David Birkett - Recollections & Short Stories

Thirsty Trip to Lake Torrens

In 1963, when I was 15 years of age, Robert (‘Tiger’) Faddy, John Millard (23 year old Boxing Instructor) and myself decided to walk from Leigh Creek to Lake Torrens. The reason for the walk was that we had heard a light aircraft had landed on the salt lake a few years before, and due to the lack of accessibility, and the fact that the plane had sunk in the mud to above the wheels, it was reputed to be still there and we wanted to find it. We took two containers of water each, and due to the hot weather forecast also took four frozen ‘tetra packs’ of milk in our back packs, to provide a cold drink on the way back.

After climbing up the stony face of Mount Beat, with our heavy backpacks, we were exhausted so we paused at the top, by an old stone cairn, to rest. We could look across to the East, from where we had travelled, and could see the township of Leigh Creek and to the West to view another smaller group of ranges, red sandhills and the glowing white of the salt lake. I had a pair of binoculars in my backpack and looking out to the salt lake I could see the bogged plane. Before proceeding we decided to remove a few stones from the base of the Mount Beat cairn, and inserted the four (still frozen!) milk packs into the cooler recesses of the cairn for our return. We proceeded down to the valley and climbed the next smaller ranges with ease but the travel through the sand hills was more difficult than we had anticipated. The sun was now climbing, the heat was starting to get to us and we were drinking more of our water to alleviate the constant thirst. We reached the edge of the lake, and again visually establish the plane’s location through the binoculars. I looked as if it had landed yesterday, and was completely intact, apart from bent wings and bent rear fuselage. However, to get to the plane we would have had to walk through the mud, under the salt layer. We had not considered this when planning our journey. We made the difficult decision to turn back as all three of us were extremely low on water and recognised the onset of extreme thirst from the heat! We crossed the first group of ranges, visualising our four cold milk packs on the summit of Mount Beat! However in the valley looking up, to our horror, all the ranges looked the same, and even with the binoculars we noticed that five summits had similar cairns on them which we had not noticed on the outward journey! We made a decision to rest under the shade of a gum tree on a dry creek bank, and decided to take turns to climb the five summits to find the frozen milk packs. After three unsuccessful climbs we decided to abandon the search, and head over the ranges back to Leigh Creek. From the summit of one peak we again sighted Leigh Creek township, with its welcoming rows of green trees, and water! We had by now completely run out of water, and were having difficulty talking, as our tongues had collectively swollen inhibiting our ability to communicate. As we progressed down the steep ranges, John Millard gesticulated towards the North East, where we sighted a white stone building, which was an outstation for one of the large stations in the area (Myrtle Springs). Through the binoculars we could see a rainwater tank and sheep trough, by a water windmill. This meant water, so we headed across to the stone hut (as we found out later that was its name).

We reached Stone Hut, and proceeded to fill our water cans from the tap at the bottom of the large corrugated iron tank. Within minutes, the fly screen door of the hut creaked, and burst open, with an old guy with a white beard and a rifle in his hands. He fired three rounds at us and although he missed, the bullets kicked up the yellow sandy soil extremely close by. We ran for the sandy mound on the banks of the nearby creek and dived over, with another three or four bullets kicking up sand on the top of the mound. We lay there to recover our breath as the old man let out a range of loud obscenities and went back into the hut. John Millard then suggested he would sneak back with three water canteens and quietly fill them, and that we were to remain there in the creek. We watched John, walking in a fast half crouch, quietly return to the rain water tank and start filling the canteens from the outlet tap. He was filling the third canteen when the door of the hut burst open again and the old man stormed out angrily with the rifle shouting obscenities. He didn’t initially see John, so Robert and I started throwing stones from the creek bed to distract him. While he shot wildly at us, John made a fast dash back to the sandy mound, diving over the bank with three full canteens. The old man fired another fusillade of random and wildly targeted shots and retired back into hut. Due to the intensity and speed of what had happened, we had not felt any fear, but we later realised what a potential close call that the incident may well have been, to our health and safety!

