Alexander Nõmm (1922-2000): Sportsman, Builder, Family Man, by Ann Tündern-Smith and Silvi Nõmm Simpson

[Silvi Nõmm Simpson is the daughter of Aleksander.]

The photograph below comes from the collection of Aleksander Nõmm. It shows him with 3 Lithuanians, whose names he could not remember.

Aleksander Nõmm is seated on the running board of the truck in this photograph
which we have used 3 times already in this blog, for Edvardas Lapinskas on the left,
Bernardas Matkevičius in the cab and Juozas Nakas on the right

Source:  Collection of Aleksander Nõmm

Fortunately, it matches exactly with a photograph already supplied by Diana Bučiūtė, a niece of Juozas Nakas, who wrote his life story for this blog. There it was 3 named Lithuanians with an unindentified Estonian.

Now identified, Aleksander was born on a farm on the Estonian island of Saaremaa on 8 May 1922. He was named after his uncle, also Aleksander. Estonians often shorten Aleksander to Sass or sometimes Sander. His uncle was known already as Sander so the younger Aleksander got Sass.

Aged 18 or 19 in 1941, he found himself conscripted by the Soviet military machine into servitude in Russia. This was a period of his life about which he did not like to talk much.

He later believed that his loss of taste and smell was due to the freezing winters he spent in Siberia nearly starving, but being a farm boy, he knew what to eat to survive. His work was mainly building barracks, which meant that he developed carpentry skills which he could offer the Australian migration selection team in 1947.

After three years in Siberia, Aleksander was able to return to Estonia when the Soviets used all the manpower they could find to advance against the German occupation of the Baltic States.

Another Estonian who came to Australia in November 1947 on the First Transport with Aleksander, a man maybe 15 centimetres shorter than Aleks (who was nearly 2 metres tall), once told Ann that there was one Estonian on the ship of whom others were afraid. This was because he was a big man who had walked all the way back from Siberia.

At the time, Ann imagined an escapee on a solitary journey, living off the land. Even if the other Estonian was describing someone who had survived a walk from Siberia with a military unit, he still was talking about a massive effort. It could have been an effort which lost many participants under its wartime conditions. It was a walk from Asia, across Europe to an island off its west coast.

Back on Saaremaa, he joined other local men in what was meant to be a surprise attack from the rear on the German occupiers of their island. However, two German machine-gunners were able to fight off the invaders. Most were killed as the seawater turned crimson with their blood.

Sass was among a handful of survivors taken to Germany as prisoners-of-war. They left from the port of Mõntu on Saaremaa's Sõrve Peninsula.

The report of his interview for possible migration to Australia repeats some of this, saying that he arrived in Germany in October 1944, brought as a prisoner-of-war.

The carpentry skills that Sass said he had developed in Siberia were in great shortage at the time of his interview. As we’ve reported in some other entries in this blog, building was minimal during the War. Many of the people with the necessary skills were in the military, the Federal Government had brought in restrictions and the building that did go on mostly was for military needs.

So what did the selection team write on its report of the interview? Occupational suitability: “Heavy general labouring”. This is why “labourer” Nikolai Müristaja landing a first job in his watch-making profession in an earlier entry is so amazing.

The middle of three sons, Sass was the only one who was taken westwards by the Germans. After the Soviet occupation of 1944, his older brother, Heimar, decided to remain in the woods and fight. He became was the Estonians call a “forest brother” or metsavend.

While he participated in a guerrilla war from his forest bunker, the younger brother (Artur) and a sister 10 years younger than Sass (Linda) were the ones who kept Heimar supplied with food from the farm. Heimar and Artur were caught.

Heimar, the metsavend, was sentenced to a mere 10 years in a labour camp for treason. Artur received a 5 year sentence for assisting treason.

The thinking behind the March 1949 deportations from the Baltic States to the Gulag is said to have been, “Your family member is there already so you can join them”. It also was expected to destroy the economic base of the Kulaks, the small farmers, a class to which the Nõmm parents belonged. Thirdly, it was expected to destroy support for the Forest Brothers. Father, Jaan, then 63 years old and mother, Marie, then 56, were rounded up and sent off to Siberia for an indefinite period, the rest of their lives.

Sass’ sister Linda had caught pneumonia and was being cared by family friends. This meant that she was not at home when the authorities came looking for the family of Heimar and Artur. She was not deported.

Heimar and Artur did hard labour, shovelling hazardous materials, and it is believed in the family that this is why they both died young. Artur was lucky enough to have been released in December 1951, from a camp in the Archangel Oblast, having served a 4 and a half year sentence, and no doubt expected to survive as best he could. He died in 1986, still in a Communist country, aged 61.

Heimar was released in July 1955, from a camp in the Komi Autonomous Republic in the northeast of European Russia (around 1,000 Km east of the Archangel area) after 8 and half years of hard labour. He died in January 1981, also aged 61. In contrast, Linda was 78 when she died, her mother was 82, her father was 2 days past his 89th birthday, and Sass lived until he was 98.

As for destroying support for the Forest Brothers, Estonia had a least 2 who died without giving up, in 1980 and 1987, even after the last active one drowned himself rather than surrender when caught fishing by the KGB in 1978. The last Forest Brother of all was Jānis Pīnups, who emerged from the Latvian forests in 1995.

After his liberation in Germany in March 1945, towards the end of World War 2, Sass was in the Oberkassel camp on the Rhine River. He remembers Canadian Red Cross parcels were received by the camp administration but the managers took out the cigarettes, coffee and best clothes for themselves.

