Outpost A Doctor on the Divide

OUTPOST A DOCTOR ON THE DIVIDE

GWENETH WISEWOULD

To my fellow medical practitioners: -

To the very young doctors who know everything,

To the very old doctors who know nothing,

And all those in between who bear the burden of the health of a nation,

For I have been all of them.

This chronicle is a medico-social history. It represents a cross section of life in a little town and district in the gold bearing country of the Divide, from its early settlement for 125 years. It could be typical of scores of other settlements in a similar type of country in Australia.

The stories are factual and occurred in the author’s experience, and all names are fictitious, or as otherwise stated, some being aboriginal. The process of living is changing rapidly; the old ways and the old tales will soon become only a memory or be forgotten. This is an attempt to preserve that memory.

8th May 1971

Gweneth Wisewould had no direct descendants of her own but her local community was as important to her as a family. The community deeply valued and respected her. She was The Doctor for over 30 years. This book recounts her historical view of the people, their lives and illnesses, the beauty and ferocity of the local environment and great difficulties being the sole doctor practising in all weathers and harsh conditions. Her material possesions only had value to serve the purpose for which they were intended. Payment for services was never a priority, the patient’s treatment and recovery was all consuming.

"Outpost exposes her great sense of compassion and strength of character in pursuing her own life on her terms. She lived by Ralph Waldo Emerson’s dictum; the whole adventure has been so very well worth while."

Smash words Edition

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Copyright passed to Elizabeth Berzkalns nee Wisewould 1972

Reproduction and Editing by Elizabeth Berzkalns.

The process of living is changing rapidly. This new version will continue to preserve the old ways and tales. Changes were made to reflect requirements of e-book readers and allow enjoyment for persons with visual impairment.

e-book ISBN 978 0 646 56866 9

Chapter 1. THE CHOICE

There were several good reasons why I renounced practice in the city and moved to the country; one was the depression between two world wars. The other, the changing type of practice which was depriving town doctor of the responsibility of attending his own patients and their families for all ailments and making him a mere clearinghouse for the specialists or the public hospitals. For without responsibility, incentive and interest soon perishes. I did not feel justified nor delighted at the prospect of devoting my life work and abilities to the limits of cut fingers or gravel rash. I had finished my commitments and appointments in two large hospitals, in one a tutorial position to medical students, each as specialist in love with a different field; but my first, the patient as a whole individual in a general practice. And then someone suggested the country.

You’d make a good country doctor, said Wallie to me. I said to myself, I’ve always loved country life, fresh air, no sea fogs, semi–retirement and pleasant work in pleasant surroundings, enough responsibility and not too far away from city amenities.

I put my name down for a small practice, within say sixty miles radius of ‘town’ and forgot about it.

About twelve months later, a young medical called. Yes,? I inquired. I’ve a practice for you, he announced. Practice! I have a practice; what do you mean? He looked deflated. Didn’t you ask us to find a small country practice for you, eh? I turned an internal somersault, So I did, I remembered. Well, tell me about it." He did, and we made arrangements which led me to an interview with the doctor selling the goodwill on the following Thursday (on the site) as it were.

Thursday afternoon found me well on the road in my car, of passable appearance being an early sedan body in blue and black on a four cylinder ‘Overland’ chassis-and suitably dressed including a short, though inexpensive fur coat and a becoming hat. The hat is the most important strategic garment, sometimes overlooked. On this occasion I chose dark, for dignity; on occasions when it is desirable and imperative to influence a business minded man, or to face an emergency, use a light hat, but always becoming.

I was accompanied by my personal a gentleman whose manners were courteous and thoughtful. He wore a black satin coat, white shirt, and polished nails were always well groomed by him. He was named Sinclair, son of Clara–Sinnie for short, who was to be my friend and companion for nearly nineteen years.

My appointment to meet the doctor was weirdly suggestive of the clandestine. I found the doctor, waiting by arrangement, just outside the town boundary in his car, and acting on instructions I followed him through several streets to a house in a far street, discreetly placed in a charming garden, where we alighted and went in. He introduced me; Mrs Tree is a very good friend of mine, who will let us talk without town publicity and comment.

