What is the legacy of Hans Erikson?

Jacaranda’s blurb on the cover of The Rhythm of the Shoe promises readers “the feeling that it has been your privilege to have met [Hans Erikson] and share in his experiences.” There is more to the Hans Erikson story, however, than appears in the pages of The Rhythm of the Shoe. He was no saintly hero. Were you to offer him Superman’s lycra bodysuit and cape, his ego would certainly have him try them on for size. But sadly his body would bulge in all the wrong places. He was a disobedient child, a liar, a coward, a pot-stirrer, a profiteer, a cheater, a fornicator, a convicted criminal, a Swede. He wouldn’t admit it but he was an Australian too. He saw more of the Great South Land than most of its own citizens ever did and he fell in love with a wild landscape and seascape he wanted preserved for posterity. Despite his many faults, he had a strong sense of right and wrong, of conscience. Like querulous Uncle Willy before him, there was nothing he hated more than the hypocrisy of the powerful and he did not shrink from a fight even though anonymity was one of his principal weapons. Strife for the Grebst clan was indeed “the spice of life.” Erikson was no snob either. He liked ordinary people and they liked him. Underdogs. The downtrodden. New money. He was a man who lived his life like those Vikings for whom glory in Valhalla was too abstract a reward; he would have “word fame” instead. He would become a “good yarn” for future generations. That was why he wrote The Rhythm of the Shoe. It was never meant as a strict recording of the facts of his life. It was the story of his life, not the facts. Good stories attract embellishment. That is how they capture the emotion of experience. In this blog, I have gone beyond the story and looked for the facts. I have found discrepancy and myth and laid them bare as best I could. But I hope my work will keep the memory of this man alive in Australia and Sweden and perhaps lead to further revelations about him and his contribution to the unfolding story of Homo sapiens running amok on a tiny planet in the cosmos. Much I know has already been lost to history forever.

Where does Hans Erikson fit into our history? He was a skilled mariner and his sailing school made a real contribution to the boating culture of Sydney. He taught seamanship in Queensland too. At the very least, he deserves a moment of recognition in our maritime history. As one of the early “doggers” in central Australia, he was a witness to the hardships, hypocrisies and injustices of frontier life. When Australia’s political leaders wanted to disguise the reality of what was happening on the black-white frontier, his ire was raised and he flung himself into the fray like a true berserker. Yes, his logic was based on blurry notions of “race” and “economics,” the prevailing themes of the time - some would say even to this day. Like Uncle Willy, he lambasted the missionaries and held them to account for the actual results of their activities rather than just assuming that their godly intentions would bring forth godly ends. He – and the journalists who gave him publicity – helped finally bury the “punitive expedition” as the accepted response of governments to black-white conflict in the deserts. He also drew attention to the condition of “half-castes” – indeed, the existence of “half-castes” – at a time when such people did not officially exist in significant numbers. This was three years before the publication of Capricornia by Xavier Herbert, a novel that captured the nation’s attention and focused it on the reality of “black velvet.” I trust that the main contribution of my own work in this biography has been to unmask Erikson from the pseudonyms he hid behind during this turbulent period, to bring him out fully into the sunlight of Australian history and to show the family, cultural and social influences that spawned him.

I also wish to salute Erikson, the writer. For one whose native tongue was not English, he managed to master the language of Shakespeare and create entertaining, poignant and insightful stories such as those in The Rhythm of the Shoe. I only wish I had found more of the newspaper articles he claimed to have written for the world’s press. A trip to Germany may be needed for that daunting task.

His genetic legacy remains a nagging mystery. Are the Grebsts extinct, frozen solid in their graves in Gothenburg and Paris? Or do they live on somewhere in the vast open plains of Australia? If this blog finally connects me with his descendants, I would be delighted. Regardless of his silent, lonely death, Hans Erikson can surely be content with having lived a full and fascinating life through turbulent times. I think of him every year when news arrives that the whales are back in Hervey Bay filling the warm shallow waters with their seafaring songs. And of the seafarer who came down from the frozen North and never returned, he may well have said: Veni, Vidi, Vinci.

Hans Erikson's Death - and his Mysterious Daughter!

