The devastating bushfires across much of the South East region on Ash Wednesday 1983 were still vividly in the mind of late Millicent resident Terry Whitworth around a decade ago.
The 39th anniversary of the fires today is a time when many in the region will pause to reflect on the inferno which claimed 14 lives, destroyed almost 100 houses and caused severe losses of stock, farm land and timber plantations.
Mr Whitworth was well-known in Millicent a generation ago as a retailer, church and community volunteer and sportsman.
These thoughts of Mr Whitworth as a civilian volunteer were shared on the eve of the 30th anniversary of the Ash Wednesday fires in 2013.
I would like to take this opportunity to reflect on the memories of the 1983 bush fire.
It started when I went to Mount Burr to see if I could help in any way to fight the fires.
When I got there I saw John Kenna and he had two 44gallon drums on the back of his vehicle and we teamed up with the young chap from the dairy farm where we used to get our milk.
We were given the job of putting out spot fires in the Mount township, so we checked every house in the town and found several with embers burning under the houses which, if left, would cause the house to explode.
Having gone through the whole town we then decided that we would go further afield towards Kalangadoo.
The first place that we came across was a house that had a picket fence all round it and it was all on fire so we decided that we would put out the fire.
While we were doing the house next door that was being used for storage suddenly exploded and was just a pile of rubble in just seconds.
We then went to the house that was surrounded by the fence to see if any one was home.
On entering the house, we found a married couple sitting at the kitchen table and they were praying, holding hands and asking God for help.
I believe He answered them when we arrived, we made sure they were ok and assured them they were now safe.
We then left to go back to Mount and do another check of the town.
On the way back we came across an elderly man who had been riding his bike and got off track and got himself tangled up in barbed wire.
We then cut him free and took him into the Mount control centre.
It was now in the early hours of the morning and we were then told we had done our duty and we then went home to have a shower and bed.
The following day I went to the Millicent RSL Hall by the bowls club and then set up the relief centre, collecting goods and redistribution.
The people of Millicent were very generous and we were overwhelmed by the amount of goods received.
One thing that stood out for me was when we went with food parcels or other items to those that had suffered, we often got the reply “take it to someone who is worse off than me.”
They found it hard to accept gifts from organisations of charity.
