Merewether
James Williams-Mozley, forcibly removed from his mother at 7 months old, recounts when we was reunited with her:
"I spoke to my mother for the first time when I was 27 years old... The time was 11.37pm on Friday the 15th of September 1978. I had just arrived in Tennant Creek from Sydney where I'd lived and worked for the previous twenty seven years.
I pushed open the tired wrought iron gate of the house and walked in darkness along the concrete path. As I did, the front door opened and a young boy and girl ran out of the house yelling 'Dougie!'. Who the hell is Dougie? My name is John! Did I just travel two thousand kilometres to the wrong address?
Before I could turn around and walk back out the gate a young woman was walking down the path towards me. She peeled the two young ones off my arms and left leg and took my hand as she said, 'Mum's been waiting forever to see you'. My eyes followed the path in front of me to where I saw the silhouette of a woman standing in the half light of the open door. Her hands were clasped together in front of her body and she stood perfectly still. Even in the darkness, I could see tears rolling down her chubby cheeks. She held out her arms to embrace me and I walked into them. We held each other for the longest time. I was home."
John Williams-Mozley in Christina Kenny (ed), Us Taken-Away Kids: Commemorating the 10th Anniversary of the Bringing Them Home Report (Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, 2007), 38.
James Williams - Mozley