimming, exploring and inventing imaginary and slightly dangerous games.

Ced sometimes felt like an outsider with his mates though he was fairly sure they never noticed. He felt it even more after his dad died. In the weeks following the funeral, when they were uncommonly polite and quiet around him, all he wanted was for things to go back to normal. This was especially the case with Boney.

He knew Boney had a hard time at home though for different reasons. Ced never mentioned it, sensing his friend wanted to pretend everything was all right. But a few weeks after the funeral, Ced found Boney sitting alone in the playground after school, chucking stones at the wall of the shelter shed. ‘You all right, Bones?’

Boney glanced up and Ced could see he’d been crying. He sat down beside him, scouted around for some suitable rocks and picked up a couple, saying nothing more as he lobbed them at the shed.

Boney sniffed.

‘Is it your dad again?’

‘Yeah.’

‘What’s he done this time?’

‘The same. I want to kill him.’

‘Is your mum all right?’

‘Yeah, I guess.’

‘You want to talk about it?’

‘Nuh.’ He threw an extra big rock at the shed, then stood. ‘I’d better be getting home. See how Mum is.’

‘What about your dad?’

‘He’s gone out fishing. Won’t be back for a few days.’

‘All right. See you, Bones. Take care.’

‘Yeah, see you. Thanks, Ced.’

Chapter 3

Botany, New South Wales

August, 1905

Eliza Miller walked to the school with Harry. Dust blended with the fetid air blanketing the suburb, aromas gifted from the numerous tanneries, boiling down works, wool scourers and fellmongeries. Botany had more than its share of stink but no one complained as the industries provided much-needed jobs. The smell was always worse in the still air of early morning but Eliza barely noticed, her mind on the coming interview.

She sat beside Harry outside the headmaster’s office waiting for their appointment. She was quiet, knowing what was to come and that it would probably make little difference. She’d been up to the school numerous times before. Her young brother was a square peg in a round hole. He didn’t fit in well with school and its rules and she couldn’t wait until he turned fourteen in December and would be officially allowed to leave. Perhaps when he began working, life would be better for him and for them all.

Harry was subdued, slouched in his chair, his scuffed left boot idly kicking at the leg of the table in front. He knew this interview would follow the same path as all the others. Mr. Jameson would tell his sister how disruptive he’d been and they would search in vain for a plan to bring him back into line.

The cane didn’t work. Harry always took it like a man, never flinching and never shedding a tear even though his fingers stung like hell. He knew he’d done wrong and deserved the punishment, but it never stopped him from larking around the next time. Time out in the playground didn’t work either for it was the place Harry preferred to be.

They would again consider suspending him from school for a few days. This was another of Harry’s preferred punishments for it was time away from school and its problems. However Eliza always made sure he didn’t leave the house on those days and the time did drag. How he wished he was older and could leave school.

The interview would conclude with his sister in tears and Harry promising to be good, to try again to refrain from acting the goat in class or doing anything else to disrupt. He wasn’t that concerned. It was only another four months until he could leave anyway. A quick calculation in his head told him that there were probably sixteen more canings to come, if he maintained his average of once a week.

He stopped thinking about school and let his mind wander back to last Saturday when he’d gone with some of his mates to Booralee Park. Six of them had spent the morning down by the creek, cutting and honing long, thin sticks into home-made spears. When satisfied, each had tied a knot in the end of a three-foot length of thin rope and looped the knotted end to the back of a spear. Harry had watched an aboriginal man at La Perouse throw a spear this way using what he called a woomera. The boys practised holding the taut rope two feet along the spear and hurling it. It worked a treat, exactly like the throwing sick Harry had seen at La Perouse.

Laying the spears aside, the boys had climbed a fence into a warehouse and taken six large cardboard boxes, carting them back to the park and setting them up as opposing forts. Retrieving their spears and with three on each side, they began staging a battle, hurling the spears at each other and hurling them back. The sticks hit with enough force to pierce the cardboard and go right through but no one had been hurt and it was enormous fun.

But then the afternoon had soured. Four older boys arrived and started making fun of their game.

‘Give us a turn!’ they’d demanded.

Harry and his mates always tried to steer clear of these boys because they were trouble. But on this occasion the younger boys had no choice but to give up their weapons and stand back. The older ones had grabbed them, loading and firing them into the middle of the empty park.

‘Go and get them,’ the leader ordered Harry and his mates. ‘This is fun.’

The younger boys did as they were asked. On the third time around, the older boys threw all but one of the spears. When the younger boys ran out to retrieve them again, an older boy fired off the last spear. It struck one of Harry’s friends in the calf and he fell, crying out in pain. The older boys instantly took off, leaving Harry and the others standing there.

Harry was the first to respond. ‘We need help. Pete, stay here with Billy. I’ll go.’

Harry ran to the nearest house. The woman inside immediately used her phone to call the local doctor and he promised to come as quickly as he could. She knew her party line would do the rest – not much remained a secret in Botany. Others listening in to her phone call would make sure the local constable got wind of what had happened and he would chase up those boys.

The afternoon continued to worsen for Harry. By the time he’d arrived home, Eliza had heard all about it.

The door to the principal’s office opened and Harry’s mind came back to the present.

Mr. Jameson stood there. ‘Come in, Miss Miller, and Harry.’

They entered and took the two seats in front of the desk while Mr. Jameson followed behind and sat down facing them.

He eyed Harry. ‘Ah, Harry! What are we going to do with you, lad?’ He closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose, jiggling his glasses up and down.

Harry suppressed a giggle.

