Boggy Creek to 1905

In 1905 settlement of the Boggy Creek catchment stopped at what is now Ed Sharp’s place at the junction of Little Boggy Track and Boggy Creek Road. Ed’s block is a tiny corner of what was Lot 37 in the Parish of Belmore, 116 acres selected in mid 1905 by William Henry Grant.The track to Grant’s block followed pretty much the line of road as it is today.Beyond the boundaries of Grant’s Lot 37 was simply wild forest, unclaimed and uninhabited.Logging crews had in all likelihood been through here, reaching up Boggy Creek possibly as early as the 1860s, hacking out rough bullock tracks to enable carting the logs found in areas where they couldn’t be shot down steep slopes to a creek and floated down to the river. Probably the enterprising young men of the day would have been relying initially on the tracks of these early forest workers to allow access and orientation to the land.

The vast unclaimed wilderness was available for selection.Up front payment of 1 shilling and 6 pence per acre gave Conditional Purchase, while agreement to pay a shilling an acre in the future gave Conditional Lease.The ‘conditions’ were to fence your block and clear a percentage of it within 2-3years. Regulations changed at different times, and differed in various areas of the state, but the basic process remained the same: roughly peg the corners of your block, and then go to the nearest government office and record your claim.The government surveyors would be along within a few months to make everything ship-shape and record your selection at the Lands Office.

The brothers Jordan

Frederick and Herbert Jordan were some of the era’s enterprising young men.They sniffed out what was beyond Grant’s block.The road to Grant’s went along the ridge, but most of Grant’s acres run south of the present road, where the land slopes off the dry ridge and down to Boggy Creek.A great deal of this south-facing slope is the rich red Karznozem basalt, which occurs in pockets in the catchment. Later owners ran a market garden on Grant’s rich site. Frederick and Herbert Jordan may have realised the value of this treasure trove, and went sniffing around the perimeter of Grant’s selection to see if they could find more.

The most accessible land was immediately to the west of Grant’s house, along the ridge where Little Boggy Track and the power line now runs.There may be another pocket of karznozem on a flat to the north of this ridge, roughly north of where the power line turns south off the ridge. Certainly another pocket runs east-west across the V of land formed by Cedar Creek and Boggy Creek, across the northern end of the bottom flat, and across Riverside Drive up to Brian Semple’s house. The brothers Jordon got to work clearing the forest in both areas, and erecting a rough hut on the peak of the ridge of Little Boggy Track pretty much where the power line now turns off its ridge to dive down to Shamballa near Cate’s house. In early 1906 Frederick Jordan recorded two selections. The first, in March, was for 100 acres in a long narrow block to the north-west of Grant’s selection.This Lot 57 took in nearly 1.5km of Little Boggy Creek, and was only about 150m wide.Little Boggy Creek no doubt looked like ‘permanent water’ – a considerable asset for any block of land.

Fred Jordan’s second selection was about a month later when on 6 April 1906 he selected Lot 58 of 200 acres, directly abutting William Grant’s western boundary. The boundary between Grant’s Lot 37 and Jordan’s Lot 58 still comprises the northern-most section of Shamballa’s eastern boundary, from just south-east of Steve Hobson’s house up to where it meets Boggy Creek Road just east of Bob Phillips’ driveway. The south boundary of Lot 58 runs east-west in a line running though Cate’s vege garden, Chris Pile’s house site and up to the ridge mid-way between the cemetery and Steve’s house. When the surveyors came through in June they were already able to record ‘improvements’ on this block of felling or ringing of 30 acres valued at £30 and a ‘galv iron humpy £10’ on the spot mentioned. The cleared land was in two areas: a circle some 20 metres north of the ‘humpy’, and the kraznozem pocket directly north and across the road from Cate’s house under the power line.

With this promising start Fred’s brother Herbert now wanted in on the act. Perhaps he was the younger brother and thus poorer. Whatever the reason he also selected 200 acres but broke it up into two blocks: a Purchase of 50 acres (Lot 63) and a further 150 acres cheaper by leasehold (Lot 64).Both these Lots adjoined the south boundary of brother Fred’s blockand ran south for the full width of Fred’s.Herb recorded his selections in August 1906; the surveyors didn’t come through again until February 1907.

