Medical help
Medical help was very limited. In the early days of settlement in South Gippsland the nearest Doctor was in Sale. People had to handle their own injuries and something like a broken leg could be fatal. It was not unknown for scrub cutters to sew up severe cuts for others or even themselves or to splint a broken limb. Families had very limited medical knowledge and had to get by. Women travelled to relatives elsewhere to give birth and were not keen to bring small children into the area until the houses were reasonable. A story that best illustrates this is the story of a small member of the Dodd family from Dumbalk North.
"The first birth on the Tarwin took place in my family - a boy-in February 1880 ... This baby boy not being strong, it was decided to take him to Melbourne for medical advise; this meant carrying the child 30 miles on horseback to Morwell, and then the long train journey to Melbourne. The mother was away a fortnight and sent word to say that the child was doing well and to meet her at a given date at Morwell. This was done. I , the father and husband riding into Morwell, leading the spare horse. Imagine the shock I received when the mother put into my arms the body of the child - it was dead. It appeared that the little fellow had had a relapse, and had died in the mother's arms while attending Dr Lloyd's surgery. The doctor gave a certificate of death, and the mother not having any friends in Melbourne, and knowing that I would expect to meet her in Morwell that night brought the child up in her arms, no one in the carriage knowing the child was dead. The next day Saturday the journey out into the bush was made. On Sunday morning a coffin was made of blackwood slabs and the grave was dug. Thus on Sunday afternoon, November 14th 1880 the little chap was laid to rest on a high bank of the Tarwin River."
About three weeks later a two year old Dodd boy also died -- again Mrs Dodd was alone as her husband was off selling cattle. This child was also buried on a Sunday next to his brother on the banks of the Tarwin.
Frank Dodd in "Land of the Lyrebird", pp 134-136