Mr. Jameson’s eyes snapped open. ‘It’s not funny, my boy. Your teacher, Mr. Clarke, is at his wit’s end. Somehow we have to improve things until the end of the year.’

‘Is there any way he can leave earlier, sir?’ Eliza asked.

Mr. Jameson shook his head and sat thinking.

Harry stared down at his hands in his lap and wished the interview was over.

Finally, the headmaster spoke. ‘Harry, I have a deal to put to you. Are you listening?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘What if I was to arrange with a local business for you to start work with them next week?’

Harry looked up, his eyes showing interest at what his headmaster had suggested.

‘I don’t mean full-time work,’ he hastily added. ‘But what if I could arrange for you to work from one o’clock every afternoon? You could leave school at lunchtime.’ He could see Harry was attentive so he pressed on. ‘But your part of the deal would be to behave yourself in class every morning. No more acting the goat, no more practical jokes, no more showing off. You would simply sit there and not say boo every morning. What do you think of that idea?’

‘I think I would like that, sir.’

‘And what do you make of it, Miss Miller?’

‘I’d say that it’s worth a try, sir.’

‘Good. Then we’ll give it a try. Today’s Wednesday. I want you to keep Harry home for the next two days. That will give me time to find him a job. And, if my plan comes to fruition, we’ll start our new deal on Monday. How does that sound, Harry? Do you think you’ll be able to keep your end of the bargain?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And do you have any preference for the type of work you’d like to do?’

Harry shook his head.

‘I heard MacNamee’s tannery is looking for a boy, sir,’ offered Eliza. ‘Harry was hoping they’d take him on in December.’

‘Well, I’ll start there. Thank you, Miss Miller. Let’s hope this new deal will have the outcome we desire.’ He stood to indicate the meeting was over. ‘Thanks for coming in. And I’ll see you, young Harry, on Monday morning with your new face on, ready to slot back into Mr. Clarke’s room.’

‘Yes, sir, thank you, sir.’

Harry began work at MacNamee’s the following Monday and it did bring a change in his behaviour. He liked the job, being around older men and doing hard, physical work, liked it enough to want to keep it, liked it enough to behave himself in class every morning for the next four months.

-oOo-

It was a few minutes after twelve when Harry arrived for his first day at the tannery. The other employees were on their lunch break, squatting in the shade of an old peppercorn tree and enjoying a fag beside a cartload of steaming carcasses just arrived from the abattoir and waiting to be unloaded. Clouds of blowflies feasted on them.

Harry was soon put to work helping to move these hides into the waiting brine baths, learning that the job had to be done quickly in order to minimize damaging bacteria. It was heavy, bloody, smelly work. Each hide weighed between forty and eighty pounds depending on the size of the animal. They arrived at the tannery still with flesh and fat attached, the actual amount dependent on the skill of the butcher. The older men shouldered the heavier hides, directing Harry to the yearlings. It was a distance of only thirty yards from the cart to the vats but, by the end of the cartload, to Harry each trip felt more like a hundred.

While the men sat down for a short but well-earned break, Mr. MacNamee started up the machinery that gently agitated the contents of the vats to ensure all parts of every hide received its salt. His tannery was working at full capacity, the same as every other tannery in Botany. Each received at least one cartload of hides every day. The army had an insatiable appetite for leather and these hides would leave here ready to be turned into saddles, bridles, belts, ammunition cases, shoes and the hundreds of other items all deemed important to the war effort.

After the brief smoko, the men began on yesterday’s batch of hides which had been soaking in brine for twenty-four hours. As each was hauled from the vat, Harry was directed to hose it down, rinsing off the salt before it was carried and dumped into one of a new set of vats, these filled with milk of lime to further soak and remove the hair.

When this was completed, they started on the third chore. The hides that had spent the previous twenty-four hours in the milk of lime were removed and, again, Harry was tasked with hosing them down while another man scraped off any remaining hair. Then they were placed into the last stage of the tanning process, a chromium solution. This would turn the stiff hides into a far more malleable product, the thinner and softer leather much preferred by leathersmiths.

There were plenty of other jobs associated with these three main steps and, as the months and years passed, Harry gradually began learning them all. Chemical solutions had to be prepared, machinery had to be serviced and supplies ordered. Mr. MacNamee realised early on that not only was Harry a strong lad but a quick learner as well and he determined to keep him on for as long as possible.

Chapter 4

Botany, New South Wales

June, 1913

Frank Bentham was nervous. He stood awkwardly at the front of the Methodist Church in Botany. His new suit that had cost a full week’s wage was uncomfortable on his big frame, tight in some places and loose in others. His shoes were polished and his new white shirt had been freshly starched and ironed by his mother but his tie was askew. He’d never quite mastered the technique of tying it.

He glanced down at his father and mother sitting in the front row. They were both smiling up at him and his father gave him a wink. He could see pride in his mother’s eyes and something closer to resignation in his father’s. Further along the row sat his younger brother, Alfie, and his sisters, with his older married siblings and their families in the rows behind. His was a large family and they all loved a wedding.

His eyes travelled towards the back of the church where some of his mates from cricket and football were sitting. A couple of then caught his eye and winked knowingly. Then he saw Boney Rathbone sitting beside Ced Miller. Frank’s eyebrows creased fractionally, forgetting at that moment why he’d included these two young blokes in his invitations. They were the youngest in his cricket team and not actually his friends.

The organist struck up the familiar tune of ‘Here Comes the Bride’ and Frank’s eyes jumped to his intended as she entered the back of the church. She was smiling happily and he could