Like brother Fred’s, both Herb’s blocks had permanent water and a dose of good soil.Lot 63, the smaller block, is a long thin block running east-west, with it’s northern boundary the south boundary of Fred’s as before – from Cate’s house through Chris’ Pile’s and up to midway between the cemetery and Steve’s – and its south boundary running in an east-west line across Bryan and Eva’s house and Chris and Deb’s, and up the ridge to mid-way between the cemetery and Uwe’s. This takes in approx 500m of winds in the creek as well as all the lower flats in the community paddock. Herb’s leashold block, the larger 150 acres, then runs south up the hill and taking in the kraznozem in the donkey paddock, all of Jane’s paddock and the gooseberry flat, and the rolling slope up Neil’s spur to meet it’s south boundary as a line running east-west from about 50m above Tony’s rainwater tank and down to the Top House pump hole.

When each of these Lots were surveyed they marked the end of ‘official’ settlement.No further land was surveyed to the west and south although, as is suggested by the activities of the brothers Jordan, it is likely energetic young men were already poking about perhaps embarked upon their own ‘selection’. Jordan’s Farm, as it became known, takes up the most upstream commercially farmable land in the Boggy Creek catchment. Although farming was attempted further up, as we shall see, none of these upper attempts resulted in enough produce to develop into established farms.

Jordan’s Farm and the land of Shamballa

The relationship between the four Lots making up Jordan’s Farm and the land of Shamballa needs some explanation. Shamballa was bought in 2 sections: the ‘back block’ of about 455 acres in 1973 and the ‘front block’ in 1978. The ‘front block’ is made up by parts of three of the Lots making up Jordan’s Farm – as we shall see shortly. Shamballa’s ‘back block’ was originally 3 Lots each with their own history. Before continuing with the story of Jordan’s Farm I will briefly cover the selection of each of these three blocks.

All this ‘back block’ country is rough: steep and forested, rising up to the Scotchman Range to the south and the 1,000 ft high Smith’s Hill. Some of the lower ground has small areas of what could be called rolling spur country – flat enough to clear and pasture. Lot 137 covers the best of this lower country and straddles Boggy Creek for nearly 1km, and was selected by Purchase in June 1909 by Edward Braithwaite. Lot 146 to the east, and Lot 151 to the south, were both selected by Alfred Mitchell. Lot 146, being at the time more accessible though without permanent water, Mitchell selected by Purchase in August 1909, and Lot 151, just touching Boggy Creek at one of its corners, he selected by cheaper Lease in February 1910, presumably to secure a water source.

The matter of roads

To make some sense of both the sequence and the timing of these selections, we must turn to consideration of roads and access. When the brothers Jordan completed their selections in 1906 the only road to or on their land was the track past William Grant’s already established farm and continuing along the path of the current Little Boggy Track up on the ridge to eventually meet Horseshoe Road to the west. On this track the Jordan’s built their first hut and started clearing to the north.

As well as this initial clearing the Jordan brothers rapidly went to work along upstream Boggy Creek, which means they must have been able to get upstream at least with a horse if not with a dray. At first it is likely they would have gone down the gentle south slope of William Grant’s block until they met Boggy Creek and then simply walked up the creek to get to the southern and upstream areas of their holding. From their hut this is a very long way around – over 2km to get to the kraznozem flat down north of Cate’s.In addition Boggy Creek, providing both permanent water and potential arable land for farming, would have presented fruitful possibilities for other keen young settlers so that the three Lots making up the ‘back block’ of Shamballa and all the neighbouring Lots were eagerly selected in the period 1908-10.

Access to these holdings would have followed the existing line of road from Ed Sharp’s along to where the power line crosses the road just north of Cate’s. From there a cart track went back down to the Bottom Flat to cross the creek possibly at first right at the swimming hole corner and up the gully on the south bank. A short cutting down to what is now the horse crossing exists, suggesting that possibly the bank at the swimming hole was torn away in a flood, necessitating another gentler approach at the more upstream site. From there the track would have meandered up the hill across the community paddock and donkey paddock to go around the head of Gooseberry Gully (which has steep sides) up below Colin and Wendy’s. Once over Gooseberry, it would have run along the rolling spur of Jane’s house and then up Neil’s rolling spur before crossing a much smaller gully to the west and entering into Mitchell’s Lot 146 selection, and across another rolling spur above Tony’s place before crossing another small gully now crossed by the Telstra track to run across the big rolling spur of which Edward Braithwaite had already cleared 10 acres by 1910.

