Recalling a life in struggle street
From the impoverished slums of Liverpool to city and regional council tables in Palmerston North, civic award holder Roni Fitzmaurice’s life has been an extraordinary story of resilience.
The once lice-ridden abandoned daughter of a prostitute, who raised a family of 11 in New Zealand, gave some 30 years of community and civic service to Palmerston North.
Now retired to Waikanae to be closer to family, the 89-year-old has finally written her memoirs, in a book called Don’t Follow Me Vera Girl.
The book is a grim read. It starts with a history lesson about the crushing poverty endured in Liverpool during the 1930s when Veronica, then Vera, now Roni, was born.
It traces her abandoned mother’s downfall from abandoned wife to ‘‘immoral woman’’ deemed undeserving of charity in the struggle to house, feed and clothe her children.
Virtually a street kid doing her best to amuse and care for two younger siblings, the young girl found the air raid shelters during World War II.
Malnourished and desperately ill, the children were eventually uplifted under the Poor Law and their mother sent to prison.
Becoming a ward, sent to the Sisters of Charity at Leyfield Children’s Home, proved to be a turning point.
Vera was fed, clean, had a real bed, was treated with kindness and began to excel at school.
After leaving school, she got a job and had a taste of freedom, of having a little money, and developed a longing to move to New Zealand.
She arrived in Wellington and went immediately to Christchurch to begin her nursing training, a course abandoned in favour of marrying a charming man who turned out to have problems with alcohol and gambling and who fathered 11 children.
There was tragedy, with one daughter dying of meningitis, and struggles caring for a son who had polio. She eventually left her husband, moving to Palmerston North as a single mother with the youngest children, struggling to find housing.
But she had practical skills, she was intelligent, she was incredibly well-organised and had a big heart.
She immersed herself in community causes, serving as a city councillor from 1992 to 1995, then gaining a seat on the Manawatū /Whanganui Regional Council from 1997 to 2007.
She holds a Palmerston North civic award for service to the community, and the women’s suffrage medal.
Fitzmaurice told a gathering of friends, family and former colleagues at the book’s launch that it had been painful remembering and recounting her earlier life. But she knew it had taught her how to be a survivor, and stirred her belief that future generations of children should not be left to suffer in poverty. ‘‘I knew how to cope. And I learned kindness is not expensive.’’
The book, designed by Anthony Behrens at Swampthing, is available at Bruce McKenzie Bookshop.