By 1947 he had moved to one of the four camps for Estonian displaced persons in the town of Melle. It was there that he heard about the Australians seeking young men and women to work in their country.

Aleksander in Melle, Germany, 1947

Source:  National Archives of Australia

Sass reckoned that he had his first real meal in six years on board the General Stuart Heintzelman. He was employed in the shipboard butcher’s shop for the duration of the voyage. Like other non-smokers, he used the freely issued American cigarettes to barter for other luxuries.

He remembered that the ship had steam turbines and a system which condensed the steam, giving plenty of fresh drinking water and allowing the use of large shower rooms. (Another passenger on a later voyage to Australia told Ann that the showers were hot, something special in those days.)

Those people who had brought musical instruments on board the Heintzelman formed a dance band which played during the evenings. The tables in the Heintzelman mess facilities could be hoisted up to the ceiling to create a dance floor.

Sass learnt modern dances, such as the samba, rumba and tango, while he was in Germany. He said he was best at the tango, but he was not musical or a folk-dancer.

On the train to Bonegilla, Sass thought that his first sight of eastern Australian countryside was “like a desert”. In early December, the fields were dry already. The yellow grass was a shock because he had thought that Australia was going to be mainly tropical.

Bonegilla itself was very exciting for the young Estonian men at first. They even found the local rabbits exciting. Sass remembers letting two of them loose in the barracks. Possums invaded the barracks without human assistance.

They went swimming in Lake Hume and found that they could catch yabbies for meals. There were big fish in the Lake also, near the Hume Weir, but their attempts to catch them were unsuccessful.

Those who returned late to the barracks would be welcomed with a bucket of cold water perched carefully on top of the partially open door.

Busloads of girls turned up from Wodonga and Albury to meet the new young men in the camp. Despite his dancing skills, Sass was afraid to take any of the girls to a dance as they were well dressed, while he “looked like a scarecrow”.

While in Bonegilla, the displaced persons received 5/- per week “tobacco money” for personal spending, after the costs of their board were deducted from their social security payments. At that time, a packet of tobacco cost 2/6.

His first Australian employer was the company of CJ Row, Webb and Anderson which operated what Sass called the Eildon timber mill. We know it from the Bonegilla cards as a timber mill at Thornton, about 12 Kilometres away from the better-known township of Eildon. Both are more than 130 Kilometres away from the company’s headquarters in South Melbourne. Given that much of the trip is on rural roads, it still is around 2½ hours drive between South Melbourne and Thornton or Eildon.

Sass reported Row and Webb were generous Australians, counterbalanced by Anderson, a “stingy Pom”. Sass received a minimum of £5/12/- for a five-day week, from which he paid 16/- tax and 36/- for accommodation and board. This left £3/-/- to spend or save.

Aleksander stacks timber at the Thornton mill

Source:  Collection of Aleksander Nõmm

After three or four months, his weekly wages went up to £7/10/-. Also, he found that he could earn an extra £3 on Saturday mornings doing piecework for Mr Webb. However, the accommodation provided was in barracks which had grass growing through the gaps in the floor. The gaps also permitted lizards to make forays through the barracks.

Aleksander (left) and another employee among the stacked timber

Source:  Collection of Aleksander Nõmm

While he was at Thornton, Sass attended English classes four days a week. Among the other DPs employed by Row, Webb and Anderson were the 3 Lithuanians in the photo above, who spoke to him in German, so he learnt some German there also. He had not picked up the German language while in Germany as he always was in camps with other Estonians.

Three Lithuanians and an Estonian again, with their clothes suggesting that this photo was taken in the same session as the truck photo: from the left, Edvardas Lapinskas, Aleksander, Bernardas Matkevičius and Juozas Nakas, with the CJ Row, Webb & Anderson sawmill in the background

Source:  Collection of Aleksander Nõmm

After finishing his compulsory employment at the Thornton Mill, Sass was able to find other work, but it was “three weeks here, six weeks there”. The Dunlop tyre company provided him with better employment, but best of all was Kraft Foods.

He started work with Kraft in 1953 and stayed with the company more than thirty years, until he retired in 1985. He was employed as a storeman, and a forklift driver and eventually in the company’s office.

At some stage, possibly even in his Estonian youth, Sass took up sport. As mentioned already, he was tall, and of medium build when younger, so he had the right body for a sportsman. His speciality in Australia was the shotput and javelin, until he damaged his shoulder.

Oberkassel, Germany, 1946:  Two volleyball teams with their trainers/managers
in plain clothes in the middle of the front row, with Sass 4th from the left

Source:  Collection of Aleksander Nõmm

In December 1949, a sports writer for the Melbourne Herald listed him as one of 9 javelin throwers invited to tests for inclusion in the Victorian athletics team. Success would lead to the Australian championships and inclusion in the team for the Empire Games (now the Commonwealth Games) in Auckland, New Zealand, two months later.

The Australian Estonian newspaper, Meie Kodu, reported in January 1950 that he had competed in the Victorian Athletics Championships, despite the heat affecting all competitors. Affiliated with the Box Hill Club, he was placed third in the javelin. It looks like Sass just missed out on the Victorian team in the leadup to an Australian team for the Empire Games.

The first Australian Estonian Sporting Games were held in Melbourne during Easter 1954. Sass did well, coming second in the long jump with a leap of 5.78 metres and second also in the shotput, with a throw of 11.53 metres.

In June 1954, Sass was participating in an Estonian volleyball team which was involved in trial games against others to determine the grades in which eventually they would play. The Estonian team had won its 3 games so far. The following month, Meie Kodu reported that they had defeated a Greek team, Olympic (of course), maintaining a record of 5 wins and no losses.

