Of Beds, Patients, Children, Toys, and Bedfellows

Bed is the best place for rest and recovery. Beginning on a serious note, I've gathered together a few photographs of  patients recuperating in their hospital beds, of which there are many, from the Australian War Memorial Collection found on Trove.

Kantara, Egypt. July 1941. A patient in 2/2 Australian General Hospital giving the thumbs up gesture. He is happy because he is going home on a hospital ship tomorrow. A gramophone is playing on his bed.

Harefield, England. A patient in his bed at No 1 Australian Auxiliary Hospital writing letters home.

NEW BRITAIN, 1945-09. RELEASED POW RESTING HIS LEG IN BED AT THE AUSTRALIAN 2/8TH GENERAL HOSPITAL. (RNZAF OFFICIAL PHOTOGRAPH.)

QFX22911 Sister Eileen Short, of 2/10 Australian General Hospital recuperating after her release in a hospital bed after her release from Belalau, a Japanese prisoner of war (POW) camp outside Loebok Linggau, Sumatra. She had been aboard the Vyner Brooke when it was sunk by the Japanese on 14 February 1942 two days out of Singapore.

The captions tell us a little of these people's stories, but we can only imagine what harrowing experiences they must have gone through before reaching the safety of hospital, and they all appear fairly happy and thankful to have survived and hopefully to be on the mend, although the patient above has a rather wistful expression, and the chap below does appear rather startled to be 'captured' in bed!

HEIDELBERG, VIC. 1943-01-20. PRIVATE C. MARTIN, AIF, IN HIS BED AT THE 115TH AUSTRALIAN GENERAL HOSPITAL. HE WAS WOUNDED BY A JAPANESE SNIPER IN NEW GUINEA.

Now for some children and their toys:
The children who appear in my old photograph album from the 1880s are mostly formally posed just like the adults, but here is a sweet one of two little girls with some toys, which may or may not be their own. I'm not sure what the older girl is holding, or what is in the cart the younger one has, but I do like the way she is standing on a block so that the height difference between the two sisters in their matching dresses is reduced. If only I knew who these young ladies were!

My mother aged about 4, in the 1920s

 Having fun in the 1950s:

Entertaining a visiting friend with teddy

and with a favourite doll

And on a lighter note, just a few family photos from the 1980s onwards, for your entertainment:

On  Mum and Dad's bed at eight weeks old, this premature arrival was barely bigger than her sister's cabbage patch dolls

No really, we're just friends!

Doesn't look too comfortable, but it works!

Why fight when you can sleep? Thanks to 'the cabbage patch kid' for this recent photo of  her two pets Buddy and Holly.

Here's my favourite bed photo from our travels, snapped in the guesthouse where we stayed  in Kitzbuhel on a skiiing and tramping holiday some years ago.

 I just love the imaginative arrangement of those continental pillows! 

And finally, I can't think of any Australian bed songs, but here's one from John Denver, performing a classic in this country :-)

For more takes on the topic for this week, just go directly to Sepia Saturday #196

Making a Difference: Patricia Morrison, Lifelong Worker for Peace and Justice

With the topic for Sepia Saturday 195 being International Peace Day, it seems appropriate that I should contribute a brief tribute in honour of a personal hero of mine, namely my late aunt, Patricia Morrison, known to her family as Pat. Christened Joan Patricia Morrison, she was born in Dunedin New Zealand on 29 October 1921, but soon afterwards her father finished studying law in Otago and the family returned to live in her mother Mona's home town of Christchurch. The eldest of a family of six, Patricia was a very bright student, and her interest in history, peace and human rights developed from primary school onwards.  In 1932 aged just eleven, Patricia won First Prize Senior Division for her entry in a Peace Essay competition organized by the New Zealand No More War Movement. The newspaper photograph below shows young Patricia holding one end of the peace banner that she was awarded, and she also received a book as part of her prize. Sadly I haven't discovered a copy of her prize winning essay.

   

Patricia attended Somerfield Primary School, where she was Dux in 1933, for which accomplishment she received her first medal, shown above. She continued to excel at Christchurch Girls' High, and then obtained an MA degree with First Class Honours in History at Canterbury University. In connection with her master's thesis, she wrote a book on Christchurch entitled The Evolution of A City, published in 1949, which  included a discussion of the considerable drainage problems that were faced when building a city upon swampy plains and underground streams. This is an issue which has been recognised as being particularly relevant today, in light of the disastrous liquefaction that occurred when damaging earthquakes struck Christchurch in 2010/2011, and  Patricia's book is still regarded as an authoritative historical work.

