HELLO DOWN THERE FROM EDITOR DES….AKA ME! OK…to celebrate my birthday I thought I would tell you a little bit about myself. I was actually born in China, but I think my parents sold me ( I know, how could they part with someone so
Read more →
TALL TALES, EMPTY TANKS – AN AUSTRALIAN ODYSSEY On late night radio an elderly man talked about catching giant Murray cod on chicken eggs; ‘I thread a fish hook through the shell of a raw egg then I hard boil it,’ he assured the dubious host. His
Read more →
Hello, You know how Pauline Conolly posts rather showoffy pictures of her garden? Well I’m about to take her down a peg or two, hahaha. Made a little bicycle tour the other day and by gum there are some pretty dire ‘blots’ ! Here I go down
Read more →
A TOUR OF TASMANIA VIA ITS MAGICAL CAVES After an absence of many years, my partner Rob and I returned to Tasmania, where we both grew up. While we were staying on the North West Coast we went to see Gunns Plains caves. My first visit was
Read more →
A LEAP OF SHAME I once asked a British backpacker; ‘What strikes you as the biggest difference between London and Sydney? As it was summer I half expected him to say; ‘The amount of visible female flesh in Sydney’ . However, he surprised me with; ‘Your city
Read more →
My interest in John Mortlock was aroused when I discovered that his journey as a convict paralleled that of my own relatives, the Shadbolts. WHERE THERE’S A WILL…… John Frederick Mortlock was born in Cambridge on August 8, 1809. His father, Frederick Cheetham Mortlock, had been a
Read more →
Hello from me, Editor Des. Well do you know what? We went to the city of Goulburn on a special pilgrimage. My guardian Rob Conolly’s ancestor William Conolly used to live there when it was just a little
Read more →
GOODBYE HOBART TOWN On October 20 1914, the 12th Battalion AIF embarked from Hobart on the troopship Geelong. They were accompanied by two Australian army nurses; Sister Alice Gordon King ( left in the picture below) and Sister Janet Ella Radcliff (right). Alice was twenty eight years
Read more →
The Mystery of the S.S. Waratah On July 27 1909 the S.S. Waratah was sighted by a passing ship off the east coast of South Africa, enroute to London from Sydney. She was carrying 211 passengers and crew, many of them Australian. The ship was never
Read more →
The SS Kyarra was built in Dumbarton, Scotland, for the Australasian United Steam Navigation Company. She was launched in 1903 as a luxurious passenger liner. Following the outbreak of WWI in 1914 the ship was requisitioned for use as a hospital ship.
Read more →