Richard Glover on the true value of an arts degree

At the beginning, all I had was a name and location. He was Thomas Lee of Goulburn. I consult various websites, including the National Library’s excellent Trove. Then I drive to Goulburn and examine Sloan Street, where he lived at one stage, calculating various distances from pubs and other locations, employing a diligence taught by my University of Sydney teachers: Heather Radi, Peter Cochrane, Bob Dreher and Tony Cahill.

After a week of work, I’m able to supply a report to my daughter-in-law. It’s proof of the utility of history: these stories, so easily found, turn out to have so much to teach.

Thomas, I discover, was born in China in 1848. He married a white Australian, Matilda Huckins, who already had a child from a first and troubled marriage. His name wasn’t Thomas Lee – he adopted that name in about 1880. Before that, he was Tommy Fong – married to Matilda, and running a market garden. In 1877, they were awarded “Best three varieties of cabbage” at the Goulburn Horticultural Show. They gave free produce to the hospital. They were probably Christian: When their house is robbed, one of the items listed by Goulburn Police was a stolen Bible.

It was tough – of course – being Chinese in the Goulburn of the late 1870s. A few years on from the robbery, a European called William Looney was charged with assaulting Tommy Fong. Tommy, farming about seven kilometres from town, had been returning from a day at the markets with his horse and cart, transporting some unsold “cabbages and cauliflowers”.

The defendant and two others stopped the cart and assaulted him, punching him in the face and then stomping on him. At that point, “an old man” came up and remonstrated with the main attacker, telling him to stop. According to Tommy’s evidence, the perpetrator said: “I don’t mind if I get two years for smashing a Chinaman”. Tommy was shocked by the incident, telling the court his attacker, “Was sober; I never had any row with him before; I am sore where he kicked me.”

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His wife Matilda then provided evidence of Tommy’s state when he got home: “When my husband returned home his face was cut; I went to meet him, and I met the defendant, who told me he had seen my husband [and] would not mind taking two years for hammering a Chinaman”. The assailant was convicted and fined 30 shillings.

There were other stories about the couple, but none pulled on my heart as much as that one.

Tommy and Matilda lived long and successful lives. They had 10 children, including a fellow who became an alderman on Waterloo Council. And, just in, there’s a new picture of my beautiful new granddaughter.

I’m related to her. And so is Tommy Fong. That’s glorious, isn’t it? The way Australian history tangles my story and his – all in the form of this perfect little girl?

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