We arrived back at Leigh Creek, again filling our canteens from the large rainwater tanks at the rear of the Single Men’s quarters, where John lived. After the water, John brought out a couple of cold bottles of ‘Southwark’ beer! Although Robert Faddy and I were only 15 years old, it was the best drop of cold beer that I have ever tasted to this day! We reported the incident to the Leigh Creek Police and subsequently Sergeant Rabbich advised us that the guy who shot at us, was a WWII veteran from Tobruk in North Africa and that he had a steel plate in his head from the war. He was the Father of a local Station owner, and also had a drinking problem. In consideration of the guy’s history, they confiscated his rifle, and asked the Station owner to keep a closer eye on him. For me this was a significant lesson about the dangers of walking too far in the extreme heat of summer in Australia! As for the four frozen milk containers? Yes! They are possibly still there within the cairn, behind the lower stones, certainly no longer frozen? Perhaps in years to come some future archeologists will puzzle over these strange containers and their purpose.

The Roulette Wheel Raid

This was one of the most interesting and humorous incidents during my life Leigh Creek. In 1963, when I was 16 years old I frequented with a group of young people of similar age from school. One of my acquaintances (David Beal), whose father owned the local garage and service station, had access to one of the open CJ5 Willys Jeeps, that his father owned the regional franchise for. Every week on a Friday night in ‘Hollywood’ (a single men’s quarters and Nissan huts) a Greek guy commonly known as ‘Louie the Greek’ ran an illegal betting casino, for the mainly single mine staff to bet (and lose!) their hard earned money on the marbles of the spinning wheel. The betting area was a single men’s social event, operated in the open air, on trestle tables. This was conducted outside the Nissan Huts of Hollywood and Silver City, on hot nights, with four large trestle tables for the miners to secure their money, captivated usually by large stones, so that the money didn’t blow away across the salt bush plains in the light and warm summer breezes.

David ‘Butch’ Beal and the lads (myself; Allan Fuchs; ‘Lofty’ Mick Clement (Town & mine Manager’s son) and; Malcolm ‘Feather’ Beal (David’s older brother) drove in the dark of late night in the Jeep, quietly with the headlights off, across the open salt bush plain viewing the portable Hollywood lights illuminating the tables and the casino wheel, with all the enthusiastic gambler’s eyes riveted on the ball rotating with the spinning wheel. It is worth noting, that although an illegal activity, the local South Australian Police were reputed to be aware of this activity, and by prior arrangement with Louie the Greek, made regular tacit raids at predetermined monthly dates, for which Louie the Greek was quite happy with, as he cleared the betting wheel off the tables, and had bottles of wine and beer, with others from Hollywood, smiling at the notified Police raid.

On the Jeep we had two spotlights mounted on the foldable windscreen, which, when we were close enough, were both turned on, with the headlights on high beam. The engine was then gunned, screaming towards, and through the gambling tables. Money blew everywhere, with the numerous gamblers running for cover, as they thought it was an ‘un-notified Police raid’, in the Police Land Rover. Louie the Greek waved his fist in the air with a hammer, shouting ‘I will kill all of you’. Needless to say, we kept going at a fast rate, through the Hollywood Nissan Huts to the Road, and across more open country, where we stopped, turned the lights off, subsequent to all breaking into hysterical laughter, and sharing a couple of ‘long neck’ Southwark beers. The Gamblers had (wrongly!) assumed that it was a Police raid. We heard nothing else about this incident, but it became a legend in the Leigh Creek Folk lore history.

The Opals and the Accident

On December 4th (1967), at midnight, I was a passenger in a car driven by Peter Radzimanowski, whilst returning from the Lyndhurst Hotel. There were six of us in the car (John Stone and myself in the front seat with the driver, and in the rear seat, Edo Vries; Jim Crawford - a cadet Police Officer, and my brother Ian. We had been buying opals at the Hotel, from opal miners traveling from Andamooka & Coober Pedy. The miners poured opals on the counter to sell for cash, and after a few beers we thought it was a good time to negotiate an opal purchase. We then drove back, with Peter at the wheel. It was a hot dusty December night and without airconditioning in the 1967 Toyota Corolla, I sat on the outside of the front seat, with the window wound down. We stopped to relieve ourselves by the Leigh Creek Airport, and when we re-entered the car John Stone, who was 1.8 m tall argued with me that he had been squeezed up for a long time in the middle of the front seat and that he should sit by the window. As I could see the lights of the town, I shrugged and moved to the centre. After another 500 metres we hit the ‘S’ bend in the road, by the exit of the Airport. Peter failed to straighten up through the ‘S’bend, and crashed through a bridge rail to land nose first in a dry creek bed approximately 6 metres below. The car ended up with the front in the ground and vertically against a gum tree. I awoke to the sight of the red light of the ignition switch which obviously was still on despite no engine operating and the odour of petrol, with a still hot engine between my legs! The car front was pushed back to the windscreen and the mass of the three people in the rear of the car had pushed the front seat off its mountings, forcing the driver and the front seat passengers into the dashboard. All were now covered in grey paint from a burst tin of grey paint from under the front, subsequent to the massive impact.

