The following is an extract of an oral history interview in 2013 with Walter Davis by Dr. Criena Fitzgerald for the ‘History of the Slav/Italian Community in Kalgoorlie/Boulder’ book project – For a better Life.
Sam Barker, Wally Davis, Eva (Wally’s Mum), and Bert Van Dyke 1934
My name is Walter (Wally) Dominic Davis and I was born on the 3rd April 1921 in Perth. My mum was born in New Zealand and her name was Eva Victoria Prudence Allen. She and her sister Rosie traveled to Cloncurry in Northern Queensland where they both married. They travelled from New Zealand all alone, pretty brave! Mum always used to say she thought New Zealand would sink and that’s why she came. They then moved on and came to Coolgardie, Western Australia. While mum was in Boulder she had four children. There was Martha the oldest, Florrie, Violet, and William, so that was four kids she had to Samuel Davis who was her husband.
Mum went into the hospital, she got what they called the ‘Black Plague’ which is like the heavy flu and there was a lot of people dying with it, especially babies. If you go to the Coolgardie cemetery at the present time you don’t find too many people in that cemetery that’s over the age of 20, a lot of children died there of the Black Plague. I think it was like typhoid because there was no good water. The water they were living on used to cost 1s 6d for a gallon and you had to go down to the mine and get it as they had it. It was from the steam boilers and you’d use that for drinking water and a lot of people ended up with it, this sort of typhoid. This was in 1894 in Coolgardie. She was in the hospital with a Mrs. Armanasco who had a young son called Felix. When Mrs Armanasco died in the hospital my mum adopted Felix. I thought he was my brother and didn’t know he wasn’t till I came back from the war. His father shot through back to America and left the boy alone in the world. He was into gold stealing and thought the police were on to him.
While mum was sick in hospital Sam Davis, her husband, shot through with all the kids, three girls, and a boy, back to Queensland. When mum came out she was left with nothing, her house, which was in Boulder, had been taken over by her sister Rosie and her family.
Rosie’s (Wally’s Aunt) House Boulder ca 1930s. Maggie in a chair, Rosie Jack and Norman on the steps.
Then she met up with a fellow called Joe Leggerini, (my father), he was a tribute miner. She couldn’t marry him as she was still married to Davis. When my dad went to prison for 12 months mum had to manage alone again doing washing and ironing and things in Perth.
In about 1928 I was put into the Salvation Army home in Perth, all us kids did, as mum couldn’t afford to look after us. It was terrible at the home, too strict and no love at all. I can remember the first night yes, I can remember it and I remember crying all night. I know that and I got a couple of backhanders for howling. Nobody came over and cuddled you or anything like that which I what kids really want.
My mum then got a job up at Tuckanarra (in the Murchison). She was working as a cook at the Tuckanarra Hotel and this is where she met Bert Van Dyke. The only one that didn’t go into the home was Felix as he was about 17 then. Bert and Mum got me out of the home and I went to live with Felix in Perth. One day I chucked an inkwell at the teacher then ran home and packed my stuff in a sugar bag. I walked into the Perth railway station and caught the train but I got on the wrong train. It was going to Kalgoorlie, so the guard said you’re on the wrong train son, and put me off at Midland. He gave me some of his lunch that he had in a bag and he said wait here and the train to Mullewa will be along soon, that’s the train you’ve got to get. He said the train changes at Mullewa and goes to Meekatharra. I got on the right train, got to Mullewa, changed trains at Mullewa, and the guard there said he wanted my ticket. I said I haven’t got one and he said, don’t worry I’ll look after you. He looked after me and put me off at Tuckanarra. I think it took from sometime early in the morning to the next night to get to Tuckanarra from Mullewa.
L to R: Felix, Dot, Mrs Reason and children and old Jack from mine garage. Taken during the flood. Ote gas producers on the back of the car. Circa 1930s.
Mum didn’t know I was there until I got off at the station at Tuckanarra. This chap was loading beer onto a truck at the station and the station’s only little, 12 foot long, and this chap had this big black beard. I went up to him and asked him do you know where Mrs. Davis is and he said yes, shes is the cook down at the pub. I said I’ve got to see her, she’s my mum, and that happened to be Bert Van Dyke. Bert took me on as his son and he was the best mate I ever had. He taught me everything, he taught me a lot about life, how to kangaroo shoot, prospect, drive trucks, do everything, he taught me the lot. I would have been about 12 yrs old when I got to Tuckanarra in about 1934.
Lady Evan Mine 1930
Bert, he came out from South Africa when he was about 17 and he joined the Australian Forces, AIF. He was awarded the MM in France and he got his discharge and he bought the first T Model Ford truck on the Murchison. He went kangaroo shooting.
I would say he was the nicest chap that I’ve ever met.
He found the Golden Fleece GM and the Lady Eva GM, he named it after mum, and he worked at Boyd’s Reward GM for a long time. We lived in a house that Bert built out of whatever he could find. It was right next to the hotel where mum worked. There was nothing else at Tuckanarra then, no school, I did school by correspondence. There were no other kids there, just me. Bert and mum never went anywhere without each other.
After a couple of years Felix came up to Tuckanarra with his family and they lived in a tent at the back of the hotel. He didn’t stay and returned to Perth when we moved to Big Bell. Bert built us a nice house. I got the job of driving the ute to Perth with the gold. Everyone thought the gold went down on the train but it was just put under the seat of the Buick. I would drive straight to the mint in Perth and they would unload the gold. Bert got a job at Big Bell driving a truck, he couldn’t go down the mine as he had ‘Dust on the Lung’. It ended up killing him, he died at the Hollywood hospital in Perth, he was 75. Mum died just before him. The day before she died I went down to see her, to see how she was going, she was up on the table and was scrubbing the bloody ceiling, she was 84. I said what the hell are you doing, she said I’m scrubbing the ceiling it looked dirty.
Searching for Kingsford Smith. Aboriginal tracker Wally Cameron middle front. C 1930s.
Well, they reckoned Kingsford Smith was lost but they found out later on that it was a stunt to get promotion business. They reckoned he was lost in the Gascoyne but he came down the telephone line, out from Halls Creek somewhere and they were looking in the wrong direction for him. Bert was one of the search parties. That’s him on the left.
Tom Allen on right, unknown in middle, Bert Van Dyke on left. c 1932
These were two friends of Bert’s. Tom Allen committed suicide on 13 March 1934 at Tuckanarra by taking cyanide in his camp. He was aged 28. He was an Englishman and he committed suicide in that little shed that the old man built and the other chap (standing in centre of the photo) hung himself under that limb. He was an English return soldier too but I don’t know his name. Now when you pick up a paper today everybody’s getting treated for post-traumatic stress, in those days you wouldn’t have heard or known what the word was. Nobody looked after them, nobody looked after old Bert either and they went through some terrible things in World War One. I suppose those two blokes were out here, they were English soldiers and had no money, where were they going to get money from, no subsistence, nothing like that.
I don’t know why my mum changed my name from Leggerini to Davis, I didn’t know about it till I joined the army. When I got back from the war I married Joan, that was 66yrs ago now. We have two daughters.
Its been a good life all in all!!!
Moya Sharp
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