Biography

Believed to be Mabel HARRIS. According to an an interview with Gus Cavanagh in 1980, this tragic story unfolded while Mr Clayton (sic) was away shepherding his sheep one day in 1893. Mrs Frances Agnes Mary Claydon lay her baby on the rug and was teaching her sister, Mabel Harris, to swim in the Hillman River when they both got into difficulties and were drowned. Later, an aboriginal woman found the baby covered in ants. With a young babe of her own, she suckled the baby and took it with her tribal group, which was traveling from the Blackwood area to Williams, following the river. The sisters were found and buried near the river.  Some three weeks later, the baby was finally traced and returned.

The parents of Mrs Claydon and Miss Harris were married in Perth in 1853 (Marriage Registration 537/1853, Perth). Mrs Claydon was the tenth of their eleven children. Others were: Letitia Charlotte Mary born 1854; Charles William born 1855; John Joseph born 1856; Alice Mary born 1857; Elizabeth Margaret born 1859; Charles William born 1861; George Albert born 1864; Thomas Edmund born 1866; Mary Alice born 1869; Frances Agnes born 1874 (Birth Registration 15505/1874); Eleanor Catherine born 1875; Emily Jane born 1876; Amy born 1877. It is not known which or whether any of these girls used the name Mabel.

Five members of the Harris family died tragically and are memorialised in a plaque on the family property.  Buried side by side are twin boys, aged three years, who drowned in a well on this property; a girl, aged 12 years, who was burned to death when he dress caught on fire; a girl aged 1 month who died of whooping cough and an unnamed baby girl who died at birth.