taggerty

Sometime between 1909 and 1913 Archie’s occupation changed from Travelling salesman to Manager of Stratton’s Flour Mills, and he must have started to feel wealthy. On Saturday, Nov 22^nd1913 a 113 acre rural property called Carron Vale near Mooroolbark, Victoria was to be auctioned after being subdivided into many small blocks. Archie kept the annotated brochure. Apparently he pre-empted the auction, and made a presumably irresistible offer for the whole property, and kept the name.

Verandah at Carron Vale about 1914: Top row is Archie, Ella, Ida; Middle row is Hilda, Jack Snowball maybe Gordon Forster? Peg and Harold on the step.

News clipping about Gordon Forster in First World War

News clipping about Harold Forster in First World War

Shortly after they moved in, War broke out and most of the young men left for overseas. This included all of Archie and Connie’s younger brothers; Charles Gordon and Alf Beatty and Gordon and Stan Forster.  Harold Forster, already overseas, served in the British naval reserve. Con’s album has many photos of her brothers in uniform driving and attending to machinery, recuperating after injury and so forth. There are fading photos of ships and seaplanes off Gaba Tepe, later known as Anzac Cove, and of course, many photos of the dashing Harold in naval uniform.

Meanwhile, young Harold and Peg revelled in their new domain:

Harold and Peg with cart load of toogies. On the back is written “With love & best wishes for a merry Xmas & a happy and prosperous New Year, Con, Carron Vale 1915. Harold & Peggy in our orchard”. Mt. Dandenong in the background.

HAP remembered this as a very happy time. However around the house the children were constantly warned to be very quiet as their mother was unwell and/or had a headache. Indeed, Con increasingly stayed in bed, suffering from indeterminate ailments, so much so that the children did not often see her. In later years HAP spoke bitterly about this “I had no Mother really, unless Hilda was my Mother”. It’s very difficult now to tell what this was all about. HAP speculated that it could have been a ruse to avoid sex!  All the surviving letters between Con and Archie are couched in extremely affectionate terms though, and Gwen said that Archie, years down the track, still loved, even worshipped Con, and that since he was a wealthy man, she could have anything she wanted. Maybe there was too much wealth and too much worship?

One Carron Vale visitor wrote in 1919:

 Dear Con,

Thank you so much for your kind note of 22^nd with its cordial invitation to spend the weekend at Mooroolbark. It’s too good of you to suggest that I might be able to add a patch of light for the days preceding your lonely vigil & patient pilgrimage through the dark shadows of the coming nights. Altho’ for the reason explained last night I am prevented from enjoying a second delightful visit to your peaceful hills, will you allow this note to say “cheero!” and express my sincere hope & best wishes for your comfort, courage & ultimate success in the fight for health & strength that you are undertaking for your well-loved ones.

All those who are privileged to call you friend will very often think of you in your brave & plucky battle of mind, of body & of soul. Whilst they cannot hope to appreciate fully the depths of emotion, the extent of suffering, the heights of endeavour that you may be called upon to experience… I’m sure that many of them would like to think that every pain you bear, every effort you make, every firm resolve you take will act in the nature of a prayer of help for those of your friends who less gloriously, less nobly & less effectively will be striving along a lower plane of living in this work-a-day world of ours:

“Comfort your heart, fear not! That you are true

Helps all your world to keep its promise too”

May an old pal subscribe himself as one of those friends?

[illegible]all

 Con kept this note all her life. It’s odd that she didn’t find it a tiny bit over the top. Is that how she really saw herself?

As an aside, Con having been a nurse, had a very large medical book called “Medicology”, leather bound and dating from 1903 I think. It had large elaborate, coloured, lift-out diagrams of each of the body systems so that you could lift out each organ separately, and numerous graphic and gruesome photographs and diagrams of every conceivable human illness. As a teenager in the 1960s, I remember being fascinated by this book, and amused that under “Constipation”, it said “what refined and delicate woman would be seen walking to the privy in daylight” as though constipation was normal, and even ladylike!  Anyway, I made the mistake of drawing this to my mother’s attention and the book disappeared. Mum later confessed that she had taken it down to the dump at Enniscrone Thornton and burnt it! “That’s where Con got all her silly ideas” she said darkly. I’m still cross with her about that!