 Patricia won a three year scholarship to Oxford where she obtained another MA, and was active in the Student Christian Movement at both Canterbury and Oxford. Her interest in pacifism and international work led her to accept a position in Geneva in 1948 with the international committee of the International Students Service, having responsibility for field workers and working to find jobs for students and others displaced as a result of World War 2.

  

Patricia, back right, with her siblings, c. 1942: Derek, Jean (my mother), Peter, Ken, who was killed in WW2 and Graeme. Only Jean is still with us. She remembers Pat as a happy child and an avid reader, always helpful and caring to her parents and siblings.

While working in Geneva in 1950, Pat sent a  package of Swiss lace as her wedding gift to sister Jean, and it was skillfully made into Jean's wedding gown by their Aunty Bess, who was a professional dressmaker.  Pat was back home in Christchurch for the baptism of her  first-born niece in 1953

 Patricia returned to New Zealand in the early 1950s, but a few years later she began working for the YWCA, and returned to Geneva, where she was based at  the World YWCA headquarters. She travelled widely, often visiting remote and often dangerous parts of the world on her own, where she would meet with fledgling YWCA groups and listen to the needs of the local women and their communities, doing whatever she could to help, encourage and inspire them.  Patricia and her parents corresponded weekly while she was away, but she once said that she hoped her father John did not know what she was doing, or he would have told her to give it up and come home! Patricia never married, but her twelve nieces and nephews regularly received handmade gifts for Christmas and birthdays, sent by their Aunty Pat from these distant countries.

One of Patricia's early passports,which were filled with stamps and visas from her extensive travels over  the many years of her working life

These nativity dolls sent to me by Aunty Pat  in the 1960s were made by women she had visited in the World Y.W.C.A. Centre  at the Aquabat Jaber Refugee Camp in Jericho,Jordan

Leaving the World YWCA after ten years, Patricia then moved to London and worked there for another five years as General Secretary of the World Congress of Faiths, with a committee of leaders of six major world religions. When she finally retired and returned home to Christchurch, she continued to support, volunteer and be actively involved in many causes back in her home town of Christchurch. In 1997 she was awarded the Queen's Service Medal for her community work, and in the year of the 50th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1998 she was chosen as the YWCA -Aotearoa New Zealand Human Rights Hero. 

Patricia Morrison with her brother Derek, wearing  her QSM at the medal presentation in 1997

Patrica's Queen's Service Medal, now in my safekeeping.

Acknowledgement of Old Girl Patricia Morrison's achievements in 1997, in a publication of Christchurch Girls High.

 Patricia's inner city council flat was badly damaged in the earthquake of February 2011 and combined with failing health, this meant she had no option but to move into a rest home. She struggled to cope with increasing frailty, but in response to my mother's suggestion that perhaps she should take things more easily, she simply replied: "Don't tell me what I should or shouldn't do, I know what I can do". For as long as possible she intrepidly continued to attend frequent  meetings for the myriad of causes she supported, either walking to them in the inner city or on occasion taking a taxi to those that were further afield.One night she apparently got the address or date wrong, and was left in the dark at deserted hall, but thankfully a couple of girls who had been attending a AA meeting nearby kindly offered to see her home safely! 

My mother's scrapbook includes this cartoon and quote
by Bill Watterson, sent to her by Pat in 1998, who obviously
 felt that it  applied specifically to her
.

Somehow that cartoon reminded me of this photo of little Patricia aged 4, already reading and eager to go to school and learn more

     

Despite her dogged determination to go on doing what she loved, Patricia's health deteriorated rapidly and she passed away on 30 August 2011, just a couple of months short of her 90th birthday. At her funeral, which was widely attended by a large number of people including her many friends and acquaintances, several peace hymns were sung, including the one below, and a special candle was lit in her honour. Shirley Erena Murray, author of  "Sing a Song for Peace and Justice", is an internationally acclaimed hymn text writer from Invercargill NZ, and was a personal friend to Patricia. A year earlier we had happily sung another of her songs, 'Come to a Wedding', at our daughter Laura's wedding, little knowing that through Auntie Pat we actually had a personal connection to the author. The other hymns chosen, "Deep in the Human Heart" and "Make me a Channel of Your Peace", were also very relevant to the selfless way Patricia had lived her life.