Mrs Tree was most kind and put at our disposal a pretty sitting room carpeted and furnished in pale and delicately coloured fabrics. So, I sat Sinnie on my knee and instructed him to sit still and say nothing, which he did, even when she subsequently produced a dainty afternoon tea with homemade cakes and biscuits. The doctor stood up and talked. He talked on for three quarters of an hour, giving to me frightfully interesting details of works and circumstances of the practice. I was intrigued into silence. Suddenly he stopped and said, Is it any use my going on?-Are you interested? Yes, I said, I am, very much so. So he continued, giving the business details of sale. I did not like them much, but they were reasonable, sensible and, to me, practical. Mrs Tree said, Don’t you give your dog anything? Wouldn’t he like a biscuit? Much relieved, I said, I’m sure he wouldn’t but he has good manners." Sinnie accepted with alacrity and had his reward, in biscuits, pity, and praise!

I asked could I see the doctor’s residence. I was permitted on leaving to drive slowly past the house pointed out to me, without stopping, and escorted out of the town again; all this secrecy was then explained. The doctor himself had practiced here up till sixteen months ago; the then incoming purchaser had not paid for it, so he had repossessed the practice for resale for the balance owing, asking for promissory notes over three years. The defaulter had not been informed of my presence to date. I said I would think it over, and I would let this agent know.

Taking things into consideration: — my large house of ten rooms almost entirely furnished with antiques, with insurances, rates, an overdraft of £2,000 at seven percent and an income of £250 a year to manage on, four semi–dependants, £5,000 in uncollectable debts owing to me. In the middle of a major depression and my two major hospital commitments finished, the temptation to go to the country was both attractive and reasonable. I accepted but I told the agent I had two requirements: — time to pack and a doctor to replace me. I would be ready in six weeks, during which time he must find a purchaser for my private practice. We fixed a date, six weeks ahead, for Thursday, 28th September 1938.

Chapter 2. COMING

1938! There was a prospect of World War Two in the air. I had given up my two major specialties in medicine and surgery which were senior anaesthetist at one major city hospital when I was a University tutor to medical students, an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist at another city hospital in charge of a large clinic. I had also been doing a variety of major general surgery cases and was looking forward to being a general practitioner, especially in the country. Here was a small practice, all duties, and lovely surroundings. It was past middle age. I could indulge in the luxury of country life into semi–retirement, a delightful prospect!

The changeover was not easy. Emerson has said that nothing worthwhile has ever been achieved without ecstasy. Here began an ecstasy of endeavour in the making, we started at once to make arrangements; my friend Ellabelle announced she would sell her lending library and return to her old job of doctor’s assistant and go with me. Together with our own dogs, we would found a new home. On Thursday 28th we would drive together to the new life. But first, six weeks of preparing for the changeover had to be planned and worked through. It proved all too short a time. Homes had to be found for half my possessions and half my household. Packing and discarding proved an enormous task. I had made a visit to the new home–to–be to take measurements. I co–opted Wallie to help pack, also to accompany the vans on the appointed day and care take the new home till we arrived. This entailed cleaning and distempering walls in the old home as the new Doctor’s wife would come in and take over as we left. The new Doctor was exacting. He would turn up at odd times each day and expect be taken out on trips of introduction whenever he had spare time, and that took a large and leisurely part of nearly every day. My work, including my practice, had to get done in the rest of the day and at night. In the end, I put in five continuous days and nights working on my feet, 120 hours during which I lay down on the floor for one hour only on the fifth night. On the appointed Thursday, the new folk arrived as we were getting breakfast and took over the gas stove, etc., so no more food. I had arranged to be at the new practice at noon to take over but there was still so much to be seen to and done, and surplus odds and ends to pack into the car that we didn’t get started till 6 30 p.m. By that time Ellabelle and I wanted our dinner before 6 pm (when the phone closed) we had rung Wallie at the new house and asked him to get a pound of rump steak and make a fire against our hungry arrival, but we still had to get there. Tired, hungry and with five days and nights without rest or sleep behind, we still had two hours’ drive in the dark to get home .We started.