Meie Kodu also reported in the same month that Sass had chaired a meeting of Melbourne sportspeople and was chosen to be the coach of the girl’s handball team.

Another Australian Estonian Sporting Games were held in 1955. Sass came second in the long jump again, with a slightly shorter jump of 5.74 metres. It looks like there was no shotput competition.

He wasn’t just a sportsman. He successfully played bridge as well. As early as July 1954, Meie Kodu was reporting Sass coming second in a bridge doubles competition when partnering another First Transport arrival, Sven Kiviväli.

By 1957, Sass was building his own house in the northern Melbourne suburb of Fawkner, having married Irene Sein who arrived in Australia in 1949. Their only child, Silvi, was born while the house was going up. Silvi worked as a librarian, married and provided 2 grandchildren to Sass and Irene. Mrs Nõmm also had an older son. The family moved into the Fawkner house in 1958.

That year was also the year when Sass became an Australian citizen, with Irene on 5 March 1958.

A turning point must have been reached in 1957-58, with marriage, house-building and citizenship, as there are no more digitised reports of A. Nõmm’s sporting achievements.

At the time of writing in 2026, Melbourne Estonians had held a Last Hurrah weekend to farewell their Estonian House on Melville Road in West Coburg 6 weeks previously. Back in 1971, they were renovating the recently acquired former cinema. A contributor to Meie Kodu listed those who turned up every weekend to help, including Sass and his bridge partner, Sven Kiviväli.

All dressed up and somewhere to go, 9 Estonians from the First Transport, probably in Melbourne's recently renovated Estonian House:  Standing, left to right, Ants Sumberg, Valentin Reesel, Erich Väli, know to all as "Potsa", Lembit Koplus (looking really happy to have left Pyramid Hill), Kalev Veermäe, Sven Kiviväli, and kneeling, left to right, Ralf Knuude, maybe Mihkel Kaige, Aleksander Nõmm 

Source:  Collection of Aleksander Nõmm

After arriving in Australia, Sass has lived and worked only in Victoria, but travelled by car through NSW, South Australia and as far north as Mossman in Queensland. He undertook bus tours of Tasmania and from the centre of Australia to Darwin. He and Irene toured New Zealand.

Ill health, however, prevented travel back to Estonia, even after its second independence in 1991. He didn’t actually want to go, because he wanted the memories of how things were to stay in his mind.

Irene died on 29 March 2008, days short of her 86th birthday. This was the point when Sass had to leave the home he had built himself. He lived with his daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren for nearly 3 years. Then more health issues forced him into retirement care with Claremont Terrace Aged Care, McKinnon, near where his family lived.

Sass stayed there for another 9 years, passing the respectable age of 98 years. The ashes of both Sass and Irene rest in the Estonian section of the Fawkner Memorial Park in northern Melbourne.

SOURCES

Estonia’s Victims of Communism, Search Nõmm https://www.memoriaal.ee/en/search/?q=N%C3%B5mm&f=all, accessed 1 July 2026.

Hayward, Steve (1949) ‘Jack Davey's Test In Six-Mile Event’, Herald, Melbourne, 8 December, p 27 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/244143925, accessed 19 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1950) 'Melbourneist' (‘From Melbourne’, in Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 26 January, p 4, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article85529847, accessed 10 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1953) 'Melbourne', (In Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 27 August, p4, https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1953/08/27/4, accessed 14 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1954) ‘Terves kehas terve vaim' (‘A healthy mind in a healthy body', in Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 29 April, p 3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article85536610, accessed 10 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1954) 'Melbourne' (in Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 1 July, p 2, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article85536914, accessed 19 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1954) 'Sport, Melbourne' (In Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 8 July, p 3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article85536935, accessed 10 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1954) 'Melbourne' (in Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 15 July, p 3, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/85536971, accessed 19 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1954) Sydney, NSW, 'Melbourne', (In Estonian) 15 July, p 3 https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1954/07/15/3, accessed 14 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1954) 'Melbourne', (In Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 29 July, p 5, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article85537041, accessed 11 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1955) ‘Rekordid kõnelevad’ (‘The records speak for themselves’, in Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 10 February, p 3, https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1955/02/10/3, accessed 14 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1971) ‘Eesti Maja’ (‘Estonian House’, in Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 14 October, p 2 https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1971/10/14/2, accessed 14 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1972) ‘Rahvuskapitali Tänu’ (‘National Fund Thanks’, in Estonian, Sydney, NSW, 20 September, p 2 https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1972/09/20/2, accessed 16 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1974) ‘Melbourne, Märkmeid Yarra-Linnast’ (‘Melbourne, Notes from the City on the Yarra’, in Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 11 September, p 3 https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1974/09/11/3, accessed 16 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1981) ‘Rahvuskapitali Tänu’ (‘National Fund Thanks’, in Estonian, Sydney, NSW, 9 September, p 2 https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1981/09/09/2, accessed 17 June 2026.

Meie Kodu (Our Home) (1985) ‘Meie Kodu tänab Toetuskaardid’ (‘Meie Kodu Thanks Supporter Cards’, in Estonian) Sydney, NSW, 9 September, p 14 https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1985/12/18/14, accessed 17 June 2026.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, Central Office; A11772, Migrant Selection Documents for Displaced Persons who travelled to Australia per General Stuart Heintzelman departing Bremerhaven 30 October 1947, 1947-1947; 212, NOMM Aleksander DOB 8 May 1922, 1947-1947 recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=5005625, accessed 17 June 2026.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria]; A2571, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla], 1947-1956; NOMM ALEXANDER, NOMM, Alexander : Year of Birth - 1922 : Nationality - ESTONIAN : Travelled per - GEN. HEINTZELMAN : Number – 608, 1947-1948 recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203902046, accessed 17 June 2026.

