Guest Author

“Blaze Away”, the Gun-Fighter

by James Lindley

When Richard Bradley and I were little, and even when we grew older, we spent just about every minute together during school holidays. I have already told the story about Old Blue and Dingo Hill, and when Richard was here in Rockhampton last time, he reminded me of “Blaze-Away” as we named an eagle that lived in the scrub between Lyndhurst (Fa’s farm) and Craigleigh, (Uncle Peter’s farm). It was only about a mile and a half through the scrub, and occasionally we would go across to visit our relations, Uncle Peter and Auntie Lily and their children, our cousins, young Peter, Tom and Joy.

One school holidays, Richard had a school mate staying at Lyndhurst, Peter Stone; Peter Stone and Richard went to Saint Brendan’s College together and of course I was on school holidays from Rockhampton. Peter Stone or Stoney as everyone called him was mad keen on flying aeroplanes and because at that time it was only about six or seven years after the end of World War Two, Peter dreamed of being a fighter pilot.

Anyway, Peter was with us the day we first saw the eagle and it was Stoney that gave him the name “Blazeaway” because, it turned out, Blazeaway was defending his hen bird, the nest and their chicks. Blazeaway was fighting with another eagle that was invading his territory and Peter was giving us a ‘running commentary’ of the two fighters in
the sky.

“Blazeaway has opened fire with his machine guns as he attacks from above the enemy’s port wing; hit him Blazeaway”, Stoney yelled as the feathers flew when Blazeaway and the intruder collided, and so the sky fight continued until the intruder had enough and left the scene of battle. Peter gave such a great commentary of the battle that Blazeaway was given a new name even if he did not know it. After that encounter, Richard and I would keep a watch for Blazeaway if we were in the area. Occasionally we saw him and it was like seeing an old friend. Sometimes he would be sitting on a limb of a tree near the nest and sometimes flying on a ‘reconnaissance mission’ to look for invaders as we would tell each other. One school holidays, about two years after that initial battle, Richard and I happened to be in Blazeaways territory and we saw Blazeaways final battle. Blazeaway was not as fast as he was in his younger days, or he might have already fought other battles on that day and he might have
been tired.

But anyway it was Richard who said “Blazeaway is getting old and slow, I don’t think he is going to win this fight”. It was true, I could see that Blazeaway was not putting up a good fight to protect his nest and the fledglings, he just did not seem to have the speed and fighting ability he had when he was younger; he was beginning to get the worst of the fight. Perhaps Richard and I should have tried to shoot the invader, we had a rifle with us, but we might have hit the wrong bird.

We both cheered when Blazeaway managed to gain some height, and then dropped like a stone to crash into the invader; we watched as the puff of feathers slowly drifted down. Blazeaway had him with his talons locked into the invaders back. It is normal for eagles to bind themselves to their prey in this way and they cannot let go until they crash to the ground and walk off the dead bird.

Unfortunately this was not going to happen to old Blazeway this time. The two birds crashed through the tree tops and dropped one each side of a small tree branch; Blazeaways talons locked into the intruders back squeezing the life out of him. Richard looked at me and I looked at him. Without a word we knew the fight was over for both the birds; Blazeaway could not unbind hanging upside down like that.

I suppose neither of us wanted to say what we knew must happen now. Occasionally we bush boys had seen the results of birds not being able to unbind. After a while I said “What say we come back tomorrow to see if he has managed to get free”. It was a forlorn hope, but what else could we do? Until then I had not noticed how much bush kid’s care about the animals, and the birds and even trees that we consider are special to us. I remember that even Auntie Effie, Richards mother noticed that we were unusually quiet and asked had we been fighting. Richard told his mother what had happened and I think the three of us were about to cry. “Go and ask Fa (grandfather) if he can do anything” Auntie Effie advised. So again Richard and I told the story about the birds hanging in the tree to our grandfather. I seemed that a great weight was lifted from my shoulders when Fa told us to go back the next day but if Blazeaway had not managed to unbind, then rather than of letting him hang in the tree until he died of thirst, we must shoot him dead. “You better take the shot gun so it will be a quick and painless death”, Fa advised.

Next morning, although Richard and I were up early, we could not hurry the breakfast along, but we did a fast job of the washing up, filled our water bottles and hurried off to get the shotgun from Fa and then we were off to see if old Breakaway had managed to get free. No such luck; the birds were still locked together, but I think old Breakaway must have heard us because he opened his eyes and gave a little cawing sound. I offered the gun to Richard; I just could not do it. I think Richard understood that I could not do it because he took the gun, loaded it and shot before I knew what happened. Although the tears were very near, I saw old Blazeaway relax as death gave him relief from the pain of hanging upside down all night.

Thank you Richard, I could always handle the physical problems we encountered like fighting other boys at the dances we went to, but you had the greater strength to be able to overcome the mental problems that always seem to crop up in many a young boy’s life.