This post finishes the recollections of Endrius Jankus, a Lithuanian refugee who arrived in Australia on the First Transport, the General Stuart Heintzelman. Endrius became known as Andrew in Australia. He was born in Draverna in the south of Lithuania on 7 July 1929 and died in Hobart, Tasmania, on 23 July 2014. He wrote this memoir in 2012, based on a diary he had kept during his first weeks in Australia.
27 January 1948
Just after breakfast, the loudspeaker announced the names of all the persons who were being sent fruit picking. My name was among them.
A little later, we were told to report to the employment office. They issued each one of us with clothing, meat and butter ration coupons and our old and new passports.
After lunch, each of us was issued with seven and a half shillings. With this money, I bought some tobacco and two airmail letters. This left me three shillings to spend later.
At 3 pm we were told that we could leave some of our belongings in the storeroom as we will be coming back after the fruit-picking season. I left my little wooden suitcase in the store.
At night we went for a swim to cool off.
28 January 1948
I got up at 6 am and took my blankets back to the store as our departure time was scheduled for 10 am.
Just before the departure time, four buses arrived to take us to our destinations. We boarded the buses and took off, but had to stop constantly as some of the buses broke down from "old age".
We stopped at Wangaratta for a while. Some bought sandwiches, others bought the plonk which made us sick. It was well in the afternoon, just before 5 pm, when we arrived at our destination, Ardmona.
Twelve of us were accommodated in a farmer’s pickers’ barracks. There were two in each small room on two single beds cocooned inside mosquito nets. Mozzies zoomed around all night trying to get under the nets. In the dead of night, they sounded like aeroplanes.
On our arrival, we were given a meal in a little hut that served as a mess hall. An old man, most likely in his seventies, was our cook. After the meal, we went for a walk to familiarise ourselves with the area. Unfortunately, it was flat as a pancake surrounded by orchards as far as the eye could see.
I shared a room with AJ, as we have known one another since Bonegilla and the Scout Movement.*
29 January 1948
I got up at 6 am, hot and sweaty. The heat seemed to follow us. While most of our families and friends shivered in Europe from the cold, ice and snow, we were sweating in the full brunt of Australia’s summer.
Breakfast was at 7 am. Then we fronted up for work at the edge of the orchard. The Boss, an overseer, showed us how to pick the larger pears from the tree without damaging the little branches.
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| Latvian fruit-pickers from the First Transport in another orchard, at Grahamvale on the edge of Shepparton, Victoria Source: Collection of Arvids Lejins |
Each of us was issued with a huge bag to fasten to the body by straps, with an opening at the front. This is where the pears were placed gently, so as not to bruise them. We were also issued with a wooden ladder to reach the top of the trees. Thus equipped, we proceeded to pick the fruit.
Lunch was at 12 and we started work again at 1 pm, going until 5 pm.
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| A group of First Transport fruit-pickers eating their lunch on the job Source: Collection of Arvids Lejins |
According to the paper issued by the Commonwealth Employment Bureau at Bonegilla, our pay was three pounds and five shillings for 44 hours a week. Since our arrival we only received only five shillings each week pocket money, so this seemed a fortune to us.
The "fortune" left us wondering after our first shopping spree in Shepparton with two weeks' pay. A watch of local manufacture cost 11 pounds, shirts were one pound, shoes were two pounds. A parcel of many tinned conserves cost five pounds and ten shillings from a well-known Sydney firm which in specialised in sending parcels to the starving "Poms" but reluctantly accepted our orders to be sent to family and friends left behind in Germany.
Everything non-British was hated, including the native Aboriginals. We saw a few Aboriginals gathered on the riverbank when a white man appeared and told them to move. It reminded us of our brethren left behind in our country with the murdering Stalinists ordering them around.
We usually worked until midday on Saturday and spent the rest of the day having a rest and doing some chores, like washing and mending things. Sunday was a free day but many times we worked for the Italian tomato growers picking tomatoes. We got better pay from them.
Things didn’t work out too well at this place. A week after our arrival, most of us got diarrhoea and we noticed that our bacon and eggs for breakfast were being cooked in a pan full of fat. We gently mentioned to the owner of the property that we appreciated the eggs and bacon for breakfast, but our stomachs could not take cooking them in a massive amount of fat due to the years of starvation.
The next morning at breakfast, our cook charged into the mess room with a large carving knife and threatened to cut everyone’s throats. We were stunned and our friendship with the cook deteriorated. We laughed after the event and gave him top marks for bravery, for facing twelve young ex-soldiers from different military formations at seventy years of age.
The other problem which occurred was the switching around of picking rates. On some days or even half days we would be picking at a daily hire rate then suddenly we would be picking at production rate, usually paid by the case at six-pence a case. If it rained, we didn`t get paid at all. We picked there for a month and left for Tatura on 1 March.
In our picking gang we had one real Australian. He was in his forties, a happy-go-lucky fellow and friend to everyone. He came from Melbourne. He always appeared with a Gladstone bag. In it he had a thermos of "tea" which he used quite frequently. While we went back to the small mess hall for lunch, he remained in the orchard at his work site, no doubt indulging in his "cup of tea".
Usually in the afternoons we came across him fast asleep under the pear trees. The boss never said anything to him or to us. As I used to talk to him, I was his favorite.
One day, during a smoko, he offered me a "cup of tea". I could not refuse his friendly offer. I took a sip and my eyes almost popped out of my head. The "cup of tea" was strongly laced with some unidentifiable alcohol.
Not to appear insulting, I downed the brew and felt sleepy for the rest of the afternoon. No wonder the poor chap used to fall of the ladder and stay there.
We returned to Bonegilla on 13 March 1948, with our first mission completed. On 18 March, the same group was sent to Tasmania. I believe this was punishment, but for what, escapes me. My relationship with the Commandant at Bonegilla was not very friendly. We could put that down to a clash of cultures.
The end.
Footnote
* This might well have been Antanas Jurevicius, since the 'Bonegilla cards' for both record that their first job was with Anton Lenne Pty Ltd of Ardmona. Another possibility is Anicetas Jucius, also sent to Anton Lenne's orchard, but he was already 32 years old, much older than Endrius at 18 and Antanas at 25.