Nõmm, Aleksander (2003) Personal communications, 9 January and 16 September.

Nikolai Müristaja (1912-1989): Watchmaker, Jeweller, Gardener, by Ann Tündern-Smith

Nikolai starts Australian life with a job in his speciality

By some fluke, Nikolai Müristaja, recruited as a Labourer to Australia from Estonia via Germany after WWII and travelling here on the General Stuart Heintzelman, was sent for his first job after arrival to employment which really suited him.

Might this have been because his first employer, recorded on his Bonegilla card as “Geo. W. Speirs of Griffiths” (sic) had thought to ask at Bonegilla if any of the new arrivals had trained as a jeweller or watchmaker?

The fluke would have been anyone know that Nikolai had this training, and advising Mr Speirs of it. (I am assuming that Nikolai's own English and knowledge of his industry in Australia was not yet up to the task of making his own enquiries.)

Nick Müristaja with friend, Griffith, NSW, 1948

Source:  Collection of Valeria Mets Blackburn

Watchmakers and Jewellers

The Estonian Pärnu Päevaleht newspaper reported, on 9 February 1935, that Nikolai Muristaja was about to receive a certificate commemorating his passing of examinations in the field of working on time-pieces.

The one known newspaper advertisement for the business opened by Nikolai in the northeast Estonian town of Kiviõli, as a watchmaker who also sold moderately priced crystal, gold and silver object, optical requirements, etc.

Source:  Rahvaleht, 30 May 1940, through DIGAR

George W Speirs, according to a notice about his will published in the Government Gazette of the State of New South Wales on 30 November 1962, was a Jeweller and Farmer in Griffith, New South Wales. Since Jewellers often are Watchmakers and repairers too, what a match with Nikolai!

In time (no, that pun was not intended), Nikolai opened up his own business as Nick Muristaja the Jeweller. This was not in competition with George's business, but because it was getting more work than he and Nick could handle in the one workshop.

Nick the Jeweller opens his second business, this time, in Griffith, NSW

Source:  Estonian Archives in Australia

The Estonian Archives in Australia, in its collection of papers relating the Nick and his wife, Nora, has an advertisement for Nick Muristaja, The Jeweller, clipped from an unknown Australian newspaper with no date. It also has a clipping from the Riverina Daily News, dated 21 October 1970 and titled, Griffith Jeweller Bows Out.

The latter reports that Nick worked for “this particular jeweller for about 15 years”, meaning that he would have started his own business in perhaps 1963. This was soon after George Speirs died, but a business in the family name still exists in Griffith. It is likely that Nick first helped the family and executors with the handover to its heir or heirs.

Selling his business in 1970 means that Nick ran it for only 7 years.

Nick the Jeweller bowing out from his Griffith shop

Source:  Daily News, Griffith, 21 October 1970 via

Estonian Archives in Australia

His plan was to retire to the coast. An  anonymous, undated summary of Nora’s life, including Nick, held by the Estonian Archives, places this on the NSW Central Coast.

Nick's Birth and Death

Having been born on 16 August 1912 (in Leisi, on Saaremaa Island) Nick was aged only 58 in October 1970 and 71 in July 1984. He died on 5 August 1989, just before his 77th birthday. Either he was temporarily unwell in 1970 but recovered in retirement, or he had made and invested enough money for his foreseeable needs and those of Nora.

In July 1984, Nick still had enough money saved to travel to North America for ESTO (the global Estonian cultural festival) held every four years, this time in Toronto, Canada. According to Vaba Eesti Sõna (Free Estonian Word), he also had stopovers in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Lakewood (New Jersey, where many Estonians lived) and Long Island, New York, and would move on to Europe.

Nick Marries

Nick and Nora had married on 8 December 1951, not in Griffith where Nick was living, but in another Riverina town, Leeton. It is about 45 kilometres away from Griffith as the local birds fly, more by the local indirect roads. Why Leeton was chosen we no longer know.

The Riverina Daily News journalist, Jim Mulcair, told his readers that the couple had first met in Germany and their marriage was followed by a one-day honeymoon in another local town, Narrandera. Nora then flew to Adelaide, where she was working as a nursing aide in the Northfield Mental Hospital.

Nikolai's early life and War

Jim Mulcair summarised Nick’s early life in Estonia as training in the village of Vändra, about 45 Km northeast of the city of Pärnu, and in the capital city, Tallinn. He than opened his own shop in the northeast town of Kiviõli. This is where he was located, close to Russia, when the Soviet Union first invaded in the summer of 1940.

He told Mulcair that, “I lived an adventurous life during the War, experiencing the good and the bad. I found myself at the front line, fighting the Nazis, who captured me 3 times. I escaped from their prison camps in Germany, Russia and Czechoslovakia, the last one of which was the worst camp I have seen.”

It is interesting that Nikolai focussed on fighting the Germans, yet finished the war in a Displaced Persons camp in Germany. I suspect that he told the Australian journalist what he wanted to hear, knowing that the Germans were Australia’s enemy during the War. For Estonians and other Baltic people, the Germans were unwanted invaders but the Soviet Union, based in Russia, was even worse.

