Maria Carmela Simonetta (Married name Dichiera)

Story

Maria Carmela Simonetta

(Married name Maria Carmela Dichiera)

The pain of separation tore at Maria Carmela\’s heart despite the comfort and security migration gave her family. Forced by necessity from her village of San Nicola in the Calabrian Mountains to the eye-numbing flat lands of Victoria\’s Mallee, she never reconciled herself to her new land and its strange ways. Almost to her last breath, at the age of 82, she mourned the loss of her eldest daughter to Argentina at the age of 21, the death of another, the many years she spent apart from her husband, and the half world that separated her from all but one sibling.

Maria Carmela, daughter of Alessandro Simonetta and Victoria Lo Bianco was born in 1887. Known as Carmela, she was one of eleven children. Poverty and hunger ran through the family.

As a young girl she learned the crafts and foods of her village, and prepared her glory box. She was praised by all for her skills on the loom on which she made household linen. She also learned and applied the healing power of herbs, and throughout her life her knowledge on such matters was sought.

In 1904 seventeen year old Carmela married Rocco Dichiera, eleven years her senior. Rocco, in a quest for financial security for his family, travelled backwards and forwards to America leaving Maria behind to bring up their children. The gaps between the years of their birth Cecilia (1906), Maria (1911), Caterina (1920, lived 9 months) and Giuseppe (1922) reflect the extent of his absences.

Carmela celebrated most of the children\’s birthdays, religious ceremonies and other rites of passage without her husband. She fed her children on what she produced and the money Rocco sent. She developed an especially strong bond with her one son, Giuseppe. He was the child who remained with her longest, and with whom she and Rocco lived in old age.

In 1927 Rocco sailed away again, this time for Australia. A few months later daughter Cecilia left with her husband and daughter for Argentina; Carmela would never see them again. The separation from both husband and daughter was hard. Although a fine story teller, Carmela never learned to read or write, and so could never feel the touch of someone through a letter home or pour out to them in writing her heart or feelings. The closest she came to literacy was to write out the letters which spelt her name, ‘Carmela\’.

In 1935, full of mixed emotions, and leaving behind her now married daughter Maria, Carmela set sail with her 13 year old son Giuseppe for Australia to join her husband. They landed in their new country in January 1936. Rocco took them to Aloomba in North Queensland where he had a little hut by the river on the farm where he worked as a stable hand. Giuseppe went to school. Although pleased to be with her husband, Carmela felt isolated. Her sister Augustina was living some miles away in Freshwater but it was hard for the two to meet. She spent her days alone pining for friends and family in the village she had left behind.

The war compounded her loneliness. She became Enemy Alien 89886 and Rocco 89885. Giuseppe was taken into the Aliens Civil Corps and in 1942 Rocco was interned, leaving her alone. The farm owner who had previously accepted the ethnicity of the family turned hostile. Carmela sought refuge firstly with her sister and then a friend from Calabria, Carmela (Piscioneri) Manno. She hoped Rocco would be released early because of his 66 years but it was not to be.

Reunited after the war, Rocco was unable to get work in Queensland so Carmela went with him to Adelaide to stay short term with cousins. Giuseppe remained in Queensland and in 1946 married Rosa Manno. In 1948 he and Rosa helped Rocco pay for a 10 acre dried fruit property at Irymple in Victoria\’s Mallee. The four of them lived on the property with Giuseppe and Rosa working as the blockies and growing tomatoes.

It was at this point that stability finally entered Carmela\’s life, a life made sweeter with the arrival to live in Australia of daughter Maria and her family.

Carmela was now aged 61 and Rocco 72. After 44 years of marriage they finally began to share a settled life together. They helped out on the farm, grew vegetables, made tomato sauce and cheese and cared for grandchildren. In 1959 Carmela became Naturalised but was still linked to her native land telling grandchildren stories of her homeland, painting pictures of green mountains, streams, harvests, festivals and ancestors. Rocco died in 1964. Carmela died six years later, in 1970. The hardships and dislocation locked forever in her heart.

Jenny (McKenry) McKenry

Granddaughter

February 2009

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