I was recently sent this following extract from a new publication, ‘In the Line of Fire’ by Ian Townsend ,by Merv Kennedy who noticed the connection of the family to the Goldfields.
This extraordinary true story has almost been forgotten, a young mother & her son Dickie caught up in a difficult situation & totally lacking in support or any chance of escape, regretfully their destiny was to end in a terrible way.
The execution of a young boy who lived in Varden St, Kalgoorlie during 1934 & the ethnic riots with his mother, Marjorie Manson, while they survived the horrors of the Ding Bat Flats riots & local hostilities, they did not survive the firing squad in Rabaul New Guinea in 1942.
Marjorie Manson was born in 1911, in Wellington NZ & was raised in Adelaide, a dressmaker by craft, she fell pregnant at & had a son, Richard Manson in 1931, as a single mother she adopted the family name to protect her son.
While living with her parents, Gorden & Phyllis Manson, in Prospect Adelaide SA, she meet Jack Gasmier, he was out of work & doing part-time gold prospecting in out-back SA & NSW, eventually he was able to raise sufficient funds to work the Bardoc show near Ora Banda, north of Kalgoorlie, with his mate, Willi Fritz, in August 1933, they had formed Bardoc Consolidated & Ora Banda Gold Syndicate, with financial backing from Adelaide, Jack was the Mine Manager.
Marjorie & Dickie arrived in Kalgoorlie in January 1934 by train, they faced a torrid & hot summer & even hotter conditions with the race riots, they heard fire crackers, bombs going off, rifle shots–not for the last time, seen flames glowing south of Varden St, Kalgoorlie, Jack had sent for them, paid the train fare from Adelaide & promised to marry her–which he did, on the 14th March 1934 at the local registrars office in Kalgoorlie, Jack had a wedding ring made of pure gold from the diggings at Bardoc, young Dickie turned 3 at this time & things were looking up for them.
They lived into a modest furnished home in Varden St, owned by Mrs Henry, Jack & his mate travelled to Bardoc each day for work, while Marjorie set up her dressmaking business in the front room, hopeful that their new lives would be exciting & financially rewarding, unfortunately she had a mis-carriage in June 1935, this resulted in medical treatment in Perth, unfortunately things fell apart quickly & their financial circumstances suffered badly & rising debts. The mining venture collapsed, the syndicate cut off funding, her health was a real concern, plus mounting medical bills to pay & no money.
Jack was charged with false pretenses & served 7 months in Fremantle prison & hard labour for issuing dud cheques, this paved the way for Marjorie & Dickie to return to Adelaide in 1935 & her parents home, train fare paid for by her father, their second trip across the vast Nullarbor Plain, regretfully she was at war with her own mother & stayed that way for the rest of her short life, but soon to venture into a far bigger war & tragic consequences.
Her decision to move to Brisbane in 1937 was because Jack was released from prison & secured work there & wanted to unite the family again, by October Marjorie was dressmaking in a small living room in Ascot Flats, Jack was working at a local factory for motor car bodies, Dickie was attending Fortitude Valley Boys School, as Richard Gasmier–but as fate would have it, she met Ted Harvey.
He was a plantation owner from Rabaul New Guinea, she was a dressmaker & he needed someone to mend a jacket & trousers for him, while on business in Brisbane, as well for medical treatment for his wife, as it turned out, Mrs Harvey never left Brisbane, Ted Harvey was a difficult person to deal with & his behaviour would lead to the death of everyone close to him, including Marjorie & Dickie. He engaged Marjorie as a dressmaker, then as his full time bookkeeper, the wider world was falling apart, Federal elections due in Australia, International sanctions & peace talks being held globally, the threat of war was looming & her prospects of family security & comfort fading quickly. The atmosphere of chaos was not far away, the Japanese Military, Volcanoes erupting in Rabaul & the crossing of pathways with Ted Harvey, followed by even more chaos.
Ted Harvey left his wife behind & sailed for New Guinea on the 12th November 1937, as Mr & Mrs Harvey, using his wife return ticket for Marjorie, on the liner ” Nankin”. He offered a vast coconut & cocoa plantation, gold mine, accommodation & a lifestyle dreams made of, he gave her the impression he was rich. Marjorie was flattered by the attention and the prospects as his secretary, initially and then a closer relationship formed.
Jack Gasmier was left behind to piece the jigsaw together, again, it appears that Marjorie asked him to take Dickie to her parents home in Adelaide in late 1937 & then left both of them behind. Marjorie wrote to her mother in January 1938 , telling her about Rabaul & her new job and that she was married to Ted Harvey, she hadn’t married him, but still wore the gold wedding ring given to her by Jack Gasmier–who by this time was now out of the picture.
