The Victorian Trooper #11 - Legacy & Tapestry: Joseph Ladd Mayes Jr.

Joseph Ladd Mayes Jnr. was born on the 8th December 1886 at the Kyneton Hospital, near Lancefield in Victoria, the fourth child of Joseph Ladd and Eugenie Mayes.

We can only guess at Joseph's childhood but the bulk of it would have been spent in the country town confines of Lancefield, living a tranquil, rural existence as the son of a highly respected policeman. He most likely attended the local Primary School with his older sisters Florence, Dorothy and Eugenie and, being the first young boy sibling they would have experienced, there's a better than even chance the young Joseph Ladd would have been doted on by them.

By the the time of Joseph Ladd's birth, Lancefield was a bustling little rural town servicing many farms in the surrounding district and offering quite a diverse commerical centre. A description from an 1887 edition the Victorian Municipal directory illusrates the town;

It would appear that Lancefield had everything the Mayes family could want and need during those early years and one can only guess that they had a happy existence for the time.

Joseph Jnr. was 9 years old when his father retired from the Force in 1895 and the family decided on a move from Lancefield to the City. I wonder how the move from the country to the relative bustle of suburban Brighton would have affected the young Joseph and his sisters. Where would they have gone to school? Were there regular trips the beach? Visits to the City on the expanding Melbourne tram network?

By the time of his father's death in 1902, Joseph was 15 years old. We know that his first occupation was a laborer for the Victorian Railways and this is where we find him at the outbreak of World War 1 in 1914.
  
Living with his mother at New Street in Brighton, Joseph Ladd answered the call to arms and enlisted in the AIF on 12th October 1915. It is from his subsequent service record that we are able to glean much information. 

It appears that Joseph Ladd intended following in the footsteps of his father as we see that he served seven months in the Australian Light Horse before his enlistment in the Australian Imperial Force. We currently don't know anything more about this period. 

By early 1916, recruiting in Australia had raised sufficient troops to replace the ANZAC losses. Having completed basic training in Toowoomba in Queensland, Joseph Ladd emabarked for Eygpt on the 31st January 1916 to join the 4 divisions that were amassing there for the push onto Europe's Western Front.

In March 1916, the Australian Imperial Force moved to France, and by July/August, the Australians were heavily involved on the Western Front. As part of the 9th Battalion, (3rd Brigade) of the AIF's 1st Division, Joseph Ladd Mayes was embroiled in the fierce fighting of the Somme offensive at Pozières & Mouquet Farm. Over the course of six weeks, the AIF suffered aproximately 28,000 casualties. 

On the 23rd July, Joseph Ladd Jnr. sustained several gun shot wounds to his left elbow and was shipped to England via Calais. At Cambridge, far from the front, he spent the next five months recuperating. 

Reviewing his Army service record, it is somewhat amusing to note that Joseph Ladd Mayes was absent without leave for a period of 15 days from the 29th December through to the 12th January 1917 for reasons unknown. One wonders whether the New Years festivities might have had a part to play in this little "vacation". It is tempting to think that Joseph Ladd Jnr. might have enjoyed a raucous time, perhaps in Cambridge or London. It is a mystery but, in any case, when he finally turned up, Joseph Ladd Jnr. was immediately charged, found guilty and was fined a total of 33 days pay. 

By May 1917, the Australians were heavily engaged at Bullecourt in the North East of France. His service record entries put Joseph Ladd Jnr. Bullecourt where the Anzacs endured some of the fiercest fighting of the war, facing German machine guns, barbed wire and the trenches of the Hindenburg Line. The Australians suffered some 7000 casualties from the battle.

(A scene in the Hindenburg Line, showing Australians with a Stokes mortar assisting in the operations near Bullecourt (AWM E00457)

One of those casualties was Joseph Ladd Jnr. He sustained severe artillery wounds to his left thigh, pelvis, buttocks and lower spine. Considering the gravity of his injuries, he probably should have been killed. Somehow, Joseph Ladd survived to be shipped to the Southern General Hospital in Birmingham England. Remarkably, Joseph would recover from his injuries but he would never return to active duty.

A rather utilitarian letter was dispatched home to Australia, informing his mother Eugenie of his injuries - no doubt causing her great anxiety until she was able to contact him to ensure he was safe.