This line of road would have been followed initially because it was the most convenient with the least effort. Settlers were disinclined to put their time into building roadways; the main game was clearing and fencing in order to claim land and make a living. Earthworks must be done more or less by pick and shovel, so that it was usually quicker to fall and haul trees to build a bridge or trackway than to dig earth. Although horses are nimble on their feet when carrying only a rider, when heavily laden they are much less so. And heavily laden drays and wagons might be hauled by teams of bullocks, which require a very large turning circle and no sharp curves on inclines.Another major consideration for access was the natural vegetation. Surveyors notes of the time record ‘dense jungle in gullies’ i.e. viney rainforest, ranging through ‘heavily timbered scrubby forest ridges’ on the lower slopes (‘scrubby’ = rainforest) up to the high and dryer ‘blady grass ridges’ near the peak of Smith’s Hill. Most of the ground along this original line of road, then, was above the viney rainforest gullies and ran along the lower slopes which were covered in giant old-growth wet schlerophyll forest, a mix of eucalypt and rainforest species.

The few scattered old stumps and stags remaining today give a clear picture of the scale and demeanour of this old growth forest. It was indeed a ‘climax ecosystem, having developed continuously undisturbed for 12,000 years since the last ice age. The canopy trees were giants: 2-3 times the diameter of the biggest existing trees, and up to twice as tall as the existing canopy. The massive Ironbark below Uwe’s at the start of the cemetery ridge track is clearly an old-growth survivor, but its girth is below the old-growth average girth, and its height is well below average since the crown would have been badly damaged through exposure when its neighbours were felled. Because of the huge girth of these original trees and the enormous breadth of their canopy, the trees were spaced much further apart than is common in existing forest. The floor of the forest thus would have been relatively open, enabling a track to be made through it for a horse and dray for hundreds of metres more or less without falling a tree if one carefully picked the line for both slope and vegetation. This was of course a major advantage to the settlers.

This original track, aligned merely by convenience, had to be regularised as settlement proceeded and families became more reliant on their selections. Mostly this would be a straightforward operation: surveyors would merely record the existing road, allocating a reserve one chain wide (20m), the road would be gazetted and it would then be an official public right of way. But in this case officialdom considered this line of road to be inappropriate for failing to provide practical access to any land further up Boggy Creek. One can see why:the Boggy Creek valley generally is narrow, and above Shamballa rapidly becomes even narrower and especially deeply riven by gullies on both sides. Thus road access to the upper reaches of the Boggy Creek valley could only be achieved along ridges. Accordingly the current continuation of Boggy Creek Road was surveyed and eventually gazetted in 1912.

This move left Alf Mitchell’s two blocks (Lots 146 and 151) for all practical purposes cut off from road access within the Boggy Creek valley, although the south boundary of both blocks is formed by the Scotchman range and the road on its (very high and precipitous) ridge. In addition Edward Braithwaite’s promising effort on the lower slopes of Lot 137 was legally accessible only by climbing all the way up the ridge to Warren and Gabrielle’s, before dropping all the way back down again along the ridge past Dorothy’s and so across the Creek.

The demise of Jordan’s Farm

The gazettal of the new road in 1912 pretty much bisected Jordan’s Farm from the north-east corner to the south-west corner. It is hard to imagine Jordans were happy about this, though presumably they were expecting to permanently host the existing track through their farm. But it would no doubt have cheered W Talbot, whose 1908 selection of 150-odd acres to the west of Jordans and straddling what is now Bulley’s track would have been difficult to get to before this new road.

In any case, events unfolded over the next few years, and no bigger event than the Great War in 1914. After the Armistice in 1918 the government was concerned to provide for ex-soldiers and foster economic growth through further development of rural areas and rural industry. The Closer Settlement Act of 1918 enabled the government to resume land grants which were deemed to not have met the original grant conditions of clearing and fencing, to consolidate these blocks or redraw their boundaries to create more practical farm units, and to re-grant these blocks preferentially to soldiers who expressed interest – the so-called ‘soldier-settlers’. Under this act all four Lots making up the 500 acres of Jordan’s Farm were resumed in 1919. Perhaps the brothers’ lives were disrupted by the War, as so many people’s were, or perhaps they had simply failed at farming. Although the Jordan’s initial enthusiasm and informed strategy was shown in the 30 acres of good soil already cleared in 1906, many settlers found that the strictly farming activities of cropping or animal husbandry was an entirely different proposition. Pioneer skills of clearing, fencing and building a dwelling relied only on hard work and minimal tools and skills. Farming, on the other hand, relied extensively on the equally unpredictable weather, markets and transport, and revolved around often mundane routines, requiring an entirely different set of skills and, often, personality. In addition, many new settlers were unused to the isolated and rough life for years on end. A combination of all these factors meant that there were often waves of personnel in newly settled areas over their first few decades. The same appears true in the Boggy Creek valley.

