A Spirit of Place

Jeff Townsend

Description

The historical tale of a young orphan’s journey across the seas from everything she knows to a new life in mainland Australia.
It is January 1835 as a newly-orphaned thief gathers what meager possessions she can find, places them in a hessian bag, and barely escapes with her life. When her journey leads her to the squalor and poverty of Cork, Ireland, Cherokee Rose Harper is viewed as just another raggedy street urchin. But what no one knows is that she is being pursued by those who want nothing more than to punish her for her crime.
With her only kin, her brother, away fighting as a mercenary, Cherokee Rose seemingly has no choice but to travel as far away as possible. After she disguises herself, she secures a job as a cabin boy on the ship, Neva, bound for the colony of New South Wales. While aboard, she befriends a young man, Ruian Conner, who protects her secret. Four months later when the Neva is wrecked in Bass Straight, Cherokee is rescued by a group of whalers and taken to mainland Australia where she is saved by an aboriginal, Wajum, who soon leads her on an unforgettable adventure across the grand continent.
A Spirit of Place is the historical tale of a young orphan’s journey across the seas from everything she knows to a new life in mainland Australia.

Sujets

• Wolves
• Historical
• Nueva York
• Misisipi
• Anaconda Plan
• United States territorial acquisitions
• Arkansas River
• Bleeding
• Cherokee
• Gray wolf
• Slavery
• Divine Insanity
• Kit Carson
• Civil War
• Utes
• Gold
• Paris
• Custer
• Platte River
• California
• Arkansas (rivière)
• Gettysburg
• Cherokees
• Fiction
• Lincoln
• Mississippi
• Kansas
• New York

Informations

• Publié par: Balboa Press AU
• Date de parution: 14 décembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781982296308
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

A Spirit Of Place
JEFF TOWNSEND


Copyright © 2023 Jeff Townsend.
 
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
 
 
 
Balboa Press
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Bloomington, IN 47403
www.balboapress.com.au
AU TFN: 1 800 844 925 (Toll Free inside Australia)
AU Local: [phone] ([phone] from outside Australia)
 
Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
 
The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.
 
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
 
 
 
ISBN: 978-1-9822-9629-2 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-9822-9630-8 (e)
 
Balboa Press rev. date:  12/07/2022
Contents
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Postscript The Aftermath
Authors Note
Acknowledgements

This book is part of the ‘Australiana’ series.
 
The First Series
Book 1:            A Spirit of Place (1830- 1841)
Book 2:            A Place of Spirits (1850- 1880)
 
The Second Series
Book 1:            Dare to Dream (1788-1791)
Book 2:            Dream to Dare (1860-1918)

            ‘We are all visitors to this time,
this place. We are just passing through.
            Our purpose here is to observe, to learn, to grow,
to love… And then we return home.’
 
Aboriginal proverb
‘A’mong all floures of the world the floure of the rose is chief and beerth ye pryse. For by fayrness they feed the sight and playseth the smell by ordour, the touch by soft hanslynge. And wythstondeth and socoureth by vertue against many syknesses and evrylles.’ Batholomeus Angelicus
DE PROPRIETATIBUS RERUM 1398
 
‘All Aborigines from Sydney onwards are to be made prisoners of war and if they resist they are to be shot and their bodies hung from trees in the most conspicuous places near where they fall, so as to strike terror into the hearts of surviving natives.’
Governor Lachlan Macquarie Orders to soldiers in 1816
‘The Irish are distinguishable by the making of loyal friends and determined enemies.’
                                                Source unknown
 
