When Barbara Francis retired in 2003 after 25 years of teaching, she turned to writing non-fiction. After two biographical works about Agnes (Nessie) Moncrieff, former international secretary of the YWCA in China, Francis has now published Titus Angus White and the Māori Captives on Waitematā Harbour 1863/4 (Atuanui Press).
You were born in Napier in 1938, on the brink of World War II. How did that conflict colour your early years?
One of my most vivid early memories is of my stepmother taking me to the railway station in Dannevirke at the end of the war. Crowds of people were there to greet the train, and when all these men in khaki got off, everybody cried.
What happened to your mother?
My mother was 32 when she died of meningitis. She was there on Monday morning, and when I came home from school, she was in hospital, where she died a few days later. I was 5 ½.
How were you supported through your grief at such a tender age?
I was not told what had happened except that Mum was an angel up in heaven. Which I took very literally, so when the sky was blue I was very well behaved but on cloudy days I was not so good, because I didn’t think Mum could see me. Not being told coloured my life forever and it took me a long time to work through it.
How did your father cope?
He was devastated, of course. As the clerk at the local court, Dad was friendly with the MP for Pahiatua and I’d go to his place after school because his son was in my class. Years later, at a civic reception in Christchurch, I was introduced to the Governor-General and I said, “Hello, Sir Keith [Holyoake]. I was Barbara Smith, I used to play with your son.” He was lovely and held up the reception line to talk with me. I didn’t tell him I’d smoked my first cigarette with his son, Peter. Actually, it was a cigar he’d pinched from his father. It made us both violently ill.
You say you were fortunate when your father was transferred from Dannevirke to Dunedin when he was appointed deputy registrar of the Supreme Court there. Why is that?
It meant I went to Otago Girls’ High School which shaped my life by giving me strengths and skills that became my foundations, with amazing teachers who showed us that women could excel as men did. It was also quite strict, with a focus on academic excellence. Although I hadn’t yet grown up enough to knuckle down, I loved learning.
Were you always going to be a teacher?
At the end of my fourth year, not realising university was an option, I spent a year working in a bank, which I did not enjoy. The next year, 1956, I went to Wellington Teachers’ Training College, another life-shaping institution.
From being at teachers’ college in the 1950s, then teaching until the 1990s, how did the profession change?
I left classroom teaching to raise a family, and didn’t return to full-time teaching until 1980, whereupon I discovered things had changed, and not always for the better. But because I’d had so many experiences outside teaching, including within the Girl Guides movement, I had renewed confidence, so when I returned to the classroom, I taught the old-fashioned way. I did get hauled over the coals now and then, but there were also parents who insisted their children be in my class.
Girl Guides was a major part of your life. What did that provide?
I loved the activities – the weekend camps and various badges. In 1974, when my two children were still pre-schoolers, I was prevailed upon to join again so Sumner Girl Guides wouldn’t close. Going back as a leader, I was plucked from being a suburban housewife to learn all manner of skills where a few wise women gently guided me to learn and grow.
How did your book, You Do Not Travel in China at the Full Moon, come to be written?
When I retired from teaching in my 60s, a friend asked what I’d do next, and I said I had a funny feeling something would fall out of the sky. The next day, I went to the birthday party of an old woman who had been a good friend of Nessie Moncrieff’s, and this elderly woman was the executor of Nessie’s estate. She told me how she meant to dispose of Nessie’s letters written from China, but her daughter suggested the Turnbull Library might want them. I went to the Turnbull to read them and then shared some of the contents with a handful of people within the YWCA. That led to a research grant through the trust New Horizons For Women: Hine Kahukura, which not only gave me finance to do further research, it gave me confidence. That in turn led to Fergus Barrowman offering me an opportunity to publish the letters through Te Herenga Waka University Press. I’ve been so lucky with the people who’ve come into my life.
How did events lead you to write your book about your ancestor, Titus Angus White?
Five years ago, I was heading home after celebrating my 80th birthday by riding around Wellington’s south coast on a four-wheel-drive. I was walking along Lambton Quay when I caught the sole of my Doc Martens on a cobblestone and broke my arm. As I recuperated, a cousin appeared with an armload of family papers she had inherited from her father, my mother’s cousin. I learnt about Titus Angus White, my great-great-great-grandfather. He’d been the native interpreter in charge of 228 Māori captives held [after the Battle of Rangiriri during the Waikato War] for 19 months on the Marion, a prison hulk on the Waitematā Harbour, in the 1860s.
That’s complicated territory, isn’t it?
Yes, and I boldly sent an email to a man whose ancestor had fought in the battle. I explained my connection and asked if he might help me. That man was Dr Mike Ross, head of Māori studies at Victoria University of Wellington, and he guided me so generously.
How did you proceed?
While researching at Rangiriri in 2020, I had a chance encounter with Brad Totorewa, who was then te toki a te Kiingi – speaker for the King. I told him I was looking into the story of the captives, explaining my connection, and he was not entirely pleased. When I mentioned Mike’s name, Brad cooled down, then explained that Pākehā were not always told the truth about what happened in the wars, in favour of colonial propaganda. Brad suggested if I was to continue, I should return to Wellington and write the story for Pākehā. Which is what this book is.
Publishing a book at 85 seems rather novel. Do you have any advice for aspiring octogenarian authors?
I have never stopped to look at my life as I have for this interview. I only got School Certificate, and a trade certificate, yet I’m now having the best part of my life aged 85. Being in your 80s doesn’t mean you have to sit back and play bridge or wait to die, so if I can encourage older people to know they are capable of more, I’ll be happy with that.