After resumption in 1919, Jordan’s Farm was consolidated into three Lots. Lot 57, the long narrow 100 acres running along Little Boggy Creek, was left as is, with the other 3 Lots re-defined as Lot 174 north of the (new) road and Lot 175 south of the road. Lot 175 became the Shamballa ‘front block’.

Danzeys farm – Lot 175

In 1906 Frederick and Herbert Jordan originally selected most of the Shamballa land and more land to the north (see page “Jordans Farm”). But they appear to have abandoned their selection or were not successful farmers. In 1920 he administrators of the 1918 Closer Settlement Act resumed the Jordan’s Farm and split it into what was considered to be two economic units, separated by Boggy Creek Road: Lot 174 to the north and Lot 175 to the south. This south block, Lot 175, now makes up the front block of Shamballa. Charles William Danzey was allocated Lot 174 (north block) on 13 Feb 1920, while Lot 175 was allocated to Victor Lawrence Edwards on the same day. But both Lot 174 and Lot 175 were officially recorded as forfeit on 2 Feb 1923. Lot 175 was now set aside for “Returned Soldier (holding Preferential Right) only”, while Lot 174 was simply made available as part of the general ballot for Closer Settlement blocks. Lot 175 was eventually allocated to Charles Danzey on 14 May 1923, and this became the Danzey’s dairy farm.

Ellen Danzey

Ellen (nee Winter) was born at South Molton, Devon, UK on 1 October 1882. “She was never in good health as a young woman, and was advised to move to a warmer country. She married Henry James Cooke in 1911, and they migrated to Australia, arriving on 11 November 1911 on the “Norseman”. They resided at Bankstown, Sydney.” (Obituary Courier-Sun 2/9/76)

Henry Cooke

Henry Cooke was born near Winchester, Hampshire in 1881, and served 4 ¾ years with the 5th Dragoon Guards in UK before emigrating to Australia with his wife in 1911. He was killed in action in WWI in 1917. Henry and Ellen had 3 children: Charlie (Charles), Edie (Edith Mary) and Doris Ellen.

Charles Danzey

Charles Danzey was born at Norwood, Surry on 1 April 1887. His home at12 Cotswold St, WestNorwoodis a nondescript little street running alongside the railway, so that it has houses on only one side. No 12 is now 12-14, a 4 storey terrace probably made by combining the two original terraces. The nearest rail station is a long way off, but the house is almost across the road from the famous Norwood Cemetery– no doubt a fertile playground.

Charles served 2.5 years in the London Regiment of the Territorial Army. The Territorials, and that regiment, were created in 1908 as the volunteer reserve of the standing army, ‘territorial’ indicating volunteers had no obligation to serve overseas. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Regiment It’s likely he joined the Territorials around the time they formed, perhaps when he turned 21.

Charles was “a well-known resident of Boggy Creek and popular member of the local sub-branch of the RSL.” He was “familiarly known all over the Bellinger River as “Doc”, was one off the quiet, unassuming, and very genuine type of Englishman, and he was held in the highest regard by all acquaintances. He was born at Norwood, Surry, England, and he came out to Australia a few years prior to the outbreak of the Great War in 1914, and engaged in rural work. As soon as the call for men for overseas service was made he enlisted, and served with the famous 13th Australian Infantry Battalion in some of the toughest fighting experienced in various centres throughout France and Flanders. He was seriously injured during the campaign, and since the war ended he suffered acutely from recurring illnesses, and many times received treatment in the Randwick Military Hospital. He also met with a severe accident in more recent years, and this added to his difficulties. Nevertheless, “Doc” displayed remarkable fortitude, and he sought to always pass off his worries with a quiet smile and an indifference which revealed the full qualities of the man.” (Obituary Courier-Sun 7/6/40)

He was also a mason: At his funeral “a special Masonic service was conducted, with the W.M. of Lodge Raleigh officiating.” (ibid.)

Charles survived Gallipoli, but was badly wounded in the arm on Malta later in 1915. After recovering in hospital in England he was repatriated to Australia medically unfit in 1916 (Aust War Memorial records).