Pialba, Hervey Bay: where sailor Erikson came ashore to die.

Hans Erikson had a daughter. Of the all the mysterious nameless women in the Grebst clan, she is the most mysterious of all. I have searched for her, high and low, for many years, tracking her like a dingo. But she never took the bait and disappeared into the huge expanse of northern Australia. Had I found her, who knows how this biography could have been fleshed out and made respectable instead of being the miserable hotchpotch that it is. What tales she could have told me! What things she could have shown me!

I first learned of her existence in The Rhythm of the Shoe. She was not born of any of Erikson’s four wives. Instead, he sired her as a favour to a friend: “the richest woman I have ever met.” This attractive, wealthy South Australian temptress was in Sydney and wanted a child without any continuing input from the father. Erikson was happy to oblige. They enjoyed a week of sex after which the woman returned to South Australia. Erikson expected to hear nothing more from her. But eight months later, she was back in Sydney at his doorstep. Her father in England was seriously ill. She wanted to give birth in Sydney and leave the baby with Erikson while she went back to England to see him. Erikson, who was living in a small flat in King’s Cross at the time, was not keen. But in the end, he had no choice. The baby arrived a week early. The mother left for England. Erikson cared for his daughter for the first eleven months of her life. At first, he had no feelings for the child. But she soon grew into his affection such that, when her mother finally returned from England, he did not want to hand her back. Legal action was threatened and Erikson succumbed. Three years later, he received a letter from the mother in South Australia advising of her marriage to another man and their intention to have children. They had decided not to tell Erikson’s daughter anything about him so that she would grow up believing that her step-father was actually her father. They would not allow Erikson any contact with his daughter and “it would be best for everybody concerned if I tried to forget my daughter altogether.” The Rhythm of the Shoe ends with Erikson on a visit to Adelaide fourteen years later. He is sitting in a car watching schoolgirls walk by. Any one of them could be his daughter. As he looks hopefully at them, he hears one schoolgirl say to her friend: “He smiled at me, the dirty old man.”

Nowhere in Erikson’s account of his daughter does he give any clues as to names or dates. There was not a single “lead” I could follow up in order to identify the daughter or locate her. She wasn’t even going to be told about him, for heaven’s sake! It was a complete dead-end. So instead, I focussed upon finding out what happened to Erikson himself. The last I knew, he was 60 years old and living on his boat moored at Burrum Heads. If he were still alive, he would be in his nineties! I realised that he was probably dead and, as a result, I would never get to interview him. As old age overtook him, he would have been forced ashore to die somewhere. Where would he choose? Gothenburg? Too far and besides, he said he would never return there. Back to the smog and bustle of Sydney? That was highly unlikely. My feeling was that he had died in Queensland.

Maryborough Base Hospital, Queensland

And so he did. His military records displayed a DECEASED stamp along with a handwritten date “17.6.85”. There was a funeral notice by Leslie G Ross Funerals in the Maryborough Hervey Bay Chronicle: Erikson, Hans of the Esplanade, Pialba passed away at Maryborough Base Hospital on June 17, 1985 aged 79 years. He was to be cremated.

I obtained a copy of the Death Certificate. It described him as a “retired yacht broker” born in “Gottenburg, Sweden.” The cause of death was “1(a) Pulmonary oedema (b) Heart failure 2 Transitional cell carcinoma of the bladder.” He had been ill with the pulmonary oedema and heart condition for one year prior to death. He was cremated at Maryborough Crematorium on 21 June 1985 overseen by an Anglican minister. For me, the saddest part of the Death Certificate was the fact that the boxes for details of his parents, marriages and children were all left totally blank. It was as if he had no past, no one cared and he was completely alone.

