Reflection and Vignettes

Below is a very short version of a Reflection and Vignettes (brief evocative accounts) shared at Saint Margaret’s Uniting Church, Mooroolbark on All Saints Sunday, 29 October 2023 – by Rev Dr Barry Brown. Interested readers may find various online sites providing more details of the main persons mentioned –Caroline Newcomb, Anne Drysdale, Alexander Thomson and Thomas Shadrach James.

Our Readings from Revelation 7:9 – 17 and the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:1 – 12), take us to another place of being, knowing, and of mystery and possibility – compared with that of the confusing, complex and threatening realities of our present world.

Faith is being open to, and daring to live by, alternative possibilities.

In the Australian War Memorial there is a ‘Tomb of the Unknown Soldier’ which represents the countless Australian men and women who lost their lives during the various wars, but who have no graves that recognise them. It also represents the many graves which exist, marked or unmarked, of those who have died in wars but have never been identified. ALL SAINTS liturgies are a commemoration of the Christian Church recalling the place of the ‘unknown’ or now ‘forgotten’ ordinary saints who faithfully lived and witnessed for Jesus Christ. We reflect upon a few of these ‘saints’.

Caroline Newcomb (1812–1874), also Anne Drysdale & Alexander Thomson.

Scotsman Dr Alexander Thomson and his wife Barbara migrated to Hobart in 1831. Within a short time he was involved with John Batman and the Port Phillip Association. He and his family moved to the future site of Melbourne in 1836 and became the first medical doctor in the Port Phillip District. He was present, and led the singing, at Melbourne’s first Christian Worship Service, led by the Rev Joseph Orton in the hut of John Batman on 24 April 1836. The Thomson family soon moved to the Barwon River (now Geelong) and established an extensive property known as Kardinia Park. Dr Thomson was a founding Elder of the Presbyterian Church in Geelong, the first Mayor of the town, and a generous supporter and treasurer of the Wesleyan’s  Buntingdale aborigine mission near Colac.

Caroline Newcomb was born in London in 1812 and in 1833 left England on medical advice and migrated to Van Diemen’s Land. By 1836 she was engaged as a governess to the children of John and Eliza Batman and travelled with them to the new settlement at Port Phillip (now Melbourne) in April 1836. Caroline was single and 23.  Her diary provides one of the better description of the landing of the Batman and Thomson families and of the service led by the Rev Joseph Orton on 24 April 1836.  There is no specific reference to Caroline Newcomb being present herself; however, her clear description certainly suggests she was, as were other white settlers.  Various records suggest that as well as being governess to the Batman children, Caroline also took on a similar role for the Thomsons, and Mrs Barbara Thomson soon became her close friend.  When the Thomsons moved to live in Geelong in 1837 Caroline went with them and lived in their household for some time.  In May 1840, while at the Thomsons, Caroline Newcomb met Anne Drysdale (1792-1853) who had arrived in Port Phillip three months earlier in search of farming opportunities.  The two women became close friends and set out on a joint venture that would last until Anne’s death in 1853.  Anne was 20 years the elder of the two and had financial capital and farming experience.  Caroline was energetic, clever and methodical.  The two women, against the advice of Dr Thomson, but eventually with his support in the transfer of part of his property to them, set up what was probably a unique joint venture by two single women.  They set up a modest home known as Boronggoop on 10,000 acres of land between the Barwon River and Point Henry. They may have been the first female pastoralist in the Port Phillip District, perhaps Australia.  Eventually they would be known by many as the ‘lady squatters.’

Anne Drysdale, like the Thomsons, was a Presbyterian and joined the local Presbyterians as an active participant.  Caroline had an Anglican background, but seemed to have been influence by the Rev Joseph Orton, a Wesleyan (Methodist).  Under the guidance and inspiration of the Rev Francis Tuckfield who lived and worked in the Geelong area while preparing to establish the Buntingdale mission, Caroline joined the Wesleyans and soon became very committed. It was not long before she was appointed a Leader of a Class Meeting.  She also held a number of offices in the emerging Wesleyan causes in the Geelong area.  Of particular interest is the role she played as spiritual leader in the household that she and her older companion, Anne Drysdale, shared.  In the publication that records their story, Miss D & Miss N – An Extraordinary Partnership, it is often recorded that Caroline led the household prayers each evening.  It was also her practice on Sunday evenings to read sermons to the whole household – which included the two single women, staff members, sometimes children who were being cared for, including those of Eliza Willoughby, widow of John Batman, and other visitors.  The home was also listed as a ‘preaching place’ for the Wesleyan missionaries, who often stayed overnight after visiting nearby Geelong.  Here we see Caroline Newcomb exercising an important lay ministry, but within the limits current for women within the Wesleyan Church at that time.  The only photograph known of Caroline Newcomb is of her standing at a lectern with a Bible, a position she often used for ‘exhorting’ – as distinct from preaching.