Charles and Ellen meet

Charles Danzey and Ellen Cooke may have met because Charles knew Ellen’s first husband Henry Cooke in the war (Eric Danzey pers. comm. Sept 2010). But war records show that Charles’ and Henry’s service did not overlap. However there is a chance they all met on the boat out from England in 1911.

Charles and Ellen married in Balmain, Sydney, in 1918. It is unknown how Charles and Ellen came up to Bellingen, but Charles was granted Lot 174 (Semfel’s) in February 1920. However he forfeited this block in February 1923, and in May 1923 gained Lot 175 under the Soldier Settler program.

The Farm house

Charles didn’t build the house – he wasn’t a builder. Charles and Ellen both mentioned moving the house over the creek by running it on rollers. The house possibly was originally the Jordans’ farm house which was on Lot 174 when Doc was granted that Lot in 1920. (Alf Bulley was granted Lot 174 in August 1924, so maybe Charles had a bit of breathing space after getting Lot 175.)

The house originally was just 4 rooms with a central hallway through. The boys slept on the front verandah (which may have been built on after it was moved), and the girls slept in one of the back rooms. Everyone ate in the kitchen, the other back room. The front rooms were the lounge and the bedroom (i.e. parents’). It was healthy sleeping on the verandah – fresh air. But when the rain was heavy or blown in you had to move the beds back closer to the wall.

After Charles bought Mitchell’s block up the back (1935), Mitchell’s dairy building was moved down and set up as a separate laundry-kitchen out the back of the house, linked by a short covered walkway with 3 steps to a new back verandah that ran right across the back of the house. That gave an extra room in the house, and more verandah space.

Farm operations

When Eric was at school they ran 50 head of dairy cows and about 50 pigs. They had a bull as well. They milked twice a day, separated the milk and the cream was put into milk cans, which were picked up at the ‘front gate’ i.e. near the Shamballa sign, by horse and cart. All the milk from the farms past Danzeys’, i.e. Mitchell’s, Bulley’s and Semfel’s blocks, had to be hauled down to there too, across the original corduroy crossing.

The dairy was just to the west of the house and slightly downhill. All the dairies in those days were heavily regulated, with inspectors dropping round unexpectedly to check up. Regulations required a minimum distance of the dairy from a house (maybe 20 yards?) and from a piggery so the milk wouldn’t get contaminated. Every dairy had to have a concrete floor and a coolroom, and all of it to be kept very clean and regularly whitewashed. All equipment had to be thoroughly scoured after each milking. Danzey’s farm had a copper outside (wood fired) to heat water for the scouring. The milk separator was in the dairy too, turned by hand. You had to get the speed right to separate the cream and whey. The whey was fed to the pigs.

Pigs were fed the whey along with pollard which was purchased in bags. The piggery was on the flank of Gooseberry gully up fairly high and facing south – up over the brow from the dairy, which was down below and to the west of the house. Each sow and piglets had a little pen with a shed. The sows and boar would be put in a run together, then when the sows were getting close to birthing they would be separated from the boar so that the boar would not eat the piglets.

‘Cleaning the land’. It was a constant job to maintain the paddocks ‘clean’ so that ‘rubbish’ would not grow. Keeping the paddocks clean was mostly done with a brush hook – cutting down scrub regrowth of all sorts while it was tiny. You had to do this to make sure the cattle got enough to eat. Scrub would stop the pasture growing.
When the weather had been dry for a while they’d run a little grass fire across a paddock, which killed the scrub and stimulated new grass growth.

Eric was involved with his dad in clearing the original forest. They would fall the trees, burn the stumps and plough the ground and plant potatoes. Ploughing was with a pair of horses.

Crops: Although the whole front block was cleared and all under pasture, they still had to grow crops for winter feed for the cattle – mostly oats but also sakhelene. The sakhelene put seed at the top, and it had to be left to dry on the stalk before harvesting because the seed was dangerous to cattle while green, causing them to bloat. One day the cattle broke in to a sakhelene crop and ate a lot, but Eric forced them to run around for quite a while and none of them got bloat.

Also they grew crops of corn for animal feed, and corn and potatoes to eat.