The Australian selection team’s report on the intending immigrant has him working as a watchmaker for 5 years (from that 1935 certification), followed by 7 years as a labourer, including the last 5 months labouring for a farmer in Germany. It looks everyone was too busy to get watches and clocks repaired during the War.

The selection report leaves empty the places where the team might have recorded Nikolai's date of arrival in Germany and his reason for coming.

Mulcair’s report continued, “After the War, no-one seemed to know what Nick was so he was placed in a Displaced Persons camp.” An Arolsen Archives record card for a file destroyed in 1951 reports that Nick was in “DP Shop Oldenburg”, presumably the workplace associated with his camp. His medical examination for migration to Australia was carried out in Oldenburg, confirming the separate record of being in a DP camp there. Another sheet records his address as “Assembly Centre 224”, which a Web search confirms as likely to have been in the Oldenburg area, where there were camps for Baltic people and Poles.

Photo of Nikolai Müristaja from his 1947 selection papers

Source:  National Archives of Australia

While Nick has only two records in the Arolsen Archives, his wife-to-be, Nora Lellep, has 6. She was in DP Camp 2515, and DP Camp Sandplatz, in Oldenburg, explaining how she and Nikolai may have met in Germany. She was classified then as a Nurse. (She had been the Head Housekeeper on a farm owned by the President of Estonia, Konstantin Päts, an association which would make her, even now, prima facie a political refugee.)

More on Nora

Soon after the marriage, Nora was touring northern Tasmania in February 1952 when she was involved in a fatal motor vehicle accident. The driver of a panel van which collided with the car in which she was travelling, with a driver and 4 others but not Nikolai, died before he could be moved to a larger hospital in Launceston. The accident was front page news in the North Eastern Advertiser based in Scottsdale.

The anonymous, undated, summary of Nora’s life says that she worked as a nurse in Tasmania but says nothing about the time. She also had nursed at a mental hospital near Newcastle, at the Concord Hospital in Sydney (which we have considered in some detail already) and in Melbourne. It does not mention Adelaide.

Nick and Nora Become Australians

Nick became a naturalised Australian on 20 November 1957. Nora was naturalised in the same ceremony, but for some reason known only to officialdom, this was confirmed in a Commonwealth Government Gazette 4 months after Nick’s naturalisation was announced.

Retirement and Gardening

According to the Archives’ summary, Nora and Nick had retired to the Central Coast before moving to the Estonian Retirement Village in Thirlmere, NSW. After Nick died, on 5 August 1989, days before his 77th birthday, Nora moved into the Retirement Village’s Hostel. That is where I met with her 20 years ago.

Nora Müristaja's own photograph of her late husband, Nikolai

Source:  Müristaja collection

scanned 7 August 2006

She was in her nineties then, and thought that the man in the large framed photograph might be her brother when it was her husband. She could still remember winning gardening competitions with the garden she and Nick developed in Griffith though. Jim Mulcair reported first prizes in Griffith, Riverina and Sydney garden competitions. Nora showed me the certificate for what might have been a Sydney Morning Herald competition, but it appears not to be in the Estonian Archives collection.

Ülle Slamer, who had worked with Nora when both of them had first arrived in Australia, celebrated Nora’s 100th birthday in late 2012 in Meie Kodu. She confirmed that the first prize was in a Sydney Morning Herald competition, in 1963. Retirement to the Central Coast was a home in Gosford, where they also won a first prize for gardens in small towns.

Nora accepts a sash for winning one of the garden competitions

Source:  Estonian Archives in Australia

They also created a new garden around their unit in the Thirlmere retirement village.  When Nora moved into the hostel, she started a rock garden there.

Jim Mulcair and Ülle Slammer both mentioned Nora’s bark paintings. They were popular with purchasers in Griffith and, later, in Newcastle (a major city north of Gosford).

In 1987, “O.P.” reviewing the art exhibition at the 13th Estonian Days gathering at the end of the previous year, included both Nikolai and Nora as less well known exhibitors. We could expect someone who made his living from jewellery as well as watch repairs to have something of an artistic bent.

Nora Müristaja on her 100th birthday

Source:  Meie Kodu via DIGAR

Nora lived to be 101 years old. Her ashes now lie next those of her husband of 38 years, in a repository in the Thirlmere Cemetery.

A plaque for Nigoolas Müristaja in the Thirlmere Cemetery
(The Estonian version of Nikolai usually is spelled 'Nigulas';
'Puhka rahus' means Rest in Peace)

Source:  Ken on Find A Grave

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: I wish to thank Terry Kass, Archivist at the Estonian Archives in Australia, for copying that Archives' file on the Muristajas for this project.

FOOTNOTE:  Estonians think that the Müristaja name might have been handed to the family as a joke, given that Nikolai's meek appearance might have been inherited from his male forebears.  It means "Thunderer".

CITE THIS AS:  Tündern-Smith, Ann (2026) 'Nikolai Müristaja (1912-1989): Watchmaker, Jeweller, Gardener'

SOURCES

AEF DP Registration Record 'Muristaja, Nikolai' https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/en/search/person/68364350?s=muristaja&t=2740782&p=0, Reference Code 03010101 16 266, Folder DP2802, names from MURINAS to MURNIEKS, Modris (1), ITS/Arolsen Archives https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/en/search/person/68364350?s=muristaja&t=2740782&p=0, accessed 9 June 2026.

Commonwealth of Australia Gazette (1958) 'Certificates of Naturalization, Nikolai Muristaja’ Canberra, ACT, 8 May, p 1442, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article240891976, accessed 3 June 2026.