The ‘lady squatters’ did well and prospered at Boronggoop. The two women were active and generous supporters of the Rev Francis Tuckfield and the Buntingdale Mission.  In 1843 Tuckfield had been in Geelong for the first anniversary of the Wesleyan Sunday School, and to examine the pupils.  He stayed at Boronggoop.  On this occasion he had with him six Aboriginal boys from the Mission.  The same year Misses Drysdale and Newcomb gave sixteen sheep in support of the Mission, and Dr Alexander Thomson provided a further twenty. .  In 1843 they acquired a lease on the Coriyule run further to the east on the Bellarine Peninsular, obtained the freehold on this property in 1848, and building on it a stone ‘mansion.’

Anne Drysdale died in May 1853.  Following Anne’s death Caroline continued to live at Coriyule and to run the property with several farm workers.  She continued to be involved in the local Geelong community and especially the local Wesleyan causes.  In November 1861 she married a Wesleyan minister, the Rev James Davey Dodson, who had been stationed in the township of Drysdale, named after Anne.  The marriage took place after much prayer and discernment.  Mrs Dodgson ‘travelled’ with her husband, living in several circuits (Maldon, Beechworth, Daylesford and Brunswick), and dying at Brunswick in October 1874.

Thomas Shadrach James (1859 – 1946)

I first heard about ‘Granpa James’ in the 1950s  from some of his Yorta Yorta descendants living across the road from our family home in Echuca.  Some of what follows, including the photo image, has been provided by one of my friends from those years, Dr Wayne Atkinson.

Thomas Shadrach James was born in 1859 in Mauritius, east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. His parents were Indian of the Brahmin caste. His family originated from the southern Indian state of Tamil.  They were very involved in church activities on Mauritius. Thomas was educated in Mauritius and proved to be a very successful student. After the death of his mother and the remarriage of his father, he decided to set out for Australia.

Thomas spent some time in Tasmania before taking up the study of medicine at Melbourne University. He aimed to become a surgeon, but this dream was dashed when, in the midst of his studies, he contracted typhoid. He recovered, but the illness left him with a tremor in his hands. He soon realised he could never practice as a surgeon. This left him with disappointment and in despair. However, his life took an unexpected change in 1881 that shaped the rest of his life, and the life of many others as well. He attended a beach gathering at Brighton, Victoria, of Aborigines from Maloga Mission near Moama, NSW. The Maloga Mission was led by a Cornish Missionary, Daniel Williams, and the people from the Mission were on a group visit and engaged in some form of ‘beach mission’. Many times in later years ‘Granpa James’ said that God spoke to him that evening. He was so moved that he offered to teach at Maloga “without salary or any view of earthly emolument”. He taught at Maloga for two years without pay, and in 1883 his appointment as a paid teacher was approved by the government authority. In 1885 he married Yorta Yorta woman, Ada Cooper. This too was an event of great significance; not only to be married, but to be welcomed and adopted as a Yorta Yorta man.

In 1888, the Aborigines from the Maloga Mission moved to establish the Cummerangunja Mission on Yorta Yorta country on the NSW side of the Murray River near Barmah, Victoria. Here he established a school and a dispensary and made a significant contribution to the education of a number of important Aboriginal activists, including his brother-in-law William Cooper, nephew Sir Doug Nicholls, and Eric and William Onus, who together in 1946, would reform the Australian Aborigines’ League.

Not restricting his activity to the Mission, Granpa James preached the gospel to Aboriginal people and White settlers on both the NSW and Victorian sides of the Murray River, and he was often in trouble with government authorities because of his advocacy for the rights of Indigenous people. In 1922 he moved to Barmah, then Melbourne, where he set up a herbalism and massage business in North Fitzroy, treating arthritis patients. James died in 1946 at Shepparton and was buried in Cummeragunja cemetery. Thomas Shadrach James modelled “primitive physick” in the spirit of early Methodism, caring for the whole person, body and soul— commending his Saviour to all, regardless of their life circumstances.

His legacy has been lasting and significant. His nephew, Pastor Sir Doug Nicolls is probably the best know (especially around the time of the annual AFL Indigenous round). The importance of education has been passed on; and it is interesting to note that one of his great grandsons, Wayne Atkinson, is now a Senior Fellow of Melbourne University. Wayne is a Yorta Yorta-Dja Dja Wurrung traditional owner and has served until recently on the Yoorrook Justice Commission. Another descendant is now a heart surgeon at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. Education, care for others, justice for Indigenous peoples: a legacy to celebrate today as Thomas Shadrach James is commemorated.

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These stories of ‘almost forgotten saints’ are inspiring. They are also a reminder that the Christian life is not always easy. Sometimes there is struggle and adversity. It is faithfulness to God, and the realisation of the faithfulness of God, that makes saints of ordinary people.