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Nothing Without Labour
Mystery regarding heritage ■ My paternal grandmother was Althea Clara Long (nee Clay). She was fifth of the 11 children of Charles and Ellen Norah Clay (nee Martyn), of Gorae, near Portland, in south-western Victoria. Ellen had been born at Cape Bridgewater, near Portland, in 1864. It is confidently believed that at least three of the 11 children - Althea, Charlotte and Edith - had Australian Aboriginal heritage. Definite confirmation of Aboriginalty may never be known. But we can rely on the girls’ quite different appearance to other family members, and oral history from my father Jim Long (1921-1987), related to my mother Marjory in 1944, and also directly by Jim to my sister Denise as a child. According to her birth certificate, listed with Births, Deaths and Marriages Victoria, Althea was born at Gorae on July 4, 1889. Some family records had her birth listed as 1890. The entry of births records in the 19th Century was less disciplined than the computer-driven 21st Century. Was Althea the biological daughter of Ellen Clay? Was she the issue of Charles Clay (or a relative) and an Aboriginal woman? Was she adopted - either formally or informally? Was she part of an early stolen generation? There are about 15 years in some births records missing from the region, believed to be destroyed by fire. Of another family situation, author Gideon Haigh in his book, Certain Admissions, said: “As far as establishing adoption was concerned, there were no records of handover to look at ... years would elapse until the Adoption of Children Act
● Althea Clara Long (nee Clay) made formal what had pre- ■ Charlotte, (no date availviously done through private able) 1884, Portland; ■ Ellen (no date available) networks. “At the time, Victorians 1886, Portland; simply had sixty days to reg- ■ Christina (later Cock), ister a birth under the antique December 25, 1887, Gorae: Registration (Births, Deaths ■ Althea Clara (later and Marriages) Act - plenty Long), July 4, 1889, Gorae; of time to quietly place a ■ Elizabeth Latimer, 1891, baby in the right hands if you Gorae; ■ Charles William, 1893 knew the right people”. The 11 children of (died July 20, 1909, aged 16); ■ George Edwin, 1895; Charles and Ellen were: ■ Leveniah, born Feb. 12, ■ Arthur Boswell, 1900; ■ Edith Victoria (later 1883, Portland;
Schofield), 1903; ■ Violet Rosalie, 1906. Christina was recorded as the oldest verified super-centenarian in Australian history, aged 114 years, 148 days when she died on May 22, 2002. She was one of the 100 oldest verified people of all time. At the time of Christina’s death, she was the secondoldest person in the world. She missed becoming the world's oldest person by just six days (Grace Clawson of the United States, born November 15, 1887, in the UK, died May 28, 2002, aged 114 years 194 days, six days after Christina). My mother, Marjory, recalls Althea’s sister, Charlotte (‘Lottie’), as childlike, always remaining about the age 12. She lived with her father all of her life, completing jobs such as setting tables, and folding laundry. Marjory says Lottie looked like Althea, although Lottie was quite short. Both had resemblances to the dark-skinned Edith. Our own family paid visits to Edith and Jim Schofield in the 1950s and 1960s, at their Portland petrol station. My mother Marjory met my father Jim at the Bandiana Army Workshops in north-eastern Victoria, in the later World War II years. When they were courting in 1944, Marjory asked about Jim’s dark skin. He replied that he was Aboriginal. The subject was never raised again in their 42-year marriage from 1945-1987. After she was born in 1949, my sister Denise recalls our Dad calling her “my little black princess” and “my Aboriginal princess”. ● Turn To Next Page