Joseph Ladd Jnr. spent the remainder of 1917 in England recovering before returning to Australia - much to the relief of his mother. He was home in Brighton for New Years Day 1918 - as attested to by the precious photographs that found their way into our collection. 

Surprisingly, his greivous injuries appear not to have deterred Joseph Ladd Jnr. from trying to re-enlist in the Army. He tried no less than three times in the period from 1918 through until 1920. Owing to his injuries, however, her was unable to gain much more than a clerical posting and, by 1920 it appears he'd given up on a ongoing career in the military. Discharged from the Army, Joseph Ladd Jnr. returnend the Victorian Railways Department as a clerk, based in the Melbourne suburb of Greensborough. 

Joseph Ladd Jnr. met Gertrude Rose Stock at Greensborough, Victoria and the two married in 1919. Together Joseph and Gertrude would have 9 children starting with John Joseph in 1919 followed by Mavis Jean (1921), Edward George (1923), Allan (1925), Kathleen Jean (1927), Ivan (1929), Donald Gordon (1931), and Margaret (1933).

Joseph Ladd Jnr. suffered declining health, throughout the 1930's, the ongoing result of his war injuries and he retired from the Railways Department. It appears he was in and out of a military hospital at Caulfield, while maintaining a residence at Andrews Sreet in Ringwood. Sometime after the birth of Margaret in 1933, his marriage to Gertrude Rose broke down - most likely due to his war experience and its damaging after effects. She left her husband, raising their children single handedly in a house that was regarded as immaculate. Gertrude Rose herself had a reputation as a outstanding cook and could serve up almost any dish imaginable. Gertrude eventually moved to Warracknabeal in Western Victoria. Joseph Ladd moved to the Anzac Hostel at Brighton.

Previously known as Kamesburgh, the Anzac Hostel became a home for permanently incapacitated WW1 veterans.

From left to right, are: Mr Joseph Mayes, 1st AIF; Mr F Leach, orderly; Mr Albert (Wardie) Ward, 1st AIF, whose bed is in the collection of the Australian War Memorial; and Sister E M Flower, assistant Matron. The patient in the wheeled bed is Mr Harold Wiseman, one of the first residents to arrive at the Hostel when it opened in July 1919. 

Joseph Ladd Jnr. spent his later years at the hostel. A family anecdote tells of his son Edward George Mayes making regular visits to his father and spending time with him. It was Joseph Ladd who introduced his son "George" to one of the Nursing Assistants at the Hostel, the daughter of a farming family from rural Victoria named Dorothy Preston. A romance soon blossomed between the young couple and George and Dorothy Mayes married during the height of WW2.

Taken at the Anzac Hostel, Brighton c. 1940s.

I imagine Joseph Ladd Mayes had a reasonably comfortable life at the Anzac Hostel - as comfortable as 1940's medicine could cater for. It seems to have been a well euipped facility with lovely gardens and set well back from the bustle of the surrounding city. I had the opportunity to take a tour through the former hostel in the early 2000's. By then, it served as a private school, though it retained all of its original character. You could feel the spirits of the past there.

Joseph Ladd Mayes Jnr. died, July 18th, 1955 and was interred at the Springvale necropolis. His estranged wife, Gertrude Rose died in Warracknabeal in 1966 and was buried at the Burwood cemetery.

DFA.

The Victorian Trooper #10 - Legacy & Tapestry: John Adolph Mayes.

(From an original recollection by Allen Mayes - John's Grandson & JL Mayes' Great
Grandson).

Perhaps the most comprehensively documented of Joseph Ladd & Marian Mayes' children, their first, John Adolph was born in Ballarat on the 23rd January 1860, during the period that Joseph Ladd was stationed at Pitfield.

John Adolph was present with the family through the period in the early 1870's when Joseph Ladd was on secondment for the Victoria Police Force overseas, then later at Marysville.

Looking through some photocopies of hand written letters, we find the correspondence between John Adolph and his sister Rebecca. We also find a brief letter from his mother Marian, which is undated. The text of that letter reads as follows;

My Dear Son, 

I see in today's Age that (----) Middleton and C Ward Callan married.

I am glad that your confirmation class is to be open again. Everything is quiet here at present and I hope will continue to. 

