Brian White
Ship name / Flight number: Castel Felice
Arrival date: 08/08/1964
I was born in the small village of Kilmington in Devon on 25 February 1947. My childhood in a country village was far from the idyllic stereotype. My parents, Tom and Bessie, were married in late 1946 and my brother Alan was born three years later. Tragically, our mother had a severe stroke when I was six years old. Her whole right side was paralysed. It is most unusual for a relatively healthy 25-year-old woman to have a stroke. Perhaps it was caused by the medication she was taking for morning sickness? My parents made the hard decision to abort their third child, reasoning that it would be difficult enough for Bessie to raise two small children, let alone a third. My mother’s stroke and abortion made her life very difficult and motivated me to be as independent as possible.
L-R, Bessie, Tom, Allan and Brian White, 1963.
My Dad worked as a labourer for the railways. I started working part-time for a private forestry business run by Maurice Coombs before I finished school. Once I turned 15 years old and left school, it turned into a full-time job. I enjoyed my work; planting, pruning, and felling trees. I had a good boss and he suggested that I go to Canada to learn more about forestry. This put the idea in my head that I could get a job overseas. When I looked into it, I found out that I would have to pay money to go to Canada, but I could get to Australia for free with the BBM, because I was still under 18 years of age.
My parents accompanied me to Australia House for the interview. I was so excited that my heart was racing and I felt sure that I’d fail the medical test. I passed and less than a month later I was on the Castel Felice sailing across the world. My parents were very sad when they said goodbye at Axminster station. My Mother said – ‘see you in a couple of years’ – knowing that I had to stay for two years or pay for my passage to Australia and back. It would be six years before I came back and saw them again.
Brian White (looking at the camera, third on the right) and other Little Brothers eat dinner on the Castel Felice, July, 1964.
The five-week voyage to Australia from Southampton was straightforward. Half the ship were English immigrants and the other half were Dutch. I was one of 17 Little Brothers off to start a new life.
When we arrived in Sydney on 8 August 1964, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I elected to go and work in the country, so my first night was spent at the BBM training farm. I remember that we all slept in one long dormitory. On our first night at the farm, we walked across paddocks to the local cinema in Cabramatta to watch the Beatles movie “A Hard Day’s Night”. I didn’t learn much at the training farm – it felt more like a holding station until we were sent to our jobs.
I was sent to work on an irrigated cattle, sheep, and grain farm called ‘Kevan Dale’ near Finley in the NSW Riverina. I had to catch a train that left Central Station at 10.30pm. It was freezing cold. I can remember walking up and down the train carriages all night trying to keep warm. I had to change trains at Junee and Mr Killeen met me at Finley Station the next day. I remember his words of greeting were: “put your bags in the back of the ute. Mum’s [meaning his wife] in the CWA [Country Women’s Association] Hall, she’ll be home soon.”
When we got to their farm, I was shown my living quarters, which was a small shed behind the garage. It contained a bed, a small cupboard, a radio, a small bathroom and no heating. I ate my meals with the family in their home.
I was used to working with trees, not sheep. In my first two weeks on the farm, I mixed the sheep up and was in tears at the breakfast table due to my mistakes. Mr Killeen was kind, but we agreed that I would never make a shepherd. He gave me other tasks to do around the farm, such as helping with the wheat harvest and in the shearing sheds.
In my first few weeks, another ‘Little Brother’, Tim Biggs, drove over from another farm to take me into Finley. I found out later that he left farming to join the navy and served on HMAS Melbourne, an aircraft carrier, in the 1960s. We’re going to meet up at the centenary in 2025 – I haven’t seen him since 1964.
I enjoyed working at Kevan Dale and became good friends with the family. I got along well with their two sons, Douglas and Kevin, who were only a couple of years younger than me. Mrs Killen invited me to join in their family Christmases and made me a cake for my 21st birthday in 1968. When I came to Australia, I planned to stay for a couple of years, but I ended up working for seven years on the Killeen’s farm.
I recently went back to Kevan Dale to see what was left. The shed where I slept had been demolished as it had asbestos in it, but the main farmhouse was still there.
In 1969 I caught a train from Tocumwal to Melbourne with a friend to attend a crusade by American evangelist, Billy Graham. I went to church in Kilmington and sung in the choir but I wouldn’t say that my family were religious. I’m not sure what motivated me to go to the rally, but I accepted Jesus into my heart and became a Christian. In 1972 I decided to go to the Melbourne Bible Institute and then, in 1977, to St Barnabas College in Adelaide, where I trained to become an Anglican priest. In total, I spent six years training for ministry. I didn’t have an academic education in Devon and it was a big change from farming to studying!
Brian (middle row, third from the left) at St Barnabas College, 1977.