In May 2011, just prior to my trip to Gothenburg, I drove to Hervey Bay and camped at Pialba, Erikson’s final home address. As every Swedish backpacker knows, Hervey Bay is famous for whale watching. Every year from mid-July to early November, whales calf in the warm sheltered waters of the bay before making the long journey back to Antarctica. There is an influx of tourists and the region has also become a favourite of retiring ‘grey nomads.’ There is no harbour or mooring facility at Pialba but the waters are shallow and protected from Pacific Ocean weather by the towering sands of Fraser Island. It is a picturesque spot, ancestral home of the Badtjala people. It also has some surprising Scandinavian history. Danish and Swedish immigrants settled at a place they named Aalborg and built the first Christian church in the area in 1875: “Dansk Kirke I Udlandet.” I drove out to Aalborg cemetery; it is well back from the coast through canelands and country with poor, sandy soils dominated by banksias, gums and silky oaks. The immigrants would have struggled to make a living there. The old church itself has been moved in to Hervey Bay and is used as the entry building to the museum. It is a poor, plain wooden box that would have been stifling in the summer heat while the parishioners prayed and sang dressed in their Sunday best. Would Erikson have visited Aalborg, I wondered. Most likely not. Although a proud Swede, he wasn’t the “ethnic” type wanting to dance around a maypole in mid-winter or sit through a Lucia procession in the summer heat. I did ask around in the Queensland Swedish community to see if anybody knew him. I didn’t get a single affirmative response. Then, of course, he did write to the editor of Göteborgs Posten, Harry Hjörne, in 1935 complaining that overseas Swedes can become a pain in the neck: they become more royal than the King himself in Stockholm. No, Hans Erikson would not have fitted in to a Swedish expatriate community.

I went to the library at Hervey Bay wondering if Erikson had involved himself in some local writers’ group. There is such a group in Hervey Bay and I flicked through their magazine, Moonaboola Quill. But there was no mention of Erikson or any Swedish references at all. One of the local poets wrote under the name “Ded Swoope” but I doubt that it was Erikson. At dusk on the beach at Pialba, I watched the flying foxes depart from their roost at Tooan Tooan Creek for a night of feeding on blossom and fruit. It is quite likely that Erikson watched the same spectacle himself every evening from his home.

In the library, I also learned something about the history of Hervey Bay that, by coincidence, tied it to the Grebst family. It was named after Augustus John Hervey, 3^rd Earl of Bristol, born 19 May 1724, who had a distinguished naval career and was present at the capture of Havana, Cuba in 1761. Erikson’s father and grandfather, of course, had been the Consul for Cuba in Sweden.

Making my way back to Brisbane to prepare for my departure to Sweden, I stopped at Maryborough and the hospital where Erikson died in Walker Street. Walker’s were a shipbuilding firm that closed down in 1973 and they occupied the low river end of the street. The hospital is on the high side. Part of it is a brown brick monstrosity that dates from 1977 and was opened by the Health Minister, Dr. Llew Edwards, for whom one of my sisters acted as secretary for many years. I remember very little about him except that he was a thoroughly decent chap who had bother keeping his false teeth inside his mouth. The other part of the hospital is an elegant wooden building with wide verandahs that probably dates from World War 2. Try as I might, I could not catch a glimpse of the sea from any vantage point at the hospital.

From the hospital, I drove downtown and walked through Queens Park admiring its collection of exotic plants. It is, in fact, one of Queensland’s first botanical collections including gems like a spreading banyan tree (Ficus benghalensis), the sacred tree of India, an Indian coral tree and African sausage trees. The impressive Customs House sits there and yachts were moored in the brown, tidal river. I felt certain that Erikson would have sailed these reaches many times. Just then, a man cycled past me wearing a black t-shirt that read “Jesus loves a good beer.” I couldn’t help but wonder if Hans Erikson had sired any children whilst in Maryborough.

The churches in Maryborough are an elegant treat and I had read that there was a Scandinavian church in Mary Street. So I drove to Mary Street only to find that it was in the poor, rough end of town, full of workers’ cottages and no churches to be seen. So I did a u-turn in Norway Street and headed back. By and large, the Scandinavians who migrated to Australia were not the rich, educated, privileged Grebsts but poor, tough, superstitious peasants.

