South Coast NSW History Story
Kate O'Connor
Not every South Coast author was to receive national or international recognition, but many became well-known locally. ‘Kate O’Connor’, as an example, was one of these, achieving her ‘fame’ in the Bega area.
Hilda James was born in 1888 in Sydney. Her father was killed in an accident at Pambula soon after her birth, so her mother returned to Sydney. However, she left Hilda with her grandparents David and Sarah James at Kameruka Estate where David James was employed as a horticulturalist.
Hilda attended the local Candelo School and, in 1905, she married Charles Spindler who also lived on the Kameruka Estate and had attended Candelo School.
At some point, Hilda started writing poetry about the local area and received encouragement from Walter A. Smith, the Editor of the Bega Star newspaper and the first Editor of the Bega District News. He occasionally printed her poems attributing them to ‘Kate O’Connor’.
This is a poem by ‘Kate O’Connor’ written 100 years ago for the unveiling of the Bega Soldier’s Memorial:
A laughter-loving people
Australians still may be
But we must all remember
The men who kept us free.
Those boys who’d barely travelled
The golden path of youth,
The men who proved their manhood
In war’s most bitter proof.
We bear our daily burdens,
The paths of toil we tread
Rememb’ring what we pledged them,
Our dear beloved dead.
With splendid steadfast courage
They faced the foreign foe,
They gave the key of freedom
To us – who mourn them so.
And we – who know their valour
Where shot and shrapnel spread
Shall keep their deeds in memory
Our Anzacs - who are dead.
For many years, locals could only guess who ‘Kate O’Connor’ was. Many conjectured that she must have been the wife or sister of Captain O’Connor, the master of the local coastal steamer ‘Cobargo’ that regularly visited Tathra and other South Coast ports.
In 1927 a book of Kate’s poems was published under the title ‘Bega the Beautiful’. The money raised was donated to a fund assisting returned World War I servicemen.
Hilda died in September 1935, age 48.