Paddocks: They grew winter crops on the flats north of Boggy Creek (Bottom Flat and Garlic Paddock) but these were pretty poor ground. The best ground for all crops was the ‘Big Flat’ – i.e. the flat in the lower field of the Bottom Paddock. They grew corn and potatoes down there, but also corn sometimes on the hill above the house.
The paddock to the east of the house – i.e. the old goat paddock where Chris’s vineyard is was called the Gully Paddock. It was steep but perfectly clear. Upstream from the dairy was the Day paddock – i.e. Jan’es paddock and the gooseberry orchard. You reached it by a cutting down the (gooseberry) gully. To lead the cattle across the gully you followed the fence west down the hill from the dairy. This fence ran along the bottom of the slope now covered in silky oak plantation at the edge of the little flat which is now Bryan and Eva’s back yard. At the end of this fence you turned left and went down a cutting to the bottom of the gully, to slightly downstream of where the current road crossing is, then straight up the other side, which was not so steep as to require a side cut.

Charles dies 1940

Charles died from septicaemia on 30 may 1940. He had cut himself shaving, and it became infected. Eric was 17 and Ron was still at home, working the farm too but also working for one of the Young & McRae families at the farm where Readymix now is. Norm was still at school, aged 13.

After Charles died there was still no money. At first Eric and Ron took turn about with the milking, or did it together. Ellen helped with the milking but couldn’t always because she had bad legs. Eric milked 38 cows single handed. After a while Ron went working for the McRaes down near Readymix because there wasn’t any money in the farm. Eric did all the rest. But there was still no money. Eric just worked to pay the bills. He didn’t have any money to spend.

World War II

When the war came Eric enlisted (possibly when he turned 18, i.e. Sept 1940) and was assigned to the Volunteer Defence Corps (VDC) because he was in effect supporting his mother with running the farm, since his father had died. The VDC trained at nights.

The Escaped Convicts

One Saturday night in 1942 Eric was in town at a dance, and heard a rumour that 3 men had broken out of gaol at the police station. The next morning he was milking, and heard voices. They had camped up at Bulleys the previous night, because there was an empty house, and walked down to the farm from there. When Eric heard the voices he thought quick, and went over to the house and said to Ron “Quick, get on your horse and ride down to McRaes and telephone for the police. I think those escaped convicts are heading this way. And mum – if they turn up, give them a cup of tea.” He went back to milking, and sure enough, the 3 men came up. One of them took a drink of fresh milk, and they heard Ron galloping off and asked Eric where that man was going. Eric played it cool and said “That’s my brother going off to work.” They asked about a meal, and Eric directed them over to the house. Ellen gave them tea, and they sat drinking it on the verandah. Meanwhile about 20 policemen headed by (?) Rankin had ridden out, and were watching them secretly from the ridge to the east. The convicts asked Ellen which way was it to Dorrigo, and Ellen pointed to the north-east. So they headed down across the big flat, and when they got to the creek Eric heard 2 shots, and the men were captured.

This was all written up in the Courier-Sun.

Bullocks and an Axe

Eric bought his first bullock team of 10 sometime in 1947. He got into bullocking via older brother Ron, who had had bullocks by then for some years and was competent with them. Eric mostly used them to snig logs he’d falled by axe, snigging them up to the road, where he would help load a truck from Tommy Sheridan’s mill onBoggy Ck Rd. He was logging Ellen’s and his own blocks a bit but mostly Semfel’s. He got a heap of Flooded Gum off Semfel’s.

Eric kept that bullock team til he sold them in about 1953 and bought a little crawler tractor. But sometimes he’d be just dairying, sometimes both dairying and logging, and sometimes just logging. The economics of dairy went up and down, and the land here was very marginal for dairying. Logging money was always there but slow, and hard work.

Selling the dairy herd 1948

Ellen sold the dairy herd at auction on 28 Jan 1948. Eric had had his bullock team for some short time and found he couldn’t manage the dairy and the logging. “Mrs Danzey has decided to give up dairying so that her sons can devote more time to timber hauling.” (C-S 9/1/48) The herd consisted of:
20 cows in full milk
10 Springing cows
3 Heifers, 2 years old
1 Steer (12 months)
12 Calves on bucket
1 A.I.S. Bull
… good quality Shorthorn with a fewGuernsey. The cows are young and in good condition.”

When the dairy herd was sold all the pigs may have been already sold to the bacon factory just as meat.

