Euphemia Mullet/Tonkin (nee Hood)

- known as Euphie February 21, 1927 to August 5, 1997

Dorothy Hood’s daughter

Euphemia Mullet came from

Lake Tyers Mission to Jackson’s Track.

Imagine living in an institution of government-owned buildings where every element of her life was controlled by others, then moving to an out-of-sight bush place with bark huts beside a running creek, with the freedom to pretty-much do as you pleased and with friends and family around. It must have been joyous.

Euphie settled with Darryl Tonkin and was mother to 13 children; 11 were Darryl’s. Like her mother Dora, Euphie insisted on cleanliness, physical health, traditional culture and education as the ways to survive in their divided world. Constantly bubbling over the outdoor fire, the half 44-gallon drum of water demonstrated Euphie’s insistence on daily clothes-washing and hut scrubbing.

Euphie was the acknowledged genealogist within the community, with a vast knowledge of where people came from, who they were related to. She kept alive the cultural understandings of blood lines and kin/skin, repeating often, “Get your education but don’t forget your culture.”

Euphie dealt with racism all her life and was even abducted from Jackson’s Track by her white partner’s family (Tonkin) because they were so ferociously opposed to the relationship.

The matter of a white man living with a black woman was considered disgraceful and in some states was illegal. About a week later, Euphie got word to Darryl: “Dear Darryl, Harry dumped me near Orbost. I’m at a sleeper-cutters’ camp…at Newmerella…I am waiting for you to come and get me.”

Across the years, in the hospitals where Euphie gave birth to her children, the Aboriginal women were separated from the white women.