The informant on Erikson’s Death Certificate was Gordon William Penny and I managed to track him down in July 2008, 23 years after Erikson’s death. This was of enormous significance to me because Penny was the only person I ever spoke to who actually knew Erikson as a living, breathing person. He was the Manager of Maryborough Base Hospital from 1984 to the time of the Goss Labor Government (whose political views he clearly did not share). Yes, he immediately remembered Hans Erikson who was a patient at the hospital, a loner who was living by himself in a rented unit at Pialba. He had an agreement with some neighbours to moor his boat for him. Erikson asked Gordon to help him write a will and also to be executor of it. Under the will, he gave all his estate to the hospital to buy a defibrillator. He did not give anything to relatives or anyone else. In his personal effects, there was nothing of value at all and his clothes were given to charity. He also had some books from the local library that were returned. Gordon mentioned that Erikson had been writing a book called The Tapping of the Shoes. “Ah,” I said, “you mean The Rhythm of the Shoe?” No, he was adamant it was The Tapping of the Shoes. The draft of the book was in Erikson’s unit. I was stunned. Had Erikson been working on a sequel to The Rhythm of the Shoe? It made sense … I mean, all authors believe their book is going to be a huge hit and so start working on a sequel. That sort of optimism is in the DNA of all writers, good and bad. I began to salivate uncontrollably at the thought of getting hold of the manuscript. Penny arranged for Erikson’s ashes to be scattered at sea in accordance with his wishes. The gentle waves of Hervey Bay are his last resting place, the songs of the humpback whale his dirge.

Then Penny hit me with a poleaxe right between the eyes. One or two months after Erikson’s death, his daughter and her husband turned up at the hospital looking for him. They were from the Northern Territory. He told them the sad news and gave them the last of Erikson’s personal effects, including the manuscript for The Tapping of the Shoes. No matter how hard and desperately I pressed him, Penny could not remember the daughter’s name and nobody had made any note of it. It was 23 years ago, after all. What did I expect? Indeed, what did I expect?

Erikson’s daughter from the Northern Territory: who was she? Was she the baby he nursed for eleven months in King’s Cross? Or did he “go combo” and have other children during his time in central Australia, children he wouldn’t admit to in print for political reasons? And what did this daughter do with his manuscript? Did she keep it and cherish it as a family heirloom? Or did she throw it in a bin somewhere? The very thought of The Tapping of the Shoes rotting in a rubbish dump somewhere in the tropics made my stomach churn. Biographers, huh? How we suffer. How we’re meant to suffer.

Hans Erikson in Sydney - Yacht broker and Sailing Instructor

After his short war service in the Australian Army, Erikson gravitated back to his seafaring roots. From 1944, he was working as a yacht broker in Sydney and one of his deals – involving the yacht “Syren” - ended in litigation.[1] A jury verdict awarded him 250 pounds in the District Court. This, however, was appealed. The reported facts of the case, set out below, illustrate the type of wheeling and dealing Erikson was involved in: probably very much like the wheeling and dealing done by his father that so annoyed him as a youngster in Sweden. Did he ever realise that? Or was he like so many sons the world over: blind to the things he shared with his father? We will never know.

What happened with the sale of the Syren was as follows. Its owner, Mr Peil, engaged Captain Kennedy to sell it for him at a price of £1,200. Erikson found an interested buyer, Mr Sunderland, a wealthy squatter, and took him to Captain Kennedy’s office and Mr Peil’s home. Sunderland agreed to buy the yacht at the listed price. On 2 August 1944, Erikson had a conversation with one of his business partners, Mr Carr. The other partners were Carr’s father and a Mr Parker. Erikson said the yacht had been placed in his hands for sale at £1,200 including his commission. But, in his opinion, it was worth £1,500 or £1,600 and he could sell it within a week at that price. Sensing a profit, Carr said to Erikson: “You get in touch with Mr Peil, and I will buy it, and you find the buyer. We will go 50-50 in the difference between the £1,200 and the sum that we get.” Carr gave Erikson a cheque for £1,200 from his father and Erikson duly gave it to Peil on 3 August 1944. On the same day, Peil gave Erikson a cheque for £150 being his sales commission and a written indemnity against any claim for commission made by Captain Kennedy, the actual broker Peil had engaged. Erikson then went to Sunderland and told him the yacht had been bought but the new owner would consider reselling it at a profit. Sunderland took the Syren out for a sail then agreed to buy it for £1,600. Erikson took a deposit of £25 on the sale. The next day, Carr started to get worried when he couldn’t contact Sunderland. He told Erikson to find back-up buyers just in case Sunderland reneged on the deal. Erikson found another buyer, Mr McGowan, and told him the price was £1,700. He introduced McGowan to Carr. Erikson then left for Tasmania; his purpose is not stated but I suspect he had been engaged to deliver another yacht down there. When he returned, Carr and his father had sold the yacht to McGowan for £1,700 and Sunderland had reappeared wanting to finalise his deal. He was “very annoyed” to hear that the yacht had been sold to someone else but Erikson managed to get him to take back his £25 deposit. Problems then began to develop between Erikson, on the one hand, and Carr and his father, on the other.

