PART 2 of the  Saga of Henrietta Foott
Henrietta and James Foott must have begun 1864 full of optimism. Assisted by Aboriginal people, they had hewn out a station just south of Bourke that was a far cry from their early life half a world away. In Ireland, James had dined on Queen Anne plates imported from China, using silverware etched with his family crest. Henrietta’s distinguished family in Scotland had guaranteed her a good education.
 
James had squandered his inheritance and sailed to Australia with Henrietta in 1853 looking for a fresh start. Their great grand-daughter Bethia pictured James’ pioneering toil. “ … he dug with his spade, and cut with his axe. His land cleared, his saplings split, his bark stripped, his homestead built, it was not enough that he bought and bred and fed and watered his sheep. He worked hard, and thought that his hands had brought a life of security for his wife and for his children.”
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The  Darling in flood, sketch by Henrietta Foott

​Women alone in the Bush,
Mothers and wives,
Keeping your guard in the weird night-hush
Over sleeping lives;
In woe or weal,
Staunch and fond,
True as steel
To the marriage bond…
Hearts of Gold, O Hearts of Gold!
                                                          (Will Oglivie 1896)          
 
Scots stockman/poet, Will Ogilvie, witnessed first-hand the heroic fortitude of the women who braved the punishing conditions of the lonely West. He admired the exceptional resourcefulness it took survive without schools, shops, churches, hospitals and post offices.
 
Scotswoman Henrietta Foott arrived near the site of Fort Bourke on the banks of the Darling in October 1860. The record of her ten-year stint in the Outback is a remarkable story of a girl raised in a comfortable home in Aberdeen, transforming into a frontier woman capable of keeping her family in a rough camp 800 km from civilisation. Without question, her sturdy faith was the backbone of the family.