In 1971 I went back to England and saw my parents for the first time in six years. They were thrilled to see me, but it was difficult for my mother to say goodbye, again. I took the opportunity on that trip to visit the Holy Land, that I would be learning about in bible college.
In 1979 I married Diane Thomas in Adelaide, and the following year we moved to Griffith, where I was ordained a Deacon in January 1980. At the end of that year, I was ordained as a priest at St Peter’s Anglican Church in Leeton. Diane gave birth to our daughter Rachel in September 1981. The accommodation provided by the church in Griffith, not suitable for a family. Diane found it difficult and didn’t get along with the archdeacon, who was my boss. After a couple of tough years, Diane decided to move back to Adelaide with our daughter and I was moved to Deniliquin, which is only 60km west of Finley, where I started my life in Australia nearly 20 years earlier. I stayed there for about a year before accepting a position in 1984 as parish priest in Moama, which is on the NSW bank of the Murray River opposite Echuca.
This was like a fresh start for me. I stayed in Moama for five years and married Captain Mary Simmons who served with the local Salvation Army. We were married in January 1988 by Barry Hunter, the Anglican Bishop for the Riverina. My mother flew out to Australia for our wedding in Moama. It was her first time traveling outside of England and flying on a plane. Unfortunately, my dad died when he was only 58 years old.
Brian and Mary, 2 January 1988.
Since Mary couldn’t have children, we adopted a six-month-old child, Andrew. He has Downs Syndrome, so we had a trip to the Melbourne Children’s Hospital to fix up the hole in his heart.
In 1989, the Anglican Church asked me to move down the Murray River to Barham, so that I could minister to the parish of Barham, Wakool and Koondrook, which straddled the NSW and Victorian state border. In 1991 we moved again, this time to Wallerawang, where I volunteered to look after the St John’s Church near the power station. During this time, I caught the train up the range to Katoomba TAFE to complete a Bachelor of Welfare. By now I was no longer being paid as a priest, so when the opportunity came up to manage a pizza shop in Lithgow, I took it. This was my first time running a small business and we stuck at it for the next 20 years.
In about 2011, Mary and I decided it would be better to live separately. I still have regular contact with her and our son. In 2017, after my 70th birthday when I was starting to think that I’d like to retire from making pizzas and move back out west, a friendly stranger came into the shop, and I discovered that he was from Hay. We kept in touch and after I left the pizza business on 31 October 2018 and spent Christmas in England, he offered me a place to rent in Hay. I felt that God was looking out for me, as even though I am on a pension, in 2020 I was able to get my first home loan at the age of 73 years and buy the place I had been renting.
When I moved to Hay, I joined the local Uniting Church, and I now lead the service every fortnight. I go to the local men’s shed on Wednesdays, a senior’s lunch on Fridays and work in my garden most other days. I grow my own vegetables and feel like I’m part of the community. I’ve had a good life in Australia and have no regrets.
Brian White, 2024
The adventures of the marvellous Brian White
By Kimberly Grabham – The Riverine Grazier – 11 October 2023
Imagine, jumping on board a ship at age 17, considered a grown-up but still not that long ago a child, leaving the whole life you knew for adventures to places unknown? That’s what Brian White did. He leapt from the UK, headed for ‘the land of opportunity,’ one of thousands from the UK, ‘ten-pound Poms,’ as Brian jokingly refers. Although, he says that his was free. As he was under 18, he was eligible to set sail, cost free.
“I wanted to go to Canada initially, as I was in forestry and grew trees, but you had to pay,” he laughs. “So, I set sail for Australia.”
Brian was born in Axminster, Devon, England and came to Australia under the Immigration Scheme. Sponsored by an organisation called the Big Brother Movement, they were called Little Brothers, a scheme founded in 1925 by Sir Richard Linton to facilitate migration of young men to Australia from the UK. The young men were trained for farm work at various government-run training farms. The Movement sponsored about twelve thousand lads to settle in Australia up until 1982. Brian, sailed from Southampton Port on July 5, 1964. His mother had a stroke when she was 25. “It was hard going for her,” Brian recalled. “So, I decided to get out in the world and see what happened. “Life was hard in England at that time, the climate was hard and it was just after the War. “It was an Italian Ship we went on, called the ‘Castel Felice,’ and owned by the Sitmar Line, from Genoa, Italy.
A young Brian White, eating dinner and looking directly at the camera aboard the ‘Castel Felice’, with fellow travellers. They were dressed well, in suits and dining at tables.
It went to Taiwan as scrap in 1972, and is probably cutlery now. Half of the passengers were from the United Kingdom, like me, and half were Dutch, from the Netherlands.” Arriving in Sydney on August 8, 1964, he and 13 other passengers on board for the Big Brother movement were asked if they had a preference for working in the city or country. Brian chose the country, and was sent to a training farm at Cabramatta, now called Fairfield City Farm. One room of the farmhouse is dedicated to the Big Brother movement.