Carr alleged against Erikson that, on 3 August, Erikson admitted to him that the yacht had not actually been placed in his hands as broker. Erikson also suggested that Carr give him a letter dated 2 July saying that he had agreed to sell the yacht for £1,700. Erikson would use this letter to induce Sunderland to raise his offer. The letter falsely suggested Carr had been the owner of the yacht for some time. Despite the falsity of the claims, Carr gave Erikson the letter. According to Carr, the profit on the resale was to be distributed £25 each to Carr’s father and Parker and the rest 50-50 to Carr and Erikson. Erikson did not tell Carr about the £150 he was going to get from Peil as commission.

The facts of the case did not paint either Erikson or Carr in a very good light. It seemed obvious they had conspired to profiteer at the expense of Sunderland. However, the Judge told the jury that the Erikson-Sunderland transaction was not the matter before them. All they had to decide was: was Erikson acting for Carr in the sale of the yacht to McGowan? If the answer was yes, then Erikson was entitled to his commission of £250. The jury so decided.

Sadly for Erikson, the appeal court judges didn’t agree. They considered that the first judge had improperly limited the jury to considering the arrangement as one of commission agency when it could also have been a partnership that possibly involved “innocent or fraudulent misrepresentation.” They ordered a new trial and for Erikson to pay the costs of the appeal. The trial costs would be left as a matter for the new trial judge. As a litigation lawyer, my own “between the lines” reading of this case is that the appeal court was not at all impressed by the behaviour and ethics of either Carr or Erikson and effectively made a decision that inconvenienced them both (but especially Erikson): sending them back to trial after openly suggesting fraudulent misrepresentation as an issue and knowing full well that neither party would want the expense and risk of a second trial. It is possible the appeal judges knew of Erikson’s reputation as a smuggler and were not inclined to assist him. Unlike in the veronal debacle, Erikson was wise enough to use lawyers this time, Keith Gunn & Co. Had they known all the facts that came out in the trial, I suspect they would have told their client to forget about suing Carr and be thankful for the £150 commission he got from Peil. Litigation, however, is often driven by pride, conceit and ego, traits well established in Erikson’s character. He does not mention the Syren case, one of his many setbacks, in The Rhythm of the Shoe.

In January 1945, Erikson’s article “On Misery Range” was published in the Sydney Morning Herald demonstrating that he still had aspirations in journalism and writing at that time. But seafaring would continue to be his main source of income. In 1945, he established a very successful yachting school in Sydney. It advertised in the Sydney Morning Herald under the name Practicraft Services Co and touted: Learn to sail a yacht. Practical tuition is available under expert guidance aboard a 30 ft sloop-rigged yacht on beautiful Sydney Harbour. Instruction is individual and the course is specially designed to provide complete tuition for the beginner on a unique ‘sail as you learn’ plan. An advertisement on 16 January 1946 proclaimed that “past pupils have won ocean races.” Erikson was named as “Chief Instructor.” He also offered yacht delivery services (“anywhere to anywhere, skiff to a steamer”) and courses tailored to the fishing industry. The company’s office was initially listed as Suite 11, 8^th Floor, 117 Pitt Street. It then moved to Suite 6, 8^th Floor, 39-48 Martin Place. In The Rhythm of the Shoe, Erikson wrote: “my early students were nearly all black-marketeers. They had made a lot of money during the war and felt socially incomplete without owning a yacht.”[2] He brokered many of their sales and purchases. The success of the business led Erikson to take on a partner to handle the bookings and financial administration side of the business while he was left to concentrate on the sailing. The unnamed partner devised a ‘tax minimisation’ scheme that was arguably ‘tax evasion.’ It would ultimately send Erikson into bankruptcy. In The Rhythm of the Shoe, he tells the story in his usual flippant style:

