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collapse, which was exacerbated by Dan’s long absence on Springbok. Harriet records a hasty departure from
Palmerston in 1873 not long after Dan had returned from Adelaide.
Harriet’s second child, a son, Dominick Douglas, was born in 1874, but it is unclear whether this occurred
before of after Daly’s appointment as Surveyor for the Native States in Malaya. Likewise, Harriet’s father’s
career also took him to Malaya, where he was appointed Permanent Resident for the Malay State of Selangor in
- He appointed Daly Superintendent of Public Works but the two again became involved in shady deals and
Daly was dismissed for land robbery in 1882. Douglas was later removed from his post also.
Details of Harriet’s life during this difficult period are unclear. It is known that she remained with her husband,
who now obtained a position with the British North Borneo Company. Again Bloomfield Douglas joined his
daughter and son-in-law until the death of Harriet’s mother in 1887. This loss must have been deeply felt by
Harriet who dedicated her book, published in the same year, to her mother. Dan Daly died in Malaya in 1889.
Her return to England opened up a new career for Harriet as a London correspondent for the Sydney Morning
Herald. She held the position for many years, calling her column first ‘A Lady’s Letter from London’ and later
‘A Woman’s Letter from London’. These articles indicate that she mixed in the best social circles, giving fashion
and social news to her Australian readers. Earlier articles, which date back at least to 1896, incorporate some
topical issues also and are written in a witty, if acid, style. Sir James Reading Fairfax, owner of the Herald, records
in his diary a luncheon to which he invited her in 1901. In 1906 she wrote, under her title Mrs Dominic Daly, of the
death of author John Oliver Hobbes, pseudonym for Mrs Craigie. Harriet indicates some familiarity with literary
figures also.
Harriet emerges as a strong and courageous woman who endured the public disgrace of both her husband
and father on more than one occasion. A large portion of her life was lived in isolated and difficult areas of the
Colonial Empire, where what little is known of her reflects favourably on the character and personality of one of
the Northern Territory’s first authors.
ADB, vol 4, 1851–1890, 1972; H Daly, Digging, Squatting and Pioneering Life in the Northern Territory of South Australia, 1887; J R Fairfax,
Personal Diary, Entry 1901; D E Kelsey, The Shackle: A Story of the Far North Australian Bush, 1975; M J Kerr, The Surveyors: The Story
of the Founding of Darwin, 1971; G Newman, The Northern Territory and its Goldfields, 1875; E Sadka, The Protected Malay States: 1874–
1895 , 1968; Book Review, Adelaide Observer, 28 January 1888; Mrs Daly, John Oliver Hobbes’, Sydney Morning Herald, 18 September 1901;
J M Gullick, ‘Selangor 1876–1882: The Bloomfield Douglas Diary’, Journal of the Asian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol 48, part 2,
1975; M Kennett, ‘The Northern Territory Goldfields 1871–74’, Business Archives, vol 4, no 1, February 1964; Entry of Marriage, Adelaide
Advertiser, 24 October 1871; ‘The Voyage of the Springbok—Return of Mr Daly and Other Passengers’, Adelaide Advertiser, 14 June 1873;
South Australian Directory, Entries Douglas and Daly; Sydney Morning Herald Archives; ‘A Lady’s Letter From London’, Sydney Morning
Herald, 8 February 1896, 25 July 1898; ‘A Woman’s Letter From London’, Sydney Morning Herald, 12 January 1901, 2 May 1908.
BARBARA MURRAY, Vol 1.
DAMASO, BASILIO VICTOR (BABE) (1910–1989), worker in many occupations, sportsman and public
servant, was born on 5 April 1910 on his father’s boat in the Limmen Bight of the Gulf of Carpentaria, son of
Annie Palarlura, a Yanula woman from the Borroloola region and Ceceba Damaso. His father was a Filipino mariner
who had been making a living fishing and trepanging in the Gulf for several years and he and Annie already had
two daughters, Mary and Andrea. Andrea died shortly afterwards while the family were at Roper River. In 1915
Babe, as he was known, came to Darwin where he lived with Joseph and Dolly Bonson in Stuart Park.
From 1919, following the death of his wife in Darwin, Ceceba ranged across North Australia from Borroloola
to Broome; Babe and Mary often accompanied him. Ceceba worked as a trepanger around Vanderlin Island;
and as a cook at the hotel in Borroloola, Government House in Darwin, and the Filipino Association in Broome.
Babe gained his formal education at the convent schools in Darwin and Broome, and his love and knowledge of
the sea from the time spent with his father during these years.
Playing first for the Wanderers Club before moving to the Buffaloes, Babe started a long and proud family
connection with the Darwin Football Club. He became in 1929 the Territory’s Amateur Bantam Weight Boxing
Champion.
Babe’s first paid employment was as a messenger/driver with Myles Kelly, a health inspector, before going to
Vestey’s Meatworks and then doing a stint driving a victory Dodge taxi for Michael Paspalis. His next job was
working on the roads with the Department of Works. The Depression saw Babe depending on relief work and being
involved with a food supply centre established by the unemployed with help from the union.
In 1932 Theresa Clarke on her way to meet Delfin Cubillo, whom she later married, decided that her friend
Nancy Mary Farrar (born 27 June 1915), a domestic at the Vic Hotel should meet Babe. Nancy (Nan) had been
born on Nutwood Downs. Her mother was Ada McLennan and her father John Farrar (lessee of Nutwood Downs).
Farrar never acknowledged Nan as his daughter. Ada brought Nan to Darwin when she was four years old and
they lived with Bluey Johns in Fanny Bay. The relationship with Babe grew despite strong objections from Bluey
Johns that Nan should not marry Babe because she’d finish up having ‘snotty nosed black kids’. They began living
together in Stuart Park and on the 5 June 1934 John Damaso, the first of their children was born. Nan and Babe,
both confirmed Catholics, were wed in St Mary’s Church on 29 April 1935.
Babe relied on casual employment and relief work supplemented by duck and geese that he shot and fish
he caught. Nan says that the family never went hungry because of Babe’s skills as a hunter and fisher. In 1937
he got a job with the Municipal Council as a labourer, then truck driver. Just prior to the bombing of Darwin
Babe was made foreman responsible for supervising 50 men. After the first raid Babe supervised the despatch of
some government records in two trucks to Alice Springs. In 1942 after joining the Army and being transferred to
Adelaide Babe applied on compassionate grounds to leave the Army so as to be with Nan and the children who had