Topsy Smith
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Topsy Smith (c.1875 – 15 April 1960) was an Arabana pioneer of Central Australia in the Northern Territory. She spent her life caring for Indigenous children at an institution known as The Bungalow in Alice Springs.
Topsy Smith was born around 1875, the daughter of Mary Kemp, who was of Arabana descent,[1] from the Oodnadatta area, in northeast South Australia. Her father was policeman George White but he did not play a large role in her life as she as mostly raised by her mother and her step-father Arthur Evans. The couple had a variety of jobs together, including running a store at Alice Well, until Arthur 'got respectable' and left Mary to marry a white woman.[2]
In the early 1890s Smith married a Welsh miner William "Bill" Smith and they headed north to the Arltunga goldfields.[2] They had eleven children, the eldest of whom was bushman Walter Smith who was born in 1893. Bill died on 20 May 1914, and finding it increasingly hard to find gold, Smith decided to return to the Oodnadatta area, but only made it as far as Alice Springs, then known as Stuart. She was pregnant at the time and was accompanied by seven of her children and a herd of several hundred goats. Walter remained in Arltunga to work.[3]
Topsy and her children were assisted by pastoralists Jane and Ted Hayes from Undoolya Station, with whom they lived for some time before moving on to Alice Springs.[4] When she arrived in Alice Springs, Smith lived in a tent. She herded her goats on a hill which was then the outskirts of town, a place that became known as Billy Goat Hill;[4] these goats were later confiscated from her and some placed at The Bungalow to provide the children with milk and meat while others were used to feed prisoners at Stuart Town Gaol.[5] No compensation was provided for these goats which were a considerable asset.[2]