One day my partner was waiting on the jetty for me when I returned with a party of students. He was not the kind who would ever go out into the sunshine and fresh air except under extreme compulsion so I knew that something serious must have happened … A gentleman from the income tax department had installed himself in our office and was busy examining our books. I did not like the sound of that very much but my partner reassured me that we were much too clever for them and there was nothing he could find that could hurt us. As an added precaution my mate had bought a few receipt books and other papers with him in a bag and thought it would be a good idea if I were to put a rock in with them and drop them over the side when I got back on board. That night we celebrated our anticipated victory over the income tax people.[3]

A prelude to the infamous 1970s “bottom of the harbour” tax evasion schemes exposed in Sydney. In court, the victory quickly turned sour when Erikson crumbled in the witness box. His resulting tax debt forced him into bankruptcy. He worked “out west” as a mechanic until he had enough money to get a boat again. Then he restarted the sailing school business in his wife’s name. Divorce ultimately put an end to it. Erikson had hit upon an extremely popular and lucrative service business that should have set him up for life but his proclivity to mix with dubious characters and take risks meant he had nothing to show for his labours.

Did he learn from his mistakes? It seems not. He turned to the Sydney underworld instead, a story he tells in The Rhythm of the Shoe and one that gave the book its intriguing title. Erikson and two “army mates” set up an illegal baccarat school in Sydney paying protection money to corrupt police. It was very lucrative and only one gambler ever seemed to make money from them. He was a New Zealand musician who paid attention to “the rhythm of the shoe,” a shoe in this context being the wooden box from which the cards were drawn and placed on the table. According to this strange kiwi, a musician could tune into the rhythm of each successive shoe and get a feeling about what was ahead. Much to Erikson’s astonishment, it seemed to work for the man. Overall, however, the business was extremely lucrative and was only abandoned when one of the partners developed a gambling addiction that threatened to expose it. Erikson was now cashed up with a new yacht and a desire to go sailing.

Chapter 14 of The Rhythm of the Shoe is titled “Beachcombing.” As usual, it is without the details of when, where and with whom. It is clear, however, that Erikson sailed up to the Great Barrier Reef and tried solitary life on various tropical isles. It didn’t work for him as his gregarious nature made him yearn for human company. The next chapter is set in Queensland and tells of his prowess as an “occasional lecturer” in seamanship in the Adult Education Department. I never managed to find out where this was: possibly the Wide Bay region where he came ashore to die. In any case, Erikson, with his vast maritime experience and raconteur’s wit and turn of phrase, was a great hit with the students. He ignored the theoretical side of things and launched straight into spellbinding tales of when he and others had gotten into difficulty at sea and how they managed to survive. His skill in this regard may have saved many lives in the changeable waters of eastern Australia where recreational boating was on the rise.

Independent details of Erikson’s life between the war and the publication of his memoirs are scarce. Fortunately, there are some snippets that give us a glimpse of his character and activities. On 13 July 1950, the Geraldton Guardian in Western Australia reported as follows:

A noted Australian yachtsman (Hans Erikson) has won a forecasting contest against the Sydney Weather Bureau. He sent a forecast to the Weather Bureau each morning for ten days and the result was Erikson was correct ten times but the Weather Bureau was wrong twice. Erikson states that his forecasts are made by studying the ever present signs of nature. If seagulls and sharks come into the harbour there will be a blow. Fish accumulating near the shore indicated heavy seas and bad weather, while clouds in a straight line indicate a big change. Erikson who lives on his yacht (Adelante) in Rose Bay claims that natural signs warn (sic) him a week ahead of a cyclone at Coffs Harbor.