Dedication
To my very own Irish rose.. .my wife, Robyn.
Part One
1.
There is no pain like the loss of a mother. Cherokee Rose wiped away yet more tears. They just wouldn’t stop. “Come on lass,” her Da said, “There’ll be time fer yer grievin’ later. There is workin’s to be done. Grab ‘old of the other end lass.”
Rose bent her nine-year-old frame over and picked her mother’s legs already wrapped in a sheet of swaddling, off the bed with a heave and followed her Da out the door of the humble cottage. She braced herself for the cool air and dampness of the late summer evening and followed unceremoniously the backward footsteps of her Da. She noticed the weakness, the tiredness and the strain in his weathered features that belied his 45 years. He masked the sadness, for her sake but she knew. This was a woman whom he loved most devotedly for far more than her nine years.
It was only a short, but long carry to the tree on their few acres that were wedged between road and rocky out climb, that no one else would dare try and scratch out a living. There was only one tree amongst the potato crops that hung sickly and limply with the disease that rotted its produce in the very soil that they stood, squelching between her bare toes. Gently they lowered the body. The hole was already dug, not very deep for the rock there too was a barrier to any promised land. With a counting of three, one final lift placed the body into the crevice.
“If you know any prayers lass now is the time to say them?” There were no priests around to do a proper service. Father Reynolds was he, himself with a sickness, bedridden and his off sider, young Father Kelly was called away for his own mother’s ill health. Rose had stopped her crying with the effort required. For a moment it ceased to be her mother, her womb of birth, her love and her life and became another chore to be done. But now the tears started to well again.
“Ma I don’t know what I will do without you but I will be strong and take care of Da for you, “she promised. “I am glad that your suffering has ended for I know you were hiding the worst from us and I know that where your spirit will be going, there will be happiness and good health and lovely days, your own Ma and Da and your other children that has been lost to us. I know their need is greater than mine and that they need you but always remember Ma; there is always a whole lot of love down here.” She stopped, the sobbing overtaking any audible words that she tried to speak. “And I love you Ma.” She heard her Da’s words follow but not one word was registering. She knew he had finished when Da picked the first rock and placed it on the grave. One by one they picked up the rocks and covered the body. “No earth,” he said as she scooped a handful, “It is tainted. She doesn’t deserve that.”
There were plenty of rocks to be sure. Finally wedged at the top of the cairn, Da placed a cross of white timber. It was only two boards, crossed and nailed perpendicular to each other. The name, Molly Harper was carved into the horizontal piece. It matched three other smaller crosses that bore the names Jo-Anne, Mary and Mikey Harper.
Cherokee Rose had another half-brother much older than herself. He was away fighting, a soldier of fortune last heard of fighting in Denmark in the Holstein and Schleswig German states with King Frederick V11’s forces. This was after his action in France with revolutionary forces. She knew not much about Tyler, only that he was the son from her mother’s first husband and a much more affluent and noble life she gave up for her Da. She didn’t know how long she stayed there until she felt her Da’s hand on her shoulder. “Come on lass. It’s time,” he said. They stood and looked a last time. It was near on dark by now. She thought how bare the grave looked and a plan hatched in her young mind.
Finally she followed her Da, each grabbing an armful of kindling for the fire and to heat the pot of broth that sat as it always did on the fireplace.
2.
The long black leech was held up to the dull light of the dual candles and examined. “He’s a little beauty.” Doctor Obadiah Tempest poked it with his finger. It wriggled from its two-finger hold on the other hand. “Hirudo Medicinatis,” he said, “all the way from Sweden this little fellow.” It was about three inches in length, blackish brown in colour, marked on the back with six yellow spots. “Becoming hard to get too you know but I believe there is a new- found supply from France.”
Ma winced. She hated them. They were applied to her body to suck out the bad blood and she had plenty of it. It was not a good colour and the bruises on her body seem to come up on her of no account. It wasn’t just that they were leeches; it was the fact that they stayed there for so long, up to four hours. She, lying still there for that time just watching them do their bit, just blood sucking away. The area of application needed to be thoroughly clean, free from hair and liniments. The leeches needed to be hungry, for to work they needed to bite and take hold. Port wine or blood was used to entice their appetite and when they had finally gorged themselves to excess, fall off, extracting a considerable quantity, two drachmas of blood with it. Six leeches feasted an ounce of blood each.
Cherokee liked the Doctor. Obadiah gave one to Cherokee. “That end’s the eyes.” She looked at it closely. “Actually they are just light sensitive parts of the body, no different to any other.” She liked him for he held no pretensions.
“So much to learn,” he kept on saying, “and so much we’re still to know about this body of ours and the things that make it sick or better. Far too many mysteries still to be solved I am sorry to say.” He wasn’t young, nor was he old to Cherokee. It was his friendly, amiable nature in a world of sickness and the dying. She wondered how he did it.
Ma had been sick since Jo-Anne was born. Jo Jo came into this world, lived almost a year and then duly left it. Ma’s health seemed to correspond to that as well. They tried to have further children. She carried them for the term but each one lived less, Mary for three months and Mikey for one.
“What do you think it is?” he said to her. Cherokee looked. “Male or female?” She turned it around and around. She knew they were sensitive to touch, temperature and drying but the sex of it! “Female,” she said.
“And pray tell why?”
“It’s doing all the work.”
“Ha! Ha!” he said with a