 I couldn’t  feel any pain for a while, until Edo Vries pulled me out, and tried to get me to stand. My left leg was the wrong way round with a hip fracture and the right leg resembled a banana! The ambulance arrived, as my brother Ian had bravely run into the edge of town to the garage (Beal’s Garage), with a fractured skull, to raise the alarm. John Stone had been killed and the ambulance medics took some time to consider how to raise me from below the bridge with extensive injuries? The ambulance battery failed, due to the extensive operation of spotlights to illuminate the crash scene, and had to be pushed started, with me in it, to get me to hospital. I was flown out by the Royal Flying Doctor the next morning, to Adelaide and after some major surgery, spent 3 months in the Royal Adelaide Hospital, and later in an Adelaide recovery centre at Hillcrest. As the hot engine had ended up between my legs in the accident, with subsequent visual injury to ‘the Crown Jewels’, the Doctors advised that I would probably not be able to have children in the future (in later years to be proved incorrect!).

 A conversation that I have remembered all of my life, was in the Hillcrest rehabilitation area, where I spent 2 months in bed. Across the other side of the ward, there was an older man (possibly early 50’s?), who had his legs amputated section by section, due to diabetes. About twice per week he had a visitor, with a peaked hat, who brought in a number of cheques to sign? He used to wheel his wheel chair, daily, across to my bed (I was in traction with my left leg and full length plaster in my right leg!). Being a cheeky 19 year old, I asked him what was the guy in the peaked hat was visiting him for? He responded that he owned 3 multi-storey buildings within the Adelaide CBD, and was a millionaire! He elaborated further, to tell me that across all of his life, his focus was to have a great deal of money and economic power, which he had now achieved. However, he said that he had neglected his health and smoked cigarettes, with no exercise at all. Consequently his health had deteriorated, and that due to his condition, was unlikely to leave the facility that we were currently in until his death! He advised me that when I leave and recover, to ensure that I maintain and keep my health, as once that you have lost it (like him), you cannot buy it back, no matter how much money that you might gain! This advice has since motivated me to maintain my health all of my life, as the most important and valued personal asset, in conjunction with a better set of personal values than I had previously! When I returned to Leigh Creek David Beal asked me if I had a blood transfusion from a Priest, as my whole personality had changed significantly.

The 3 months provided me with some thinking time about my life and my future life’s direction? Also, with two broken legs, I had an affair with one of the nurses in the ward late at night. In those days the nurses were under complete control of the matron 24 hours of the day, and slept in a dormitory. I discharge myself from hospital in March 1968, as I thought that I had been there long enough, plus my bed was next to the morgue, and every day a deceased person was wheeled past my bed! I stayed in my cousin Jean’s flat at Glenelg and Diane (the nurse) accompanied me. One day later, the S.A. Police rang the door bell, to advise me that the matron of the Rehabilitation Centre, had called them, and accused me of kidnapping the nurse! Despite my advice that Diane accompanied me of her own free will the Police escorted her back to the Rehabilitation Centre for a lecture from the matron. It was another interesting experience.  

Upon my return to Leigh Creek, I gave up smoking; drinking and studied by correspondence. I also gained a position in the Mechanical Drawing Office in 1968. Ray Gray, apart from being my boss in the Drawing office, became a good friend and mentor for my life’s future direction. He encouraged me to run as a form of rehabilitation, as there was no support physiotherapy in those days at Leigh Creek at all. I used to arise from my bed at 0500 hours and walk/limp out to the racecourse on the edge of town, to initially, walk a lap. I eventually became stronger in my legs and was able to run to the racecourse, do one lap, and then out to a flooded mine (‘K’ Cut), which was 750 metres long and 100 metres wide. I then swam in the summer, and then ran back home to have a shower, and to commence work in the Mechanical Drawing Office at the Northfield Workshop location.