Reunited after a lifetime, Aboriginal sisters Margo Beavan and Judy West will share their story of loss, with Hunter River High School students on Thursday.
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After, in a private ceremony, the sisters will bring their brother’s ashes home.
The day marks 60 years since Judy was torn from her parents at Karuah.
While Judy found Margo in 2011 her other siblings have died.
Judy was never able to reunite with Jenny, Betty or Peter.
Margo’s stories are Judy’s only bridge to the past.
“My adoption family gave me a really good life but I still feel really angry,” Kurri Kurri-raised Judy said.
“We all [except Margo] became wards of the state.”
The school ceremony invites students into a very personal story that gives history lessons emotional and geographical context.
“I don’t think the students can really believe the stolen generation happened,” Margo said.
“I found all my brothers and sisters one-by-one.”
Judy added: “They think sometimes [stolen generation] is a myth or a fairytale.”
Their brother, Peter, lived in Sydney where he completed his strapper’s apprenticeship with celebrated horse trainer Tommy Smith.
Peter cared for triple Cox Plate winner Kingstown Town.
“He was very proud of that,” Margo said of their brief reunion.
“He stayed with horses his whole life.”
Jenny reunited with Margo in the 80s for a short time before her death.
Betty, who has also died, was confined to a wheelchair from a young age and had an unhappy childhood in her adoption-family.
Peter was diagnosed with lung cancer in January 2013 and died on Margo’s birthday in May, the same year.
Margo was briefly reunited with Peter through a mutual friend.
“Peter kept on saying, ‘I thought you were dead’,” Margo said.
The three eldest siblings, Jenny, Betty and Peter, were taken by authorities before Margo was conceived.
Margo would have been taken too if it wasn’t for a tip-off that the welfare officers had come back to Karuah.
“Mum sat in the bush with me and saved me,” Margo said.
To mark the 60th anniversary of their separation, Margo has composed a poem for the school students that in part tells her parent’s grief.
Your hearts were broken the day welfare came. Things would never be the same. You suffered in silence, never speaking a word. Hearing you cry, never speaking a word. Never thought this day would come when I’d find my family one by one. Jenny was the first to come home. The big car pulled up, Jenny stepped out – what are they all looking at? She started to cry with tears in her eyes. The last time she was home she was only five. Jenny had a daughter later in life, Tammy is her name, the love of her life. My journey started in ‘85 when my brother didn’t know if we were dead or alive. How excited, the first time we met, as he passed his birth certificate, ‘here,’ he said, with a big smile, ‘that’s who I am, I’ve been gone a while’. Strapping horses all year ‘round, the most he was proud of was Kingston Town. I remember seeing my sister Jen, at a picnic day, standing behind a pylon, looking my way. Sister, Bet, she came next.Thank God Crissy came. ‘Come with me, we’ll take care of you, we know what you’re going through’. It wasn’t until Link Up gave her a call she knew she had family after all. We met for the first time at midnight when she sat on the floor, and held my leg tight. ‘I’ll never let you go’, she said to me, ‘they should have been charged with cruelty’. Home she came to stay, until the day she sadly passed away. Cindy from Link Up rang: ‘I’ve come across your file, and I noticed it’s been sitting here for a while. This is your only sister left, leave it with me, I’ll do my best’. I wish my sisters were here that day when Link Up rang to say, ‘I found your sister not living far away’. My heart started beating fast, I didn’t know what to say, is this really true? ‘Is this really you?’ Well, the rest is history, and here we are today, telling our story of being taken away.
Margo and Judy will lay Peter’s ashes on their mother’s grave at Karuah Cemetery on Thursday.