I am indebted to the amazingly detailed recollections of Eric Danzey for nearly all of the material on this page and many subsequent pages – David Bloodwood

The Back Block 1948

Ron married his wife Joan in 1948, at about the same time Eric met his future wife Norma McFadyen, from the well-known Gleniffer pioneer family. In the same year Ellen transferred the back block to Eric and Ron.
By agreement between them Eric got the Mitchell blocks (west) and Ron gotLot137 (east, by the road), which was ‘mostly clean’. Ron grazed his bullocks there, built his ‘shack’, and lived up there with his wife Joan. But the country was too poor, and Ron sold out to Eric and bought a place at Brierfield, then sold that and bought on Martell’s Road. Eric never cleared his block or worked it; he logged it.

Eric and Norma married in Oct 1949, and at first they lived with Ellen in the old house. Robert and 2nd child Brian were born while Eric and Norma continued living with Ellen. Soon after Brian’s birth they moved up to Ron’s ‘shack’ (early 1952?), but were not there very long.

Bulleys

They moved from Ron’s ‘shack’ to Bulley’s, which had a little house on it (transfer dated 17 Sept 1954). Eric ‘milked a few’ there, selling the whole milk, but it was too poor to do any good.

In 1953 while at Bulleys Eric sold his bullock team and bought a little green crawler tractor which he used for snigging instead. He still falled trees with an axe, though.

Bulleys house burnt down some time after Eric moved out – he suspects it was arson.

Eric owned Bulleys til 10 April 1958, when it was transferred to George Lavender of Thora Road.

The back history of Bulley’s block is:

William Henry Talbot selected Lots 115 and 116 in 1908. 115 was Conditional Purchase, and 116 was Conditional Lease. In 1909 he converted 116 to Conditional Purchase as well. There are 2 road resumptions for the extension of Boggy Creek Rd, first in 1912, then a minor adjustment to one section on the boundary with Lot 137 in 1921. Then in 1939 The Bank of Australasia took a mortgage when Alfred Frederick Bulley bought it. This mortgage was discharged when it was transferred to Alf’s widow Margaret in 1954 prior to sale to Eric (Land Titles Office records)

The Cyclone 1954

The original house was very badly damaged in the big cyclone in February 1954. Ellen was away in Sydney visiting one of the daughters, possibly around the time of a birth. On 20 Feb the cyclone came through, tearing off the roof of the living room, and soaking everything inside. Les Semfel, a tall skinny older man, a self-taught builder living over the road, gave Eric a hand to build a new little house for Ellen, pretty quick afterwards. Les directed the project and Eric helped. They used the timber from the original house, but the iron was ruined in the cyclone, so new iron was used. When Ellen came home fromSydney she camped in the surviving part of the house til the new little cottage was ready.

Eric brought down some poles on the ute from Bulleys where he was living, and squared them up with a broad-axe for piers for the new cottage.

Semfels

Soon after the cyclone Les Semfel left his farm and Eric moved there, possibly early Spring 1954. He still had the little crawler tractor. Les Semfel’s house had concrete stumps, and the land was a lot better than Bulleys: Les had planted kikuyu down on the red soil between the house and Cedar Creek, and Eric would wait til the kike was 2ft high, then put the cows in on it and ‘they’d milk alright off that’. He also rented Ellen’s paddocks on the north side of Boggy Ck.

The sulky and the old car found near Cate’s would have belonged to Bulleys. Bulleys had Lot 174 (Semfels) from 1924 to 1936 but forfeited it when they didn’t pay for it. Les Semfel got the block after WWII, and had an army van as a vehicle.

Eric Leaves Boggy Creek 1955

The family moved to East End in town because of the kids and getting them to school. Through a solicitor he swapped Semfel’s block for a milk run with truck, picking up cream cans from the farms. Eric sold his dairy cows separate from the land/business swap. He sold the land to Tom Lavender, who was just a dealer and didn’t want to farm the land. Tom bought Eric’s herd too, but took them over to his farm and put them with his herd. Tom had the milk run that Eric got in exchange for the land.

Les Cooper bought the house separately, and broke it up into sections and moved it next to where Readymix is now.

Tom Lavender sold the block to Archie Crombie, who also was a dealer, and he soon sold it to APM.