Commonwealth of Australia Gazette (1958) 'Certificates of Naturalization, Nora Muristaja’ Canberra, ACT, 4 September, p. 2870, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article240881940, accessed 3 June 2026.

Geni 'Nikolai Müristaja' https://www.geni.com/people/Nikolai-M%C3%BCristaja/6000000007645412229, accessed 9 June 2026.

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Mulcair, Jim (1970) ‘Griffith Jeweller Bows Out’ Riverina Daily News, Griffith, NSW, 21 October, p 1.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, Central Office; A11772, Migrant Selection Documents for Displaced Persons who travelled to Australia per General Stuart Heintzelman departing Bremerhaven 30 October 1947, 1947-1947; 206, MURISTAJA Nikolai DOB 16 August 1912, 1947-1947 recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=4105816, accessed 7 June 2026.

National Archives of Australia: Department of Immigration, South Australia Branch; D4881, Alien registration cards, alphabetical series, 1946-1976; LELLEP NORA, MURISTAJA Nora - Nationality: Estonian - Arrived Sydney per Svalbard 29 October 1948 Also known as NEE LELLEP recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=9195434, accessed 7 June 2026.

National Archives of Australia: Migrant Reception and Training Centre, Bonegilla [Victoria]; A2571, Name Index Cards, Migrants Registration [Bonegilla], 1947-1956; MURISTAJA NIKOLAI, MURISTAJA, Nikolai : Year of Birth - 1912 : Nationality - ESTONIAN : Travelled per - GEN. HEINTZELMAN : Number – 602, 1947-1948 recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=203729837, accessed 7 June 2026.

North-Eastern Advertiser (1952) 'Serious Accident Near Derby' Scottsdale, Tas, 26 February, p 1, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article149421507, accessed 17 March 2026.

“O.P” (1987) ‘XIII Eesti Päevade näitusel’ (‘At the 13th Estonian Days Exhibition’, in Estonian) Meie Kodu, Sydney, 29 April, p 4, https://dea.digar.ee/page/meiekodu/1987/04/29/4, accessed 4 June 2026.

Pärnu Päevaleht (Pärnu Daily Paper) (1935) ‘Uusi ostustöölist’ (‘New Craftspeople’, in Estonian) Parnu, Estonia, 9 February, p 3 https://dea.digar.ee/page/parnupaevaleht/1935/02/09/3, accessed 3 June 2026.

Rahvaleht (National Paper) (1940) [Advertising] Tallinn, Estonia, 30 May, p 8 https://dea.digar.ee/page/rahvalehtvabamaa/1940/05/30/8, accessed 4 June 2026.

‘Refugee/Displaced Person Statistical Card (Lellep, Nora)’ Reference Code 03010101 14 150, Folder DP2339, names from LEKES, Vavrinec to LELIONKA, Vincas (2), 3.1.1.1 Postwar Card File / Postwar Card File (A-Z) / Names in "phonetical" order from L, ITS/Arolsen Archives https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/en/document/68011981, accessed 7 June 2026.

‘Resettled file, Muristaja, Estonian’ Reference Code 03010101 16 266, Folder DP2802, names from MURINAS to MURNIEKS, Modris (1), 3.1.1.1 Postwar Card File / Postwar Card File (A-Z) / Names in "phonetical" order from MI, ITS/Arolsen Archives https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/en/document/68364349, accessed 4 June 2026.

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Helmut Nurmsalu (1927-2014): Assimilated Australian, Father of Star Designer, by Ann Tündern-Smith

Updated 10, 17 and 29 June 2026.

Helmut Nurmsalu was one of 5 Estonians sent to Thornton, a locality northeast of Melbourne, Victoria, to work for the timber merchants CJ Row, Webb & Anderson.  The group included 3 Latvians and 3 Lithuanians as well.

When I started to look for public evidence to add to that part of Helmut's life recorded in the files of the National Archives of Australia, but it seemed scant. I thought his life story would be a brief one.

That was because I started by looking through the digitised Estonian-language newspapers which that country’s national library has made available on line through its DIGAR Website. While this produced 14 Results which included the Helmut Nurmsalu name, 13 of them were recent mentions of a person living or recently deceased in Estonia.

Our Helmut was included only in a 1948 list of Estonians refugees who had resettled already in Australia, published at the end of the year in a Swedish newspaper, Stockholms-Tidningen Eestlastele (a mixture of Swedish and Estonian which translates as Stockholm Newspaper for Estonians).

Then I discovered how much of his life was recorded in Australian publications digitised by Australia’s National Library in its Trove collection. I realised that the picture was very different.

How Helmut Assimilated

When the Federal Government took the lead in immigration matters after World War II, the official settlement policy was assimilation. Immigrants were expected to “forget the past, look forward to the future”.* Fortunately, the Government forgot to tell the immigrants much about this, as they set about starting new community groups or building on existing ones, publishing newspapers in their own languages and so on.

Some individuals – or were they individualists? – went their own way. We probably can describe Helmut as one of them, someone who assimilated although he possibly did not know that this was what he was doing. It must have started before July 1950. That’s when his engagement to marry a young Australian woman was announced by an advertisement in Melbourne’s Argus newspaper.

His intended was Elizabeth (Betty) Robinson, third daughter of Mr and Mrs RV Robinson of Sunbury. It was then a rural town, with a population of around one thousand, 38 kilometres northeast of Melbourne’s central business district. (Today it is more like an outer suburb of Melbourne, with many residents commuting by rail into the city for their work.)