At the time of writing in 2012, the Adelante was owned by John Dickins and was up for sale in Southport, Queensland. It was described as 23 feet 6 inches long, made in Hobart in 1939 using huon pine. The designer was Laurent Giles. Dickins had not bought the yacht from Erikson but from an Aboriginal man on the Gold Coast. “Adelante” is a Spanish word meaning “forward, ahead.” Erikson, however, would have noted a Swedish connotation with “adel” meaning “noble” in his native tongue.

On 14 July 1950, the Sydney Morning Herald reported the sad story of 23 year old Jenefer Wornum, a zoology lecturer specialising in herpetology at Sydney University. Her yacht, “Gentleman’s Agreement,” had been wrecked and she was missing. Erikson is referred to as “a friend of Miss Wornum.” He chartered an aeroplane to search for her and found some wreckage six miles south of Wattamolla National Park. It is possible she was a past pupil of Practicraft Services Co. Accompanying Erikson in the plane were Miss Cynthia Sutton of Pacific Highway, Gordon, “a close friend of Miss Wornum” and Mr R. W. Reynolds, manager of the speedway at the Sydney Sports Ground.

The next true milestone in the life of Hans Erikson was the publication of his book, The Rhythm of the Shoe by Jacaranda Press in Brisbane in 1964. Jacaranda actually arranged a joint launching of Erikson’s book with We Are Going by Aboriginal poet, Kath Walker (1920-1993) - later known by her indigenous name, Oodgeroo Noonuccal. There is a charming black-and-white photograph of Erikson and Walker at the launch, smiling and holding copies of each other’s books. At 58 years, his face is weather beaten with a trimmed white beard and receding white hairline. There is a definite air of confidence about him. Did he discuss Aboriginal issues with Kath Walker, an early activist for her people’s rights? Again, we may never know. It is sobering to think that Erikson may well have been voting in Australian elections when Aborigines at the time had either no voting rights or curtailed rights. Only after the 1967 referendum did this appalling situation begin to be rectified and in 1983, all voting law differences between Aborigines and other Australians were fully abandoned.

Two years after the limelight of his book publication, we hear of him living on his boat at Burrum Heads, 300 kilometres north of Brisbane. He is in a feisty mood, fighting against a proposed bitumen road development from Maryborough to Burrum Heads, then a sleepy village of 100 people with no hotel and no streetlights. According to a Sydney Morning Herald article of 22 June 1966, the “6’3” swashbuckling Swede” was the “anti-publicity officer” of Burrum Heads, threatening to tear up bitumen, turn signposts around and put ‘zero’ on the speed limit.

With his saltwater blue eyes, suntan and raconteur’s gift, Erikson was quite a Sydney identity. Since he’s been making those tongue-in-cheek comments about Burrum Heads, he has become a Queensland character too.

The story made it into the Winnipeg Free Press on 6 July 1966 referring to a “retired Swedish mariner called Hans Erikson.” He may have given up his birth name but Erikson never gave up his Swedish identity. Uncle Willy would have been proud: “never forget that you are a Swede and that all around the world that stands for honour and capability, loyalty and manliness.”

---

[1] Erikson v. Carr (1945) 62 W.N. (N.S.W.) 251

[2] TROTS, p. 99

[3] TROTS, p. 100

Hans Erikson v. General Tojo - His true role in WW2

From the collection of the National Archives of Australia

World War 2 officially began on 3 September 1939 with the British declaration of war against Germany. Unlike Canada, Australia didn’t bother making a declaration of war; Prime Minister Menzies simply accepted that the British one applied to his own country automatically. Wartime measures came into force throughout Australia including the National Security (Aliens Control) Regulations that required all aliens to be registered and monitored. The aliens targeted by these regulations were not the likes of E.T. or Dr Who but non-British subjects. Lars Olof Grebst duly presented himself for registration in Adelaide on 25 September 1939. He was then living at 14 Hutt Street, Adelaide and his occupation is listed as “cleaner.” He produced his Swedish passport and had his fingerprints taken. He was described as 6 feet 2 ½ inches tall, grey eyes, slim build, “scar under left eye, partly bald.”

