Bravery, horror and resilience

By Kath Gannaway
BLACK Friday saw 4,932,000 acres of land burnt out, 71 people dead, 69 sawmills destroyed, towns razed to ash and an aftermath that left a trail of human suffering as communities strove to put their lives back together.
The 1939 bushfires also brought out the bravery, generosity, resilience and sheer determination of the people of the Upper Yarra and in communities around the state.
At Warburton on Saturday night some of those people told their stories.
Norm Golding, now almost 102, was the senior member of the panel. He was 31 at the time and received a Royal Humane Society Bravery Award for his role in saving lives in the Powelltown area.
Des Morrish, at 20, was working at a mill out at Crooked Creek, but anticipating the worst, stayed home to join other fire brigade members to protect Warburton township.
Frank Cole, then 23, was at the Ada Mill when the fire went through. He survived in a dug-out after running through flames to get back to the mill.
Ted Chisholm, at 20, was among those who helped save The Chalet, while Keith Johanson, also 20, was working at the Signs Publishing Company, which became a refuge for many of the township’s women and children.
Millee Rickards was 19 and living in Powelltown. Her father Jack Weatherley died from injuries he received when he was in a truck crash on his way back from fighting fires on Donna Buang. Beryl Fraser was not long married and living in Melbourne when the news came through to her and husband Leo that her father William Illingsworth and her brother, Harry, had perished at Matlock.
Keith Thomas was a teenager living at Millgrove, his older brother Jack away working in the bush.
Barry Marshall was just a baby, taken to the safety of the Yarra River by his mother, along with other women and children as the fire swept around Warburton.
Extracts of their stories paint just a glimpse of the bigger picture, but they are nonetheless powerful.
Des Morrish was with fellow brigade members Mac Sparkes and Harry Martyr on the aqueduct when the fire came through.
“We could see the fire coming like a thousand tornadoes from the Doon. It crossed the Yarra and Mt Little Joe was on fire in two ups. The fire was that fierce it burnt all the oxygen on the ground and went racing up into the air, creating an updraft of 216 miles an hour. It took trees out of the ground … like someone had strewn a giant box of matches.”
Ted Chisholm spoke of the effect on the town of losing many of their popular young men and of the Kerslake family, who perished on the Acheron Way after leaving their vehicle. The burnt-out car, he said, remained on the side of the road for months.
Keith Johanson said the men were given wet wheat sacks at the Sanitarium Weetbix factory to put out flying cinders.
He also touched on the plight of the Kerslakes. “The heat was so great it had softened the bitumen on the road, so soft their shoes became stuck on the road surface. They walked until they could walk no further,” he said.
Keith Thomas told a story that would have resonated with many families at the time. “We were worried about Jack. We didn’t know what had happened to him and had no way of finding out,” he said.
Frank Cole was at the Ada Mill up behind Powelltown. He and 18-year-old Bill Lloyd were sent to pour water on the seven tramway bridges that served the mill in an ambitious bid to save them.
“We got caught and had to get back to the mill. Bill, instead of turning for the mill, ran off down the track and I had to run after him to catch him. We ran back through the flames and by the time we got back all I had on was shorts.
“Everyone thought we were dead,” he said. “Sheltering with the other mill workers in dug-outs, they had blankets at the entrances and survived.”
Still blinded by the smoke when he arrived back at his mother’s home in Warburton, he said his mother bathed his eyes with cows milk to relieve the pain. Millee Rickards spoke of the impact her father’s death had on the family.
“My mum never got over it. I would have been 20 in the April, but dad (Jack Weatherley) died in the March. My mother had a breakdown.
He was coming back from fighting fires on Donna Buang when the truck he was on crashed. They were all so tired after days of being up there.” Beryl Fraser’s moving account of her last few minutes with her father brought tears.
She and husband Leo had spent Christmas with the family and on the Monday morning were asleep in a sleepout when her father William Illingsworth knocked on the window about 6am before heading off into the bush.
“We opened the window and he kissed me goodbye, shook Leo’s hand and asked him to take care of me.” Leo’s brother broke the sad news of her father, and her brother Harry’s deaths to the couple, who had returned to Melbourne, on the Saturday morning after Black Friday.