Mother of Ten Read Online Free Page A

suggests that Myrtle and Bobby might be able to join him.
    It
wouldn’t be much for you, love, but everybody else is getting their wife up
here, I don’t see why I can’t be doing the same. I mean I seem to be the
loneliest guy about here, Myrtle.
    He
returns to the idea later in the same letter.
    I’ll
have to try to persuade you to come up here, love, because I can’t live without
you, darl. See what you’ve done to me, love, made me love you like that. 
I never think of going out with another girl. It just doesn’t appeal to me
anymore, darl. Yet one time I used to be the biggest flirt going ... all I want
in this world is to get home to you and get with you. I’m not worried about
home, love, it’s you I want.
    On
the last page of the letter he returns again, but with less optimism, to the
suggestion that Myrtle and Bobby join him in Seymour.
    I
guess it’s not much of an idea, love, because we are not in a position to
afford it, are we darl?
    In
another letter, undated but written around the same time, he once again laments
that he is unable to get out to be with her and asks if there is anything she
wants.
    I
want you to have anything you desire, love, and if I can get it you will have
it love .
    Myrtle
apparently asked him to get her a camera because in another letter he
apologises that he was not able to get one in Seymour and promises to try to
get her one in Melbourne when he is transferred to the hospital there.
    Not
all his letters have survived the years but they must have written daily to
each other because later in the same letter he comments:
    I
haven’t had a letter from you today, Myrtle. I guess I will get it this
afternoon, love.
    All
of his letters start with ‘Dearest Myrtle’ and end with ‘your ever loving
husband’ and several rows of kisses. Wherever he could find space on the
lettergram he added more kisses and messages like ‘all my love to you, darl’.
He asks about his son in each letter. In one he writes:
    Gosh,
Bobby is getting a big fellow, isn’t he? He’s not very tall though.
    Myrtle
apparently took a photo of Bobby, probably with a camera borrowed from her new
mother-in-law, and sent it to George. I am not sure how tall he expected a
child of less than six months to be!
     Myrtle
must have also made mention of Bobby being ill, for George goes on to say:
    Myrtle
what’s this about him dying? He’s not looking that bad is he love? He’s not
going to die - look who his parents are! Anyway, if he is sick, send me a
telegram and I will see if they will give me some compassionate leave.
    The
reference to Myrtle’s fear that Bobby might be dying is interesting. Mothers
who have been separated from their babies have reported experiencing such fears
with subsequent children, believing their child might die as punishment for
‘abandoning’ their previous child or children.
    After
receiving a bone graft at Heidelberg Hospital in Melbourne to repair a wrist
injury, George was finally reunited with his family when he was discharged from
the army in March 1945 and returned to Orbost.
    The
township of Orbost is a small community in the East Gippsland Shire 375
kilometres east of Melbourne. It is part of the territorial home of the Kurnai
people who once occupied the whole of East Gippsland. The town is situated on
the banks of the Snowy River with its mouth a picturesque ten-minute drive
away.
    Established
in 1842, Orbost was initially a farming community but a significant timber
industry developed due to the area’s rich forestry resources and the 1939
fires, one of Australia’s worst natural disasters. It had been a hot, dry
summer during 1938 and 1939 with fires breaking out over the state. On January
13, 1939 (known as Black Friday) temperatures reached over 45 degrees Celsius.
A northerly wind hit the state and the fires became one massive fire front. Seventy
one people died. More than 20 000 square kilometres of land were burnt
including several towns, 1300 homes and 69