“I remember, we walked into Cabramatta one time to see the Beatles movie, ‘A Hard Day’s Night,’” he recalled. “After two weeks, I was offered a job in Finley in the Riverina. I caught the train from Central Station, and I remember how very cold it was in August on the train. Passing through Goulburn, I just walked up and down on the train to try and keep warm.” One of his fellow ‘little brothers’ got off at Berrigan, and Brian got off at Finley Station. He was met there by Mr Ian Killeen. “He said, ‘put your bags in the back of the Ute,’ and I put my two small cases in, and off we went, to his property called ‘Kevandale’,” Brian recalled. Mr and Mrs Killeen had two sons,Kevin and Douglas, both of whom attended Hay War Memorial High School. Douglas and his family recently came to the Centenary of the school, earlier in 2023. ‘Kevandale’ had cattle, sheep and grew grain crops. “I remember in the first weeks on the farm, I got some sheep mixed up, I ‘boxed’ them. At breakfast I burst into tears, and said, ‘I will never make a shepherd,’ but I ended up staying there for seven years,” he recalled.
In 1969, Brian caught a train from Tocumwal to Melbourne with a friend, to attend a Billy Graham evangelist crusade. “I don’t know why we went, but I remember we had suits on,” Brian said. On the train back to Tocumwal, Brian was asked by another passenger what he thought of the crusade. “I said ‘I don’t know, but I feel strange,’ and the man replied, ‘don’t harden your heart against it,’” he said. “I did not understand the Christian faith back then.” When he returned to Finley, he knelt beside his bed, and asked Jesus to come into his life, if he was real. This heralded the start of his Christian journey.
From 1972 to 74, he attended the Melbourne Bible Institute, at Armidale. After this, he tried to enter the Melbourne Diocese of the Anglican Church, but discovered that he needed further education. Upon his return to Finley, the local Anglican priest, Reverend Bill Ginns took Brian to meet the Bishop of the Riverina. “Many people in Hay will remember Bill and Rowena Ginns who came to Hay after their time in Finley and Tocumwal,” Brian said.
From 1977 to 1979, he trained for the Anglican Church at St Barnabas College in Adelaide. He then married his first wife, Diane Thomas on November 30, 1979, and was made a priest at St Peter’s in Leeton on December 8, 1980. They welcomed their daughter Rachel on September 11, 1981 in Griffith Hospital. The couple then moved to Griffith, where Brian was ordained a Deacon. Their marriage ended when they were in Griffith, Diane returning to South Australia. Bishop Barry Hunter moved Brian to be his assistant at Deniliquin. While in Deniliquin, he was sent to Culcairn and Henty for five months. In 1984, he was then made Minister of Moama, Mathoura and Bunnaloo. In 1988, Bishop Hunter married Brian to Mary Simmons, his second wife, who at the time was Captain of the Salvation Army in Echuca.
At the end of 1989, the couple moved to Barham, and had the parish of Barham, Wakool and Koondrook. While living at Barham, Brian and Mary adopted their son, Andrew, who had Downs Syndrome. In 1991, the family moved from Barham to Lithgow, where they looked after a church at Wallerawang, near the power station, which has closed since they were there. While there, Brian travelled to Katoomba to complete a Bachelor of Welfare at TAFE. The family were then offered the opportunity to run a pizza shop in Lithgow, Papadino’s Pizza which they did for the next 20 years.
The wonderful Brian White today. Image: The Riverine Grazier/Kimberly Grabham
“I was in the shop in 2017, when a man who worked for the RTA came in to buy a pizza,” Brian recalled.“I told him that I was planning to go back to the Riverina, to a town out west, and told him you won’t know the place. It is called Hay. He then told me his name was Jeffry Anderson, and nickname is ‘Panda’. He took out his driver’s license to show me, and it said he was from Hay. Small world, we have since become friends.”
Brian finished at the Pizza shop on Halloween, 2018, and in January 2019, moved to Hay. Since coming to live at Hay, he has joined the congregation of the Uniting Church, and has been given the opportunity to periodically lead Sunday Services. Through all of his ups and downs, Brian remains the cheerful, jovial, wonderful person that is known around town. He still talks to Mary and son Andrew most days. Andrew is living in a group home. “One of the favourite times of my life was coming to Hay, buying a house and becoming part of the community,” Brian said. Brian maintains a connection with the Big Brother Movement, an organisation he said shaped his life in positive ways. He has been back to England three times, and is happy with the way his life led him. The centenary of the organisation is in 2025, something which Brian is looking forward to, and is hoping to attend.
“I have no regrets about making the decision to come to Australia, my life would have been very different if I had stayed in England,” he said. “There were far more opportunities here,
and everyone wanted to come to the ‘land of opportunity.”