Good bye, dear son. God bless and keep you. 

Your Mother. 

His most tangible presence is recorded in March 1878 when, as an 18 year, he was the recorded witness on the death certificate of his mother Marian at Broadmeadows. Sometime afterwards, John Adolph's adventurous spirit saw him leave Victoria for Wilcannia in the south west of N.S.W.

In 1835, explorer Major Thomas Mitchell was the first European to visit the region, in which he traced the Darling River to what is now Menindee. In June 1866, the township of Wilcannia was proclaimed. In 1871, the population was 264, and grew to 1,424 by 1881. During the 1880s, Wilcannia reached its peak, and had a population of 3000 and 13 hotels and its own newspaper, the Western Grazier. It was, with Wentworth, Echuca, Mannum and Goolwa, one of the major Murray-Darling river ports which played a vital part in the transport of goods, notably wool and wheat, in the days of the paddle-steamers.

It is not immediately clear what occupation John Adolph initially pursued in Wilcannia District. In 1888, aged 28, he was awarded a gold medal by the Wilcannia Rowing Club as crew member for winning the “rowing scratch fours” race.

Wilcannia Rowing Club.

He married Julia O’Grady at Wilcannia on 23 June 1895. She was aged 31 and he was 35. A son, John Joseph was born in Wilcannia on 9 September 1896.

(Julia O'Grady (Mayes), date unknown).

(John Adolph Mayes c. 1890's) 

Apart from the medal, his marriage and the birth of his son, no other information is on hand to tell us what sort of life style John Adolph and his family had in Wilcannia.

Between 1896 and 1898 John Adolph moved his family to White Cliffs where he worked an opal mine on Turley’s Hill in partnership with D. Cowan. The pair was said to have barely scratched a living from the mine. In 1898 he purchased two blocks of land at White Cliffs, though no houses were ever built on the land.

A second son Leslie was born at White Cliffs on 6 March 1899. John Adolph was 39.

Julia died at White Cliffs from Brights ( kidney) disease on 14 December 1901. She was aged 36, John Adolph was 41, John Joseph was 5 and Leslie 2.

We can only image the difficult task for John Adolph in raising his two boys. They were cared for during the day by nuns at the Catholic Nunnery. John Adolph never remarried.

A short time after Julia’s death, John Adolph had an accident chopping wood. A chip flew up into his eye causing severe damage. He was taken to a Sydney hospital for a major operation but unfortunately he lost the sight in that eye.

During his mining venture, an alarming incident was recorded when the opal mine John Adolph was working caved in and he was buried alive. The townspeople and miners, with shovels and bare hands worked desperately to dig him out, not sure if he would have survived. Miraculously, he was still alive. His hat had slipped over his face, creating a pocket of air that saved his life.

We do not know if John Adolph or either of his boys journeyed to Melbourne, for the burial of Joseph Ladd in 1902. It is not clear what the relationship with the extended family was at that time.

John Adolph loved his sport and in 1915 aged 55, as a member of the White Cliffs Rifle Club won a gold medal for the 300, 500 and 900 yards shoot.

His two sons eventually left White Cliffs, worked in New South Wales for a time then moved to South Australia where they spent the rest of their lives.

Between 1915 and 1926 John Adolph returned to Wilcannia and started a saddlery business in the main street. The business became a resounding success and, it seems, John Adolph became a prominent member of the Wilcannia community. He was elected the honorary secretary of the Wilcannia Hospital Board. During this period he discovered fraudulent activities by two board members and reported this to the Administration. Unfortunately the word of the members protesting their innocence was such that John Adolph was branded a liar.

John Adolph Mayes' saddlery business, Wilcannia.

This did not deter him from gathering indisputable evidence of their guilt and within a year the two members were charged and found guilty.  

In 1929, aged 69, he  wrote a “History of White Cliffs”. The document is held by the White Cliffs Historical Society.

Bowls at Quorn, South Australia, 1935.

In 1935 he traveled to see his eldest son John Joseph, who was married with a family and living in Quorn South Australia. Two years later he died in Wilcannia on 30 May 1937, aged 77.

Next: Legacy & Tapestry: Joseph Ladd Mayes Jnr...

DFA.