The arrival in Rabaul was exciting, the town was glorious, plenty of trees & fruit everywhere, colourful plants & flowers, her own living quarters on the plantation at Lassul Bay, full time employment, that was the limit of the relationship, but leaving Dickie behind hadn’t been as easy as she expected, the separation grieved her, although only brief, yet she felt something foul but could not put her finger on it?
Marjorie developed a great love for the tropical lifestyle & the comfort it provided, her duties as the bookkeeper only took an hour or so a day, with full time house servants on site, her life was changing quickly, new clothes, no cooking, no washing clothes, no washing dishes, the dream of security & comfort, it seem more than she dreamed of. But in her role as the bookkeeper, she found out that the plantation was in some financial pain, propped up by the small gold mine, as Ted Harvey continued to trade with various merchant traders, including the Japanese.
Dickie arrived in Rabaul in 1940 as a 9 year old boy to join his mother for the last time, as Australia was preparing for war with the Japanese & fortifying New Guinea, also installing coast watchers to serve as unofficial spys for Australia, Ted was a coast watcher.
In April 1940, Ted, Marjorie & Dickie sailed from Rabaul to Yokohama on business & noted the build up of navy warships in Japan, which he reported to the Australian Government, on his return to Rabaul. Marjorie’s belief that Rabaul was a paradise & a happy place to live for her son, was shattered when it was invaded by the Japanese military in January 1942, after the attack on Pearl Harbour in December 1941. Leading to the evacuation of the plantation & family home, as the invasion was successful & our troops were totally out numbered & pushed back into the hills & jungle.
Martial law was installed by the Japanese military, local families vacated their homes & also vanished into the thick jungle, Ted stocked up with ample food & water, while they lived with-out any mod-cons, they were safe for the time being, until Ted wrote to the Japanese military & offered to surrender, thinking they would end up as prisoners of war & cared for. Thinking that they may even be allowed to reside back on the family plantation, the fear of being found & captured was always in the back if their minds.
Surrender was the only option in early May 1942, they were contacted by a known local & lead to the Japanese police force & eventually the military, they were accused of being spy’s, in occupied Rabaul & martial law in force. Ted owned a tele radio, Marjorie a small gun & they did leave messages on the beach in rock form, for our pilots to follow, the family admitted to these things, a navy lawyer in a normal suit interviewed them & appeared to support them & it look like they had made the right decision to surrender, perhaps their war was over, it was, but not as they expected.
After being thrown into a small wooden storeroom at the prison camp, tried by the Japanese in a martial court & found guilty of spying, they had no chance, the young lawyer in the suit, turned up in full navy uniform, they had no defence counsel, the court case was in Japanese language, the now court lawyer tried to explain in English the proceedings & outcome, yet, they still thought all was ok, perhaps it was not fully explained to them in English, both Ted & Marjorie stood up & thanked the three sitting military judges for being fair during the trial & the death sentence, which they did not know & understand it had just been passed?
Death by firing squad. Young Dickie was not in court;
Mid afternoon, on the 18th May 1942, the whole family, including Jimmy Manson, Bill Parker were loaded up on the back of a truck like cattle & driven a short journey from the prison camp to an isolated location in Rabaul, Dickie stood between his mother & Ted Harvey, at the foot of a volcano & open pit, blind folded to disguise the open pit, he was only 11 years & 3 months old, recently celebrated his birthday in the jungle & a home made cake, as they dis-mounted the truck, his mother kissed him on the forehead for the last time & held his hand tightly,
The last thing he heard & felt was, his mothers hand, her breathing–then the shout to shoot, followed by his uncle Jimmy & family friend Bill Parker, no one will find them. The shout has now long gone, but never the sound of the rifle shot.
The Japanese navy destroyed all documents related to this case, but evidence was gathered during war crimes investigation after WW 11, the former navy lawyer presenting the case, was open & honest about the trial, when questioned, he believed it was a fair trial– questionable. Yet Dickie was found guilty & sentenced to death & not even in court, as well, he was a minor, total in-justice to this lad & his family, and why this story should never be forgotten, he was & still is one of us & absolutely innocent of any war crimes, yet no one was charged under the war crimes act–another in-justice.
The local who played a part in their surrender, Joe Roca, he died of poisoning in Rabaul hospital in 1948 for his part & the betrayal of a very tragic & moving story, the Australian government did reply to his grandmothers letters & offer any assistance to help her find out what happen to her daughter, her son & a very brave young grandson– again, another in-justice.
Moya Sharp
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They were ethnic riots, Moya, not race riots. http://museum.wa.gov.au/explore/wa-goldfields/getting-gold/ethnic-riots