That drive was a classic in memory, the ultimate achievement in ecstasy of endurance and can never be forgotten. The car, a two–seater sedan was loaded to the roof with oddments and leftovers from house and yards. It included not only our personal luggage but parcels of meat and vegetables and ‘groceries’ to be dropped en route, by detour of a mile, at the house of old friends living in the forest about twenty miles short of our destination. It also included Sinnie, Melisande (his sister and consort) and Mr Jones their pup, and one white hen. The hen and one precious parcel and the dogs shared the front compartment with us plus other parcels and she, the hen, with the precious parcel, would be dropped at a nearby house, about sixty miles short of our destination. Having done that, we would set off in earnest for our new home, a journey, which we expected, would take about two hours. Alas, it took six hours. Physical fatigue reared its unreasonable head while I was still clearing the city environs. I had reckoned on that, and had myself under control and knew I would not fall asleep at the wheel. I had no experience of the delirium of exhaustion till then. It was the ‘Angels of Mons’ * again, but in reverse. We had gone about five miles when I suddenly saw a woman wheeling a baby in a perambulator across the road right in front of me. I saw them quite clearly, and drove right over and through them, and going through them, I knew they were not there.

*Angels of Mons refers to an incident (which became legend) early in the First World War, when English soldiers in retreat, leg weary and exhausted passing through Mons saw visions of angels in the sky above them directing them homewards and took heart.

I had several of these hallucinations in the next few miles going through several pedestrians and realising, they were not there. I then came to an awkward bridge approach on a curving road and a huge stone pylon, and with no footways. Here I saw an old couple approaching me walking slowly but getting nearer; at first, there were two old women in long black garments and very much in the way; nearer still, they appeared very clearly to be a youngish couple walking very close together. I could see details of dress. She had a brown crepe–de–chene dress with lace at the neck and a yoke of fine tucking and an obscuring hat; they crouched against the pylon and I flattened them against it and passed on over the bridge. I realised my hallucinations had come to stay but go on we must. I turned to Ellabelle and said, I want you to help me. I am seeing things that are not there, but I am not going to sleep. I will keep talking so you will know what I am doing, and if you see anything I do mention please tell me. She said, Poor Ella! I was hoping to get some sleep on the drive up. But I will keep awake and watch with you.

I said, I have just run through another woman with a perambulator and here is a black cat in the middle of the road. I have gone through it. Now I see a large lorry with high, red sides. It has just turned in front of me across the road (it was very real and freshly painted); I’ve gone through it so it wasn’t there. There are head lights rushing towards me, lots of them-but I don’t think they are there either. Suddenly she said quite calmly, Keep a little more to the left, those headlights were real ones. I dropped pace to about twenty miles per hour for safety in manoeuvring just in case my hunches were at fault, and then I discovered my engine was boiling. With all our planning, I had forgotten to fill the radiator. We were out on the highway; I knew there would be no garage for many more miles. Then I remembered a waterhole at about the twenty–six mile post and nursed the engine along slowly for another ten or more miles till we came to it hallucinations and all-and pulled up. We were both very weary.

We had to wait a long time for the engine to cool, and we were empty for food, which we had not brought. I said to Ellabelle, Here we can get water if there is anything to get it in. It’s through the fence. I’ll look for a tin or something. But a search of the roadside revealed never a scrap of rubbish and no tin. Ellabelle, who had packed the car said, Somewhere there is a thermos of black coffee and an orange. I grubbed about in the dark and at last found one orange, one thermos, and one eggcup. We drank thankfully, black coffee in driblets per eggcup, and shared the orange. Life and sanity seemed to swoop upon us like a refreshing breeze and vigour returned. There still remained the problem of the radiator, no eggcup for that! Ellabelle thought awhile and then said, Somewhere there is a poo. ‘Somewhere,' was immensely obscure in that full load, but I eventually unearthed the chamber pot and with it climbed through the wire fence. It was quite dark; the lagoon was lined with rocks and boulders. I was clad in my best town shoes, but I made it, three trips and the radiator were dealt with and the journey resumed. We were partially refreshed and for another ten miles or so, there were no more illusions, a grateful respite. We arrived safely at our second detour to drop the ‘groceries’ at our friends, poor dears, they were too upset at our bedraggled and late appearance to think of offering refreshment, and we were glad to be on our way.

The rest of the journey proved to be a greater and a slower trial, weary as we both were. The hallucinations returned in another form. Five miles further we were off the highway and had before us fifteen miles of country road, less traffic, but no guide lines and more wheel tracks. It was difficult to keep on the centre or to the left, and the pace had to be slower. I could see at the road edges, green streaks where the wheels ran on to the grass and left brown muddy marks the colour of the roadway, and learnt to look for those green streaks to find the left boundary of the way. Then I went blind. For some time I had been seeing green streaks all over the roadsides, middle and on the metal centre too and just as they completely confounded me, sight failed. I was wide–awake, still staring ahead when things went blank. I drove very slowly on, knowing the road was straight ahead, and slowly, surprisingly, sight slowly returned.