His Marriage

The marriage took place on 5 February 1951 in Melbourne’s leading Catholic church, St Patrick’s Cathedral. Helmut had stated that he was a Protestant, most likely a Lutheran, before migration to Australia. In contrast, he is listed as a Roman Catholic on the passenger list (“nominal roll”) for the voyage of the Heintzelman. He may or may not have been required to convert to Catholicism before the marriage.

Having the marriage ceremony reported by newspapers probably required relatives to contact the social pages editor. That looks like what Betty’s family did, as reports subsequently appeared in two Melbourne newspapers, The Age and The Argus, on 7 February 1951.

The focus in the Argus article was on bridal wear, although the groom’s origin in the Estonian town of Türi got a mention. The Age added descriptions of the clothes worn by 2 bridesmaids and a flower girl, it named the best man and a groomsman, and it added a reception which followed Hotel Federal. What a contrast to what Helmut had endured during World War II, which had ended less than 6 years earlier!

Helmut's photograph from his Bonegilla card

Source:  National Archives of Australia

Both partners to the marriage were living in Sunbury. Helmut’s occupation was stated to be Process Worker (someone who carries out repetitive operations in a factory) while Betty was Receptionist.

Might the couple have moved then to rural Omeo? The National Archives of Australia’s RecordSearch Web function can find files relating to one Nurmsalu only, our Helmut. In all cases, his first name is spelled with an addition H on the end, the German spelling. The Estonian T has a soft sound anyhow, more like our D, so Estonian orthography sees no need to add an H where German and even English writers often do. For example, the newly independent Estonian Government had to write to the Australian Government to beg it not to spell the English version of its name as ‘Esthonia’. There’s a whole file on that topic in the National Archives.

Helmuth Plays Australian Football

Back to Omeo, in rural Victoria’s far east. Actually, even more rural, to a town called Ensay on the Great Alpine Road, located between Swift’s Creek and Bruthen. If Australia had villages, this would be one, with a population of 109 in 2016. The local Bairnsdale Advertiser and East Gippsland Stock and Station Journal reported on an Australian Rules football player with the family name Nurmsalu during the 1953-54 season.

He was named first as ‘H. Nurmsalu’, one of Ensay’s goalkickers, in the 1 June 1953 issue. He was named as one of Ensay’s 3 best players for the game. In the 15 June issue, he was named again as one of the goalkickers and best players for the team, although without an initial this time. His team reached the semi-finals played on 15 August 1953, losing to their Swift’s Creek rivals, when he again kicked one goal and was one of the best 6 players for the Ensay team.

For those readers more familiar with the type of football which Nurmsalu may well have played previously, soccer to Australians, jalgpall (literally, football) in Nurmsalu’s mother tongue, there are 18 players on an Aussie Rules team. This means that the top 6 are the best one-third, not more than half.

At the end of the season in August, votes for the Best and Fairest Player in the Omeo District League were tallied. Helmut was not the winner, but he scored a respectable 8 votes, enough to get a mention in the report in the Bairnsdale Advertiser. From this we learn also that his playing position was ruckman, normally the tallest player in the team whose main job is to contest the ball when play is not moving, particularly the centre bounce at the start of the game and boundary throw-ins after the ball leaves the playing oval.

Helmuth’s height according to his Bonegilla card was only 5 feet 6 inches, which is below 1.7 metres. The medical report completed at the Babenhausen camp before Helmut was accepted for migration to Australia says that he was taller, 1.8 metres (5 feet 11 inches, translated to the measurements still used in the USA). That could be tall enough to be a ruckman in a shorter community. (Babenhausen got a mention in our second last entry because Martha Donald, soon to travel to Australia on the same ship as Helmuth, moved to the same camp.)

At the start of the next season, 22 May 1954, Nurmsalu was again one of the goalkickers for Ensay and one of the team’s 4 best players. In the next Saturday’s game, he did not kick a goal but once again was one of the 5 best players. He was the team’s best goalkicker in the 26 June game, with 2 against Swift’s Creek, and of course one of the 3 best players, but his team lost heavily. The final score was Swift’s Creek 17 goals, 7 behinds for 109 points, while Ensay scored only 6 goals, 7 behinds for 43 points.

That’s the last we can read of Nurmsalu playing for the Ensay football team. However, the likelihood that it’s our Helmut is supported by Betty’s presence on the local Commonwealth-State electoral roll for the Division or Province of Gippsland in 1954. Her place of residence was Ensay North (apparently Ensay was much larger back then) and her occupation was Home Duties.

Another 1954 Electoral Roll, dated 25 February 1954 like the Ensay one, has Betty resident at 45 Waverley Street, W5 (Essendon), for the Commonwealth Division of Maribyrnong and the State Assembly District of Moonee Ponds. One of those two rolls was incorrect.

Helmuth Becomes an Australian Officially

The next public record is the grant to him of Australian citizenship in a ceremony on 16 October 1957. His address at the time was on Nepean Highway, Aspendale, now back in greater Melbourne. At nearly 30 kilometres southeast of the edge of Melbourne’s central business district, it was almost as far in the opposite direction as Sunbury was to the north west. A car trip between the two to visit Betty’s family would still take more than 2 hours today.

Helmut officially became Helmuth with his new citizenship. Maybe he just gave up trying to spell it the Estonian way. Maybe putting the H on the end helped other people to pronounce it in a way which sounded more Estonian. Maybe it helped them to stop saying his name as if it was protective headwear.