                                              

The following extract from the obituary given at Patricia's funeral by Kate Dewes, herself a notable and awarded peace activist, tells more about Patricia's extraordinary achievements and interests, and shows the esteem in which she was held:

"Early in 2011 our Women's International League for Peace and Freedom group met together to catch up and plan the upcoming annual Hiroshima and Nagasaki Lantern ceremony. The smiling faces that day masked the depths of devastation we have all experienced since the [Christchurch] earthquakes started over a year ago. Some, including Patricia, lost their homes and we all knew people who had died....

She was a diminutive, self-effacing, humble woman who achieved amazing things as a leader promoting issues for women and families all over the world. She was a financial supporter of [the] Disarmament and Security Centre, the Peace Foundation, the Campaign Against Foreign Control in Aotearoa (CAFCA) and the Anti Bases Campaign (ABC), to name a few of the over 70 groups she supported.

 In 2002 when Christchurch celebrated the 20th anniversary as the first Nuclear Weapons-Free City and became the first Peace City, Patricia was one of the inaugural recipients of the Mayor's Peace Awards. The citation recognised her leading role in the United Nations Association organising Model UN Assemblies for schools in Canterbury, the annual Lincoln Efford Memorial and John Grocott Peace Lectures... She was involved with a leading women's organisation which was pushing the boundaries everywhere on a wide range of issues. One example was when the US branch of the YWCA 30 years ago protested against the possession of guns. Their vociferous opposition resulted in them losing their funding, and male colleagues resigning from their advisory boards. But they stuck to their principles, which she admired. She admitted that she would often "take the flak" when she supported the younger women in YWCA who were trying to do things differently - like training social workers from all different ethnicities and faiths."

 

Citation on reverse of Peace Award

Joan Patrica Morrison, 1921-2011, on this International Peace Day, 21 September 2013,
 we salute you!

To read more blogs on the subject of World Peace, check out this week's  Sepia Saturday



Postscript:
Just as an aside, when looking through Pat's papers I came across the following anecdote related by my mother, which would have been quite apposite to last week's Sepia Saturday blog, #194:  "While at Oxford Pat puzzled her tutors by always knitting as she studied, and said she could not study without knitting. During the war years, immediately preceding Oxford, Pat had knitted big sea boot stockings and balaclavas for men in the Merchant Navy. As a family we would sit around the warm fire knitting. As one brother remarked thoughtfully, 'there are only two people in this family not knitting, one can't and the other won't. The 'can't was the baby and the 'won't' was our Dad."

And finally... I thought I had no real sewing photographs whatsoever, but then just the other night I came across this one, among the treasure trove of papers and family photographs that had been stored for years in Auntie Pat's garage. I don't remember ever having seen it before, but I think that it must have been taken at the work place of Pat's Aunty Flo. Flora Euphemia Forbes worked in Christchurch City as a tailoress, and I believe she is the smiling lady in a white blouse, standing next to the suited young man wearing a jaunty tie at the far left of the group, middle row (second from end).  I can't resist appending it here.

A study in concentration .

I really can't find any photographs of ladies sewing in my collection, or of flags either - Antipodeans don't wave flags very much, unless they're supporting their team at a game of AFL footy perhaps - but the aspect of concentration on a task here made me think of this contemplative study of my great great grandmother Jane Young nee Paterson, intent on reading her book. Jane and her husband Charles were devout Presbyterians who emigrated from Glenmuick Aberdeenshire in 1851 to "the Land of the Long White Cloud" aboard the good ship Bangalore. They had a total of ten children, spread out over a 22 year period. Jane was born in 1823 and must have been in her late fifties or early sixties when this photograph was taken in 1880 or later. Hopefully by then she was able to enjoy a little time to herself for leisurely pursuits such as reading, even if the book is only a prop here in this photograph.  I'm sure she worked hard and did plenty of industrious sewing for her large family over the years. I only discovered this photograph a couple of years ago - it had languished hidden in my late aunt's garage for many many years, but was a lovely find when it finally saw the light of day!

Jane Young nee Paterson, 1823 - 1903

Jane and Charles Young celebrated their golden wedding anniversary in 1894, and it was said in the press report that they "[had] always held a high reputation for their kind and helpful acts, as well as for their industry and probity", and that "Jane [bore] her years with a degree of activity which would excite the envy of many a younger dame". Her obituary 9 years later said that "she was the first woman to take up residence in the Church Bush, and her influence and efforts to create pleasant and friendly amity among the pioneer sawyers in the Church [Bush] and Maori Bush from the time of their arrival till the last of about 2000 acres of native forest between Kaiapoi and Rangiora had been cleared will long be remembered". It sounds like she was a good woman, and an ancestor to be proud of.