The Back Block is sold

On 10 May 1956 Eric sold the back block to James Blakeney Kimber of Kalang. Kimber took out a mortgage to his wife Amy in July of that year. Only two years later James Kimber sold to Max Mills of Kalang. Max Mills enters into a number of intriguing transactions with the back block. Firstly, he rolled over the mortgage with Amy Kimber (who was till recorded as wife of James). Then in July 1962 he obtains a second mortgage with the Rural Bank. In July 1965 a caveat is recorded over the title. In June 1969 he is able to discharge the first mortgage with Amy Kimber by extending his mortgage with the Rural Bank. This transaction is with the approval of the caveator of 1965. In February 1974 he is warned of the land tax implications of having multiple holdings, but by this time negotiations had been entered into with the proto-Shamballans, to whom he eventually sold some months later. The title was transferred to Jacona Holdings Pty Ltd on 10 May 1974, and then to Shamballa Co-op in April 1978. (Land Titles Office records)

Although Ellen was 73 when Eric and his family moved to town, and getting quite blind, she continued to live in the little cottage by herself without phone or power. She loved having the grandchildren to come out and stay. But things were difficult and after some years she moved out to Brierfield to live with Ron and his wife in about 1963 when she was in her 80th year.

A final land transaction occurred while Ellen was still alive: in 1968, 45 years after Charles and Ellen were originally granted the land, Lot 175 was converted from Conditional Purchase to Freehold at a cost of $1540. 

The sale of the family dairy herd in 1948 really marked the end of the farming operation on the front block. Ron and his wife moved up to the ‘shack’ and then left the area shortly afterwards. Eric was living next door and occasionally renting some of the paddocks, but he was doing less and less farming as he increasingly struggled to make ends meet for his growing family through a mix of dairying and logging. Eventually he decided that off-farm work was a better bet than farming itself, and bought a milk run when he moved to town.

Between 1955 when Eric moved to town and 1976 when Ellen died, there was some agistment but the whole property became gradually more rundown and more overgrown. Ron Danzey managed the property for Ellen, since Eric didn’t have time to even visit it. Gordon Braithwaite logged some of it in the 1960s, and put in the side cut across Boggy Creek downstream of Tony’s place. The Bottom Flat was entirely covered in privet forest tall enough to walk through when the Shamballans first moved on to the front block in 1978. Neighbour Frank Stump was running some dairy cows on Semfels in the mid 1970s, using the old bales for milking. Semfels was sold to Australian Paper Mills (APM) in the late 1950s, but they did nothing to it before selling it to State Forests in about 1992. Although Semfels paddock was growing in at the edges it was still largely clear, even in 1990 when Cate ran horses there. In 1994 State Forests cleared, ripped and planted the red flat with Blue Gum. Bob Phillips recalls in 1974 the road from the front gate up to the back block was largely a tunnel under lantana.

Although Ellen was 73 when Eric and his family moved to town, and getting quite blind, she continued to live in the little cottage by herself without phone or power. She loved having the grandchildren to come out and stay. But things were difficult and after some years she moved out to Brierfield to live with Ron and his wife in about 1963 when she was in her 80th year.

A final land transaction occurred while Ellen was still alive: in 1968, 45 years after Charles and Ellen were originally granted the land, Lot 175 was converted from Conditional Purchase to Freehold at a cost of $1540. 

The sale of the family dairy herd in 1948 really marked the end of the farming operation on the front block. Ron and his wife moved up to the ‘shack’ and then left the area shortly afterwards. Eric was living next door and occasionally renting some of the paddocks, but he was doing less and less farming as he increasingly struggled to make ends meet for his growing family through a mix of dairying and logging. Eventually he decided that off-farm work was a better bet than farming itself, and bought a milk run when he moved to town.

Between 1955 when Eric moved to town and 1976 when Ellen died, there was some agistment but the whole property became gradually more rundown and more overgrown. Ron Danzey managed the property for Ellen, since Eric didn’t have time to even visit it. Gordon Braithwaite logged some of it in the 1960s, and put in the side cut across Boggy Creek downstream of Tony’s place. The Bottom Flat was entirely covered in privet forest tall enough to walk through when the Shamballans first moved on to the front block in 1978. Neighbour Frank Stump was running some dairy cows on Semfels in the mid 1970s, using the old bales for milking. Semfels was sold to Australian Paper Mills (APM) in the late 1950s, but they did nothing to it before selling it to State Forests in about 1992. Although Semfels paddock was growing in at the edges it was still largely clear, even in 1990 when Cate ran horses there. In 1994 State Forests cleared, ripped and planted the red flat with Blue Gum. Bob Phillips recalls in 1974 the road from the front gate up to the back block was largely a tunnel under lantana.