At Carron Vale the children were usually looked after by Hilda. If she was away they were evidently left to their own devices or minded by various employees. HAP said he understood that a male employee had interfered with Peg at one stage. He also said that one woman who was responsible for them had seemed to relish thrashing Peg for minor infractions while he himself had escaped largely unscathed. Their early education was also left largely to Hilda, who loved them both and had relevant qualifications and skills. We used to be impressed to find dedications in Harold’s very battered children’s books (one was “King Solomon’s mines” by H. Rider Haggard), such as “First prize awarded to Harold Beatty for French” At least we were impressed until HAP confessed that it was only out of him and Peg! In about 1917 though, when Harold would have been 9 or 10, they both used to walk to “school with Mrs. Welshman” presumably in Mooroolbark.

They’re heading off to school in the picture below. The sticks they are carrying are for killing the snakes they might meet on the way.

Harold and Peg on the way to school with Mrs. Welshman about 1917

HAP had fond memories of many beach holidays, often shared with the Blair family who were neighbours at Mooroolbark. The Blairs we see most often in the photos are Dorothy, the eldest, who much later lived over the road from Peg in Olinda, Alison the middle girl, Winifred who was about the same age as Harold, and Graeme, probably the youngest. These must be 1918 if Gordon Forster is back from the war.

Con usually had a live in “companion”. One of these in the early twenties was Mildred Bell, an accomplished concert pianist, who inspired Harold to learn the piano. From about 1924 it was Ada Wadelton aka Miss Wad or Waddy. They joined Gordon and Stan Forster who became weekend regulars at Carron Vale after the war, and various other house guests, in the legendary house parties, which all seemed to involve a lot of tennis.

Someone typed up a

“Symphonic study composite of breezy tragedy and morbid burlesque in several acts… dedicated to those very pleasant memories of delightful House Parties spent on the good shop s/s “Moorool” (barque) which are thus immortalized for ever and a day”

The cast are:

King of Carron Vale; Queen of Carron Vale, his spouse, better half…and the power behind the throne; Bonnie Prince Harley, heir to the throne; Princess Peg; Abdul Pasha; Sir Basil Keogh [presumably Harry Keogh, Managing Director of Elcon]; Mdle Clothilde [Hilda]; Lady Wad; Count Kirklyn [Lynn Kirk]; Lady Marion [Marion Kirk]; Signor Pippi [Pip Powell]; Earl Stanley; General Gordon and Madame Joli, delicatessen provider for the epicurean gourmet[Mrs Jolly the cook]. It’s a shame the anonymous author didn’t give us more idea what actually happened instead of launching into a wild fantasy. All I can make out of it is that Lynn and Marion are courting or else recently married. Still, at least it must have been memorable. Con made cute little mini photo albums for at least one lot of visitors, with a few photos like those above, and finishing with a business card for “Mr & Mrs. A Beatty, Carron Vale, Mooroolbark” annotated: “From your friends who have enjoyed every minute of your visit”. Peg or Hilda must have kept one as a souvenir.

Carron Vale house party off to the Oaten’s New Year ball: Archie, Mildred Bell?, Hilda?, Stan, Gordon, Harry Keogh (Director of Elcon)

Archie had the reputation of being an excellent host, genial and generous. HAP remembered how his father used to have fun rounding up everyone in sight for church on Sunday morning, jollying them along to make it seem an adventure. Christmases were especially not to be missed. Hilda wrote home from at least two of her travels saying she had “come over all Carronvaley” and wished she could be there. Little Gwen was especially impressed with Gordon and Stan’s generosity. Every Christmas they formally presented each other with a cheque for ten pounds! Regular presents for Peg and Harold were the Billabong books by Mary Grant Bruce. HAP recalled that he or Peg were given most of the first six as they were published. The survivors have been literally loved to pieces. “Back to Billabong” has the pencilled note “Finder please return to Peggy Beatty”