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As was usual in the period he travelled up the east coast as far as Cape York, and thence westward to Darwin, via
steamship, in this case the SS Malabar. James Fuller met his son in Darwin and they went by train to Emungalan,
then the rail terminus. From Katherine, across the Katherine River south of Emungalan, they continued their
journey on horseback to Victoria River Downs (VRD) Station. The journey of 300 or so kilometres took 10 days
because it was the wet season and the country was boggy and the creeks and rivers swollen with monsoon rain.
Charles began a short, three months, apprenticeship learning rough riding and horse breaking, supervised by
his older brother, Ted. As the dry approached the men prepared their drover’s plant and then began their droving
season. Charles worked with his brother, and later Noel Hall, droving cattle from VRD to Wyndham meatworks,
throughout the period 1926 to 1940. Mobs of 700 cattle took five weeks to travel the 450, or so, kilometres to
Wyndham; the journey back to VRD took 10 days. During the dry season the men would ‘spell’ for a brief time
at VRD, then take another mob to Wyndham. Three mobs a year were the maximum the seasons allowed. Once,
in the 1920s, the Fuller drove a mob to the Wyndham wharf for live export to Asia. Occasionally during ‘the Wet’
they drove cattle to Carlton Station, Western Australia, another but much smaller Bovril Estates pastoral lease.
The droving team usually consisted of the Fullers, some Aboriginal stockmen, and one or two young Aboriginal
boys being trained in stock work by the Fullers. The main jobs in the droving camp, horse trailing and cooking, were
shared out each drove between the Fullers. In 1937 during a brief ‘spell’ on VRD, Charles and his current droving
partner Noel Hall, met their future wives. The two women, Joyce Falconbridge and Dorothy Allen, were nursing
sisters with the Australian Inland Mission. They had arrived in late May 1937 for a two-year term in charge of the
small Australian Inland Mission (AIM) hospital, Wimmera Home, on the banks of the Wickham River close by the
VRD Station homestead. Charles’ brother Ted, had earlier (in 1935) also met his wife-to-be, Mildred McKenzie,
under very similar circumstances. Joyce and Charles were married in Darwin on 20 January 1940. Later in the year
Joyce left Darwin to go to Melbourne for medical supervision of her pregnancy and Charles joined her there in
time for the birth of their daughter, Patricia.
Having left the Northern Territory Charles found difficulty in obtaining work. Twice he tried to join the army
but was rejected on the grounds that he was in a reserved occupation. Similarly he was frustrated in his attempts to
return to the Territory, and only achieved his goal after considerable ‘string-pulling’. In 1942 he travelled, overland
this time, to the Territory where he rejoined his brother Ted who was still droving cattle for VRD. After a short
while Charles, now based in Katherine, began work droving for the Army taking bullocks to the meatworks on
Manbulloo Station just outside Katherine. He stayed in that job until the end of the war in 1945.
At war’s end Charles went to Melbourne to bring Joyce and their daughter back to the Northern Territory.
Between late 1945 and 1960 the family lived in the district bounded by Pine Creek and Beswick. Charles worked
at a number of jobs using skills he had acquired as a drover and bushman, but because he had no formal training
or qualifications it became increasingly more difficult for him to hold jobs for any length of time. In a period of
rapid growth in the Northern Territory, the main employer, the Commonwealth of Australia, sought younger and
more qualified men for work once done by accomplished bushmen. On one occasion Charles discovered on the
Katherine ‘grape vine’ that the job he was doing, Municipal Inspector, had been gazetted, and his experience in the
work would not qualify him for permanent employment.
The Fullers were, however, hard working and prepared to give things a go. Charles and Joyce ran a bakery in
Pine Creek (late 1946), managed Ted Fuller’s butcher shop in Katherine (1947–1948), and worked on Beswick
(Aboriginal training) Station (1951–1954). Charles also worked as a ganger supervising maintenance work on
the Stuart Highway, as a farm hand on Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO)
experimental farms in Katherine, and as a labourer for the Department of Civil Aviation at Katherine airport. At
Beswick he was head stockman supervising the training of Aboriginal men in stock work.
Despite their difficulties, including Joyce’s long and debilitating illness, the Fullers enjoyed life in the
Katherine–Pine Creek area. Charles in particular was involved in community activities and in the late 1950s was
President of the Katherine Racing Club. His work was acknowledged when the Club gave him a life-membership.
In 1960 Charles and Joyce left the Northern Territory and went to live in South Australia. Charles worked for BHP
in Whyalla between 1960 and 1963, and then for the Electricity Trust in Whyalla. He retired from work in 1969.
He and Joyce moved to Adelaide in 1977. Charles Fuller died in Adelaide on 10 April 1992, survived by his wife
and daughter. Cremation took place at Centennial Park.
Interview with C Fuller, Adelaide, December 1987, Northern Territory Archives Service, NTRS 226, TS498; personal conversations with
author.
LYN A RIDDETT, Vol 3.
FULLER, (IRIS) JOYCE SEYMOUR nee FALCONBRIDGE (1910– ), nursing sister, was born in the
Healesville district of Victoria on 19 February 1910, one of three daughters. In her early twenties Joyce commenced
her nursing training at the Queen Victoria Hospital in Melbourne. During the period of her midwifery training
Joyce became friendly with another trainee, Dorothy Allen (later Hall), and it was as a result of their friendship
that Joyce came to the Northern Territory.
Dorothy Allen had been approached by the Australian Inland Mission (AIM) to consider a second two-year
term of duty conducting an AIM hospital in northern Australia. The Council of the AIM had recently decided to
tighten its policy on employment of its nursing sisters, so that whereas previously they had chosen young women
who were Christian, now they insisted the nurses had to be Presbyterian. Joyce Falconbridge not only met all the
requirements, she was, as well, Dorothy Allen’s friend. She was delighted to accept the offer of a term of duty