The stolen children report provides a chilling history of case after case of children removed from their families, not because they were being neglected, but because they were Aboriginal. Below are excerpts from the report.
Millicent
They told me that my family didn't care or want me and I had to forget them. They said it was very degrading to belong to an Aboriginal family and that I should be ashamed of myself. I was inferior to whitefellas. They tried to make us act like white kids but at the same time we had to give up our seat for a whitefella because an Aboriginal never sits down when a white person is present ...
The man of the house used to come into my room at night and force me to have sex. I tried to fight him off but he was too strong ... When I returned to the home I ... went to the Matron and told her what happened. She washed my mouth out with soap and boxed my ears and told me that awful things would happen to me if I told any of the other kids. I was so scared and wanted to die.
When the next school holidays came I begged not to be sent to that farm again. But they would not listen and said I had to ...
This time I was raped, bashed and slashed with a razor blade on both of my arms and legs because I would not stop struggling and screaming. The farmer and one of his workers raped me several times ...
When they returned me to the home I once again went to the Matron. I got a belting with a wet ironing cord, my mouth washed out with soap and put in a cottage by myself away from everyone so I couldn't talk to the other girls.
Fiona
I guess the government didn't mean it as something bad but our mothers weren't treated as people having feelings. Naturally a mother's got a heart for her children and for them to be taken away, no-one can ever know the heartache. She was still grieving when I met her in 1968.
When me and my little family stood there — my husband and me and my two little children — and all my family was there, there wasn't a word we could say to each other. All the years that you wanted to ask this and ask that, there was no way we could ever regain that. It was like somebody came and stabbed me with a knife ...
When I finally met [my mother] through an interpreter she said that because my name had been changed she had heard about the other children but she'd never heard about me. And every sun, every morning as the sun came up the whole family would wail. They did that for 32 years until they saw me again. Who can imagine what a mother went through?
William
I can remember this utility with a coffin on top with flowers. As a little boy I saw it get driven away knowing there was something inside that coffin that belonged to me. I think I was about six years old at the time. This was the time of our separation, after our mother passed away.
My family tried to get the Welfare to keep us here ... trying to keep us together. Aunty D in Darwin — they wouldn't allow her to keep us. My uncle wanted to keep me and he tried every way possible, apparently, to keep me. He was going to try and adopt me but they wouldn't allow it. They sent us away ...
It seemed like nobody cared. I don't know how long it went on for, but night after night I'd see the bogey man. I never saw the person. I don't know who that person was ... Wanting my mother, crying for my mother every night, day after day, knowing that she'd never come home or come and get me. Nobody told me my mother died. Nobody ...
I wake up in the middle of the night, same time. My kids have asked me why I get up in the middle of the night and I can't explain it, I can't tell them — shamed ...
Carol
We were treated like animals when it came to lollies. We had to dive in the dirt when lollies were thrown to us. The lollies went straight into our mouths from the dirt. We had to, if it was a birthday or feast day of the missionaries, wish them a happy day, take our lollies and run, knowing what could happen.
We had to sometimes kiss the missionaries on the lips, or touch their penises. I remember clearly on one occasion, I was told to put my hands down his pants to get my lolly.
The nuns taught us that our private parts were forbidden to touch. If we were caught washing our private parts, we would get into trouble from the nuns. I grew up knowing that our private parts were evil, yet missionaries could touch us when they felt like it. That is why when I grew up that I automatically thought when a man wanted sex that I had to give it to him, because that's what, y'know.
Jennifer
Early one morning in November 1952 the manager from Burnt Bridge Mission came to our home with a policeman. I could hear him saying to Mum, "I am taking the two girls and placing them in Cootamundra Home". My father was saying, "What right have you?" ...
They would not let us kiss our father goodbye, I will never forget the sad look on his face. He was unwell and he worked very hard all his life as a timbercutter. That was the last time I saw my father, he died within two years after ...
When I was thirteen years old Mrs S. called this middle-aged male doctor to the house and said she wanted an internal examination of me. That was terribly shameful for me, I will not say any more. During the time [with her] I was belted naked repeatedly, whenever she had the urge. She was quite mad. I had to cook, clean, attend to her customers' laundry. I was used and humiliated. The Board knew she was refused any more white children yet they sent us there ...
Paul
For 18 years the State of Victoria referred to me as State Ward No 54321 ...
Throughout all these years — from five and a half months old to 18 years of age, my Mother never gave up trying to locate me ... She wrote many letters to the State Welfare Authorities, pleading with them to give her son back. Birthday and Christmas cards were sent care of the Welfare Department. All these letters were shelved ...
In May 1982, I was requested to attend at the Sunshine Welfare Offices, where they formally discharged me from State wardship ... [The Senior Welfare Officer] explained that his Department's position was only to protect me and, "That is why you were not told these things before". He placed in front of me 368 pages of my file, together with letters, photos and birthday cards ...
The welfare officer scribbled on a piece of paper my Mother's current address in case, in his words, I'd "ever want to meet her". I cried tears of relief, guilt and anger ...