Shortly after Tom and Millie were married, the Australian economy was hit with rising unemployment and a sluggish export market, particularly for commodities like wool and grain. It became a much greater challenge to make ends meet, financially, as the country headed towards its worst economic crisis in history, the Great Depression. Millie’s uncle and aunt, Buzz and Louisa Crawford, decided to rent out their property, Fordleigh, in the hopes of weathering the storm. In this climate of hardship and uncertainty, Tom and Millie decided to take on the lease which included a tiny two bedroom cottage with a lounge room and a kitchen. However, six months into their rental of Fordleigh, their dream was almost crushed when Buzz had to put the property on the market.
Through sheer hard work and determination, Tom managed to raise the necessary funds to purchase the property and during this time, their first daughter, Alice, was born. When Alice was just 6 months old, Tom and Millie lost her, suddenly, to cot death; an event that shattered them both. The following year, further heartache followed when Tom and Millie’s second daughter, Enid, was born prematurely. Enid, who was always quite frail and delicate, developed a chronic kidney disease and passed away when she was just nine months old. These tragedies cast a dark shadow of self doubt over Millie who was to became very nervous about delivering other children. Despite this, in April of 1928, Tom and Millie’s third child and first son, Stanley John, was born, followed 20 months later by Francis Henry in December, 1929.
By this time, the unyielding bite of the Great Depression began to really sink its teeth into the nation and times became extremely difficult for families everywhere. The Government set up a number of capital works programs to provide some employment relief for those who were adversely affected. The Henham Gap Road was one such project and Tom went to work with a number of the local farmers on this road-making gang to form a road all the way from Halls Gap to Dunkeld, over the Henham Gap.
Clearing trees in bushland
This involved cutting into the side of the Victoria Range mountains for about two miles, which they did with picks, shovels, wheel barrows and bullock drays. There was a sheer drop hundreds of feet down the mountain side and the precarious road itself was only just wide enough for two cars to pass.
Henham Gap Road
Fortunately, even during the worst of the Depression, Tom and Millie were fairly self-sufficient at Fordleigh. They milked cows, made their own butter and sold the cream to the butter factory at Hamilton. They always had chickens and eggs, made their own bread and were basically able to live off the land. Rabbits were always plentiful for meat or an old ewe and they also kept their own bees for honey. They had a large orchard and grew all of their own vegetables. In short, they were able to weather the economic storm far better than many.
In 1930, Tom brought home his first motor car; a brand new Ford, the 'Tin Lizzie'. It was a tough, simple and reliable two speed machine that cost Tom 295 pounds. The dealers who sold these cars to farmers often had a difficult time teaching them to drive, as the transition from horse to car was apparantly not an easy one. Having spent their entire lives with horses, they expected cars to have enough road sense not to run off the road or bump into trees.
'Tin Lizzie' - T Model Ford
The trip into town from Fordleigh was never straightforward. It started with a rough paddock track that took you through several old heavy mortised timber gates and another slip handle gate with three poles that had to be lifted off and replaced after you went through. There was a stoney crossing that was frequently subject to flooding and eventually, a rough gravel road for 36 miles that had potholes and corrugations making it a very long and uncomfortable ride.
One late Autumn day in 1931, Millie, who was heavily pregnant with their third son, Allan, went into labour a little earlier than expected. The weather was nasty - very wet and windy - and Tom hit the panic button, racing them off in the Tin Lizzie to town. As they came out of the bush over the gap hill near Dunkeld, a great gust of wind blew the canvas hood completely off and they had to continue the rest of the journey into Hamilton, soaked to the skin in the howling wind and rain.
The following year, Max was born, followed eighteen months later by Harold. With five exuberant boys under the age of eight, life was very hectic indeed! It wasn’t until Harold was four years old, that their sixth son, Cecil, arrived on the scene.
“... I have vivid memories of this occasion. While mum was in hospital, Tom was ploughing a paddock with the old Fordson Detroit tractor and three furrow stump jump plough. My big brothers were picking up sticks and I was sitting on a stump watching the tractor going around and around. Suddenly, I desperately needed to go to the toilet but Tom was at the other end of the paddock, so I messed my trousers. This was not good!
When Tom stopped the tractor, he marched over and took my trousers off, turned them inside out and belted them around a stump. To my utter horror, he then put them back on me and jumped straight back on the tractor, leaving me there to bawl my eyes out. I was devastated! I guess this was the start of being brought up tough...”
- from Harold's Memoirs
Meanwhile, in hospital, Millie was kicking up quite a fuss over baby Cecil, convinced that the nursing staff had made a mistake. Her previous children all had dark hair and dark eyes, (after her side of the family), but this baby had a shock of white hair and blue eyes. The “White Cat”, as he would come to be known, was actually the spitting image of Tom from an early age and the two very determined personalities would often clash as a result.
Life at Fordleigh was as much about discipline and survival at times, as it was about making a living. The isolation, the climate, the sparseness of any kind of modern technology - even electricity- presented a range of challenges which bred a high degree of self reliance and a strong, determined and sometimes unforgiving work ethic. There are many amusing stories Tom's children can recall of their life growing up on the farm - some of which have been preserved by his daughter, Joyce, in a family history book. Harold's Memoirs also give a snapshot of growing up at Fordleigh and provide an interesting account of life in the bush for a rural Australian family in the late 1930's.
From 1939-45, World War II broke out and there were a large number of army troops engaged in a training program about two miles east of Fordleigh. There were trenches dug over about 200 acres of property and American instructors were teaching the aussie troops how to use certain equipment. Tom became quite friendly with some of the instructors and often had two or three of them over for a meal with the family to share a few stories. The boys would often stay up at night watching the red tracer bullets being fired at targets in the mountain. During this time, car headlights had to be blinkered with a shield so they could not be seen from the sky above and the windows of the house had to be painted black so that no light could escape to prevent enemy planes from seeing any activity.
An interesting anecdote from this time, is that American servicemen had a number of young panther cubs which they had brought across from the States with them as mascots. When they left, it is believed that rather than taking the cubs with them or humanely destroying them, they released them into the wild. There have been many sightings of ‘a large cat’ or what people describe as a panther in the Grampians, particularly around the southern Victoria Point region, ever since. Although there has been no photographic proof, there have been livestock casualties, paw prints, animal carcasses found up high in the forks of trees and the distinctive sound of wild cat screams at night. As such, many locals generally accept their existence today, whether they are descended from the wartime panther mascots or not.
Victoria Point area
By the end of World War II, Tom and Millie’s family was complete with the arrival of Neville, Joyce and Kevin. Soon after this, the family moved into a new house that Tom had built himself, adjacent to the old one. Most of the timber used in its construction came from the property and was milled at the Dunkeld Saw Mill.
There were now three bedrooms, a large lounge with an open fireplace and a bathroom. The kitchen had a double chimney to accommodate an open fireplace, as well as the Wellstood slow combustion stove. There was a pantry with cupboards, a sink and a new table that could fit all of the family around it with even some room to spare for a few visitors!