Helmuth's Residence and Occupations

He first appeared in a 1958 electoral roll, with Elizabeth, for Gisborne, the next town on the railway line beyond Sunbury. He had become a Linesman by occupation. The interesting thing about that is it was the occupation given by his father-in-law on the marriage certificate. Robert (Bob?) Robinson must have introduced Helmut to this work.

His occupation on the Personal Particulars of Person Wishing to Migrate to Australia form completed in Germany was given as Agricultural Work. It records no previous occupation but the AEF DP Registration Record, also completed in Germany, also in September 1947, records his previous occupation as Locksmith.

Maybe Helmut played more Australian Rules football with local teams. We don’t know if he did as not all the small newspapers with local circulations have been digitised for the National Library of Australia’s Trove Web service.

Helmuth and Elizabeth stayed at the same address for the 1963 roll, but moved to another home in Gisborne for 1967 and subsequent rolls, until 1980. The electoral rolls beyond that year have not been digitised yet.

Helmuth's Children

An interesting addition to the 1977 rolls in the appearance of Susan Mary Xavier Nurmsalu, who must have turned 18 on or after 21 March 1973. That’s the date on which Australia’s voting age was lowered from 21. According to Betty’s gravestone (see below) Susan is the middle child of Betty and Helmuth. Her older sister, Helene, does not appear at all on the electoral rolls as Helene Nurmsalu: perhaps she married before she became old enough to vote. Their younger brother, James, must have enrolled after the 1980 rolls closed.

Helmuth Becomes a  Public Servant

During this time, on 17 May 1973, the Commonwealth of Australia Gazette included a notice which said the Helmuth Nurmsalu had been appointed to the Department of Civil Aviation as a Fitter and Turner.  A later Gazette, published on 8 October, said that his appointment had dated from 20 February.

Helmuth was now an Australian Public Servant, at the age of 46. Having previously married an Australia, played Aussie Rules and become an Australian citizen, how much more Australian could Helmuth become?

He also had changed his occupation from Linesman to Fitter and Turner. Presumably he had been upgrading his skills and perhaps practising what he had learned in Estonia 30 or more years previously. Maybe he had the help of his father-in-law again.

Within a few months, Helmuth found out how the Public Service worked. In August he received a provisional promotion to a supervisor position. On 15 November, the Gazette announced that his promotion had been cancelled, with someone else being promoted to the position after going through a formal process of appeal.

He did try again, but it was 9 years later. The Gazette of 29 July 1982 announced that the has been promoted to Senior Fitter and Turner in the Department of Aviation (as it was called now) with effect from 24 June that year.

Public Servants are eligible to retire with superannuation (a pension to which they have contributed part of their salary) from the age of 55. In Helmuth’s case, that would have been on 10 February 1982, so clearly he had stayed on. Not having joined the Public Service until he was in his 40s, he did not have as much superannuation accumulated as someone who had started in their 20s or teens. The compulsory retirement age then was 65, so Helmut may well have stayed in his secure job until February 1992.

There should be a record of his retirement in an issue of the Gazette digitised by the National Library. If there is, it has been missed by the Optical Character Recognition (OCR) process.

Deaths

Betty died on 22 April 1995. She was buried in the Sunbury Cemetery, under a plaque which names Helmuth, the three children and two grandchildren. It is in the shape of an open book, with the right page still blank and waiting for Helmut’s details. 

This should mean that he is with us still but 2 followers of this blog, have found a death notice in a rural newspaper using the Ryerson Index.  The Great Lakes Advocate, published in the New South Wales coastal town of Forster, carried the notice for Helmuth, also known as Charlie, on 12 March 2014, so he probably died soon after his 87th birthday.  The distance from Sunbury, in Victoria, is likely to explain why Helmut is not lying beside Betty.

The plaque for Betty Nurmsalu in the Sunbury Cemetery

Source:  Robby in Find a Grave

Of the 3 children, Susan achieved national fame as the designer of a self-titled women’s clothing range.

Susan the Star Designer

The September 1993 appearance of the first Aboriginal model on the front cover of the local edition of Vogue magazine is regarded as a turning point. The model was Elaine George; her apparel was a white top by Susan Nurmsalu.

Elaine George with the September 1993 Vogue cover
featuring her in a Susan Nurmsalu top

Source:  Sydney Morning Herald

Susan’s Web presence indicates that she was designing tailored women’s workwear, jackets and coats, and using higher-quality natural fibres. Her output appears to have been aimed at professional women and was sold through boutiques and higher end chain-stores.

Sadly, her individual designing career did not last long. A 1997 issue of the Commonwealth Gazette carried a notice under the Federal Corporations Law, announcing that a receiver and manager had been appointed to Susan Nurmsalu Pty Limited. This meant that the company had been unable to pay a loan on time.

Susan moved on to design for Trent Nathan. This company, founded by a designer of the same name in 1980, had evolved into one where the brand was more important than the designer. It kept its new designer away from publicity.

The deregistration of Susan Nurmsalu Pty Ltd was announced in an ASIC Gazette (published by the Australian Securities & Investments Commission) on 18 October 2005. That was around the time that Susan left Trent Nathan. I’m guessing that she then was aged around 50, with decades of creativity left in her.

There has not been publicity about her since. Susan's skills as a designer remain on display, though, with clothing bearing her name still available on auction Websites.

Her siblings do not have a Web presence, either, unless under changed names. We can but wish all of them the best.

FOOTNOTE

* This quotation comes from a headlines after the arrival of the Heintzelman passengers in Victoria via the Australian military ship, the Kanimbla.  See, for example, the Courier-Mail of 15 December 1947.

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