Whilst I don't have any photos of family members sewing, I do have a couple of examples of their work that I treasure, and hope will become family heirlooms. My husband's Aunty Dawn was a wonderful knitter and crocheter, and would knit from morning til night, especially when failing health in her early seventies didn't allow her to do very much else. Whenever a new great niece or nephew arrived, and there were many, their doting Great Aunty would always send the lucky family a lovely parcel of beautifully knitted baby clothes and rugs etc. When Dawn passed away, my sister-in-law Ann inherited numerous boxes containing many hundreds of granny squares, that Dawn had kept ready to use whenever she needed to make a gift for a friend or relative. Ann herself was a great sewer and embroiderer, and when she died of cancer at only 52, we could have practically opened a shop with the amount of sewing and embroidery materials left in her sewing room, and of course her home was decorated with many completed and framed works she had done over the years. She hadn't been into crochet however, and  I was given the boxes of squares by her mother. Some fourteen years after Dawn died I finally managed to piece together several rugs and throws like the one pictured here, and have also given plenty away, as Dawn herself would have done.

Granny square rug crocheted by Dawn Featherston

A favourite piece of embroidery done by Ann Featherston

Now click here to check out other Sepians' blogs on this prompt, here at Sepia Saturday

Women on the Water

What are we waiting for - let's go!

I must confess I was rather struggling to find any photographs in my collection that were vaguely relevant to this week's topic, but putting the emphasis on water, women and rowing images, I came across this little snap of my husband's grandmother Doris Newth, born 1903, sitting in a row boat, on a river somewhere in England. It's a very small snap and unfortunately I don't have the original with me, so I don't know any more details, ie. where it was taken or why, but I rather doubt that Doris was about to row away on her own. She looks relaxed, innocent and quite young, but who knows, perhaps as a child she was quite accustomed to doing that kind of thing, like the children did in those classic tales of 'Swallows and Amazons', written by Arthur Ransome, which I remember reading avidly as a child. The exciting series of children's adventures in the Lakes District were first published in 1930, and their unsupervised exploits were something that these days would surely be inconceivable - today's children are rarely left to their own devices by responsible parents, especially where water is concerned!

I have another snap of Doris relaxing with her husband Frank Olds, by a river somewhere, and the only relevance is that in the background you can see an anonymous woman, apparently punting her way past, wearing a dress and using a very long thin pole to propel her craft along. Perhaps there was a gentleman friend reclining in the boat, but if so he's hidden behind Doris and Frank, who look quite oblivious to her presence. Hopefully if she had overbalanced, Frank would have leapt to her aid.

I did but see her passing by ... or not?

Happy 100th birthday young Doris!

Doris Olds was a lovely lady who lived a long life, passing away at 101 in Hereford in 2004. She was mentally alert to the end, and no doubt if I'd seen these photos before she died and had thought to ask her, she could have told me so much more about them, and about her life experiences in general.  If only! She wasn't able to come to Australia for her daughter's wedding as a war bride in 1947, but she did visit her Australian family subsequently, on about 5 occasions, her first trip being for our wedding when she was 70, and the last when she was 95, which was pretty amazing.  She came by air, not by sea :-)

Thinking of sea voyages and women on the water in small craft in the middle of nowhere also brings to mind this photograph of Little Boat, a wooden boat so named because it only measured 29 foot from bow to stern. Nevertheless this was the vessel aboard which which my fearless sister and her husband voyaged from Darwin, Australia to Florida USA, via South Africa. He was an experienced yachtie, who had built Little Boat himself and had taught my sister how to sail after they met.  Several years later they made the return voyage with their two young daughters, who were born in the States, aboard a slightly larger boat, (Cytherea, 36 foot, from which the photograph was taken), weathering storms and wild weather, becalmings and even the occasional  whale passing beneath them, and homeschooling the girls along the way. 

Little Boat, Bay of Islands, 1994

And here are some real-life 'Swallows and Amazons' - my nieces and their friends, sailing off Pohnpei, Micronesia in 1991, en route to NZ.

Apart from this, I can only refer you back to the photograph of my own grandmother Mona Forbes in my first blog, posted under the heading Boating on the Avon, in Christchurch NZ, which I really love. Punting on the river is also popular there, but I doubt if my grandmother engaged in it herself. Her father Charles however was known to be handy with a long pole of another kind - according to his obituary, he excelled at pole-vaulting!