It became a sort of rhythm: ten-seconds of clear vision with clear road ahead for a hundred yards, a black–out while I drove the distance, a slow fade in again, and another hundred yards ahead visible, and fade out again. We finished the journey that way and at last reached the turn into the town and the last bridge. I said with relief to Ellabelle, Only a bridge over the river and one more turn, and we are there. She didn’t reply, but told me afterwards her heart sank when I said ‘bridge’, wondering how I would make it; but with that long, forced effort of alertness ending at last, we pulled into the garage of the doctor’s house and stopped, spent and thankful.

We sat there, just sat there. Wallie did not appear but the house lights were up, so we climbed out, dogs and all, and went into our home to be. In the lounge room, we stopped and laughed. Wallie was sprawled in an arm chair by a log fire, sound asleep, having spent the day furnishing the house by plan, and helping the van men unload, and waiting twelve hours for us to arrive. In the fender, in a frying pan, lay a large, juicy rump steak, raw and awaiting us. We woke Wallie and our welcome was complete. It was 11 30, but it was just after midnight when we finished that meal.

Wallie then broke the news that there were two calls awaiting me-a sick baby first, and a young man with bronchitis, very ill, in the hospital, also I hadn’t told him where I wanted my bed put, everything else of course, but not that! So, he said, I put it just inside the door in your room and unrolled your swag on it, it’s not made, I only unrolled it. I made the two calls before I found it. I had not seen it for five nights. It had been rolled up, pillow inside, mattress and all five days ago. I stripped and fell into it lumps and all, and fell immediately asleep.

I woke suddenly at Wallie’s voice in the doorway saying, 8 a.m., I’ve cooked breakfast and surgery is at 8 30, if you don’t get up I’ll pull the clothes off. He might have too, so I yelled, For God’s sake don’t, I’ve got nothing on. He vanished.

In the surgery were two old men, very agitated because No doctor yesterday. Doctor, could you sign our books? I said, Yes, of course, and did so without authority, but knowing I would get it later. They went away much relieved, in spirit at least.

So started my first day’s work in the little country practice, in a little town of no importance that nobody I knew had ever heard of, my pleasant days of semi–retirement. We saw Wallie off in the train. Ellabelle settled to housekeeping. I made my bed-(It needed it)-and set out, without introductions, to make myself known to the town, and to make the district and its people familiar to myself. With sleep I had recovered completely except for one reaction, laryngitis that accounted for a hoarseness and almost complete loss of voice, so I called on the chemist. I had found he lived next door. I asked him to make up a then standard mixture for laryngitis, which contained some tincture of opium. He looked over the prescription, then looked at me sadly, and said, No, oh no, Doctor, which rather startled me until I realised my predecessor had been a drug addict. I gave the chemist my good reasons for the request and promised not to ask for a repeat.

He was a mine of information about local geography, roads, landmarks, snowfalls, and fogs; which led me to spend my first two or three months learning the roads and landmarks so as to be able to find my way in fog or snow, knowledge which proved absolutely essential to me in the winter months of the following years.

Chapter 3. HOME TOWN

It is not given to everyone to start life afresh after middle age. I was fortunate, having surrendered city work in two specialties in starting a new life as a general practitioner in a country town solo. It gave me a fresh outlook, new people, and a number of strange new responsibilities in pleasant surroundings; which were altogether delightful. I set out to explore my new territory and its people, my people and my new home. I looked forward to making this country my home and its people my people, a place and people to serve and to belong to an adopted tradition and a heritage.

The little town, like Rome, was built upon seven hills, but it straggled more except in the main street, which entered it at one end by a bridge over the river. A shallow stream two to four feet wide, bumped its way in a boomerang curve between close set buildings, and out by another bridge over Deep Creek, three feet wide, but deeper. Both streams flow inland and helped fill reservoirs for two larger towns miles away to the North, past the farms and pasture lands. We are, here, a cold country over 2000 feet up in the great divide, on the frosty side of the ranges and expect frosts at night, cold winds from the North and south west in winter. A moderate snow