I owe my existence as do hundreds related to me to an old Wiradjuri woman known by the family ascribed name Bessie
I owe my existence as do hundreds related to me to an old Wiradjuri woman known by the family ascribed name Bessie, who came to warn my GG Grandmother at Gobarralong in1852 the Murrumbidgee flood was to rise much further and faster than previously experienced. “Missus…Get up hill, fast”, she insisted they must leave immediately to higher ground to save her 10 children with one on the way, two dogs, a cat, a cow, and a horse. It was said my GG Grandmother “had been on the Murrumbidgee for ten years. They knew you had to trust the aborigines. Especially about the weather and the river.” They took what they could in a wheelbarrow and a bucket of hot coals. Through the darkening drizzling sky, ankle deep in squelching mud, apart from a toddler being dropped twice, “Blessed Mary!”, “Holy Mother of God!”, grabbed, “Thank God!” in a flowing waist deep creek crossing they made it to high ground. The house was washed away. GG grandfather who had gone to Gundagai approximately 54 kilometres down