Footprints to the Wimmera

‘Footprints: the journey of Lucy and Percy Pepper’’ is an exhibition by Public Record Office Victoria that uses public and family records to trace the lives of an Aboriginal family in country Victoria in the first half of the twentieth century.

 

Percy & his family, c1912, from the Watkins family

It focuses on the life of Percy Pepper. Missing two fingers following a work accident, Percy with his sick wife Lucy try to make a life for themselves and their seven children, while constantly on the move across Victoria in search of work. Deemed half-castes and thereby precluded from living on Aboriginal missions, the Peppers endured constant hardship.

Original letters, photographs and public records reveal a family plunged into poverty; their attempts to 'make good' and catch a break in white society frequently thwarted.

One of about 40 Aboriginal men who enlisted in the First World War, Percy fought in France where he sustained head wounds in a shell blast. Following his discharge he was one of the few Aboriginal soldiers to secure a soldier settlement block – and with it the hardships faced by many soldier settlers.

The Pepper family's generational story is one of hardship and resilience, of sorrow and loss – and a remarkable parable about the strength of family in the face of adversity.

The exhibition has special significance in the Wimmera, as Percy’s father Nathaniel Pepper had lived on the Ebenezer Mission at Antwerp. 
The ‘Footprints’ exhibition will be on display at the Dimboola Library and Dimb-E Shop in Lloyd street from Thursday 18^th till Tuesday 30^th September. 
An official opening will be held in the R.S.L. Hall in Lloyd Street on Wednesday 17^th September at 7pm. (RSVP to Dimboola Library Ph: 5391 4452 by 12th September)