The Victorian Trooper #9 - Twilight By The Sea.

After 35 years of service in the Victoria Police, Sergeant 1st Class, Joseph Ladd Mayes retired in December of 1895. His service record shows he was discharged on a full pension and superannuation payments allowing him to live a comfortable life in retirement. His pension alone was calculated at 138 pounds, nineteen shillings and sixpence annually.

Joseph Ladd, Eugenie and their younger children Joseph Ladd Jr, Edward, Mary and Norman moved to the leafy seaside suburb of Brighton in Victoria.

They lived at a house in Union Street, curiously named - "Toronto". Union Street is a particularly lovely street off the Nepean Highway, South East of Melbourne. At that time, most of the houses there faced onto a parkland and small creek - the evidence of which, still exists, providing a quiet sanctuary for the residents. I've had this vision of Joseph Ladd Mayes taking an early morning walk along that creek, perhaps with a Cocker Spaniel in tow for company, to a local corner shop or newsagent to fetch the newspaper the way my grandfather George used to do when he was still alive.

How did Joseph and Eugenie spend their days? Quiet walks along the beach? Joseph sitting on the porch of the house with a pipe and that newspaper while Eugenie knitted or crocheted? What were the lives of Edward, Mary and Norman like at Union Street? Were the elder Mayes children a fixture in their lives? All grown up with families of their own and living their own lives in various parts of Victoria, South Australia and NSW?

It is known that Joseph Ladd was involved in raising funds for his countrymen back in Ireland who were still struggling with the remnants of the Potato Famine. Now retired one wonders whether he involved himself more in the fund raising side of this charity.

The Mayes family saw in a new century, saw the federation of their country and perhaps celebrated the birth of the nation.

Joseph Ladd Mayes died on the 11th July 1902 at their Union Street home after a stroked. He is reported to have lingered for two days. I certainly hope that he did not suffer.

Meticulous to the end, Joseph Ladd Mayes ensured his affairs were in order before he died. Among the family collection, is his last Will & Testament, dated July 4th 1898. It is a fascinating, if simple document, written by Joseph Ladd himself in which he sets out clearly, what his wishes are. He request that the sum of 25 pounds be set aside for his daughter Rebecca Mayes "of Brighton, aforesaid Spinster". Joseph Ladd also made a request that the sum of 20 pounds - but not more than 25 pounds - be set aside for a headstone to be erected for his first wife, Mariann at Bulla just north east of Melbourne. His signature, effected with a frail hand at the end of the document, is a poignant reminder of the man.

Together 'til the end, it would remiss of me not to include Eugenie's signature - written a few days after his death - beside her late husband. 

Eugenie dutifully carried out his last request traveling to the town of Bulla herself to see that Mariann was given a fitting memoriam - one that exists to this day.

Joseph Ladd Mayes' body was ferried from the Union Street house on Saturday, July 12th, 1902 at 3.30PM and was interred, after a small service, at the South Brighton cemetery. His death was recorded in an obituary that appeared in the Brighton Southern Cross newspaper on the 19th July 1902.

Joseph Ladd Mayes, decorated Constable, Senior Constable then, Sergeant 2nd & 1st Class. A loving husband to Mariann Henrietta Piquet, then Eugenie Rebecca Burke. Father of 12 children.

Eugenie lived on for another 37 years - a loving mother and grandmother to a growing family which no doubt enriched her life. I get the sense of a proud and loving woman in the New Years Day 1918 photographs that came into our possession in the early 2000's. No doubt, her family sustained her and, at least partially, filled the void her husband had left.

Eugenie moved from the Union Street residence to New Street, Brighton.  Eugenie Rebecca "Jane" Mayes died after a short illness in 1939 at the Oakwood Avenue home of her son Norman Hector. A love story, spanning twenty years of life while they were alive, continues on into forever. Eugenie Rebecca was buried with her husband.

Joseph Ladd Mayes 1833-1902.

For all intents and purposes, their family might have assumed the memory of their parents might well fade into distant memory. They might further have wondered what the future for the Mayes family would hold. Time tends to weaken the bonds of memory. But, chance discoveries decades later often bring these stories back from the distance and allow them to live and breathe once more.

Next: Legacy & Tapestry: John Adolph Mayes... 

DFA.