A line is then drawn through the handwritten name “GREBST, Lars Olof” on the Form of Application for Registration and the name “ERIKSON, Hans” is inserted. A second form, Notice of Change of Name, was also completed on that date. So it was that Lars Olof Grebst officially became Hans Erikson.

Erikson's true Sovereign Lord, King Gustaf V (right) in Berlin in February 1939 with Hermann Goering and Prince Gustaf Adolf.   Erikson went to school with the Prince: source Wikipedia

Two burning questions I have always wanted to ask Hans Erikson are why he changed his name and how he chose his new one. The decision to become “Hans Erikson” seems to have been hasty, possibly even made while standing at the counter of the Aliens’ Registration Office in Adelaide. We know that the name Grebst is of German origin going back many centuries. With the outbreak of war against Germany, perhaps he feared that having a German surname would lead to discrimination and ostracism similar to that meted out to many German Australians in World War 1 when the shocking fatality lists began to come back from Gallipoli and the Western Front. More likely he may have feared that his family’s pro-German past would come back to haunt him. On top of that, perhaps he had used his real surname when submitting anti-British articles to German newspapers and seeking payment. Of some significance is the fact that he didn’t adopt a more English-sounding name: Lars Olof Grebst didn’t become “Lawrence Greves”, for example. Whilst “Hans Erikson” is far easier for English speakers to pronounce than his birth name, it still sounds Scandinavian and Germanic. It therefore seems to me that the problem was not with a German-sounding name; the problem lay with the name Grebst itself and all it stood for: Vidi, anti-semitism and embargo-busting. If the Australian authorities ever put this jigsaw puzzle together (which, of course, they never did), he would have been treated with suspicion and possibly even locked up for the duration of the war.

What Erikson was doing in Adelaide at this time is a mystery. However, by early March 1940, he was back living in Sydney. His alien control records show that he moved about regularly, residing at the following addresses:

·      10 Herford Place, Darlinghurst (3 weeks);

·      Alexander Avenue, Tarin Point, Kogarah (7 months);

·      Labert Flats, Crick Avenue, Potts Point (5 months);

·      11 Short Street, Darlinghurst (4 months);

·      Manning Court, Manning Road, Double Bay (2 months);

·      37 “Chatsbury”, Ithaca Road, Elizabeth Bay (1 month);

       Manning Court, Manning Road, Double Bay.

In February 1942, Erikson went to Paddington Barracks and volunteered to enlist in the Australian Army. In The Rhythm of the Shoe, he says he did this because he thought that fighting for his adopted country was “noble and praiseworthy.” However, he refused to give up his Swedish citizenship and therefore did not technically qualify for enlistment. He had certainly not rushed to join the Army at the outbreak of war. His date of enlistment was 27 February 1942. A week earlier, the Japanese had bombed Darwin and invaded Timor. On 23 February 1942, the Australian government was in a state of panic and Prime Minister Curtin – the very same man who had criticised Erikson in Parliament in 1935 – rebuffed Churchill’s pleas and recalled all Australian troops from abroad in anticipation of a Japanese invasion. The country was in desperate straits. With this came enormous pressure for all adult males not engaged in essential employment to join the army. Australia would soon be fighting for its very survival against the barbarous Japanese. In this extraordinary atmosphere, the military bureaucrats turned a blind eye to Erikson’s Swedish nationality in order to get one more soldier in the ranks. On Erikson’s attestation form, against question 3 asking if the volunteer is a natural born or naturalized British subject, somebody has noted the words “friendly alien.” The form notes his occupation as “dealer,” marks him as married (to “Diana”) and states he has never been convicted in a civil court. It leaves blank the optional question about his religious denomination. As part of the enlistment process, Erikson took the following oath:

I, Hans Erikson, swear that I will well and truly serve our Sovereign Lord, the King, in the Military Forces of the Commonwealth of Australia until the cessation of the present time of war and twelve months thereafter or until sooner lawfully discharged, dismissed or removed, and that I will resist His Majesty’s enemies and cause His Majesty’s peace to be kept and maintained and that I will in all matters appertaining to my service faithfully discharge my duty according to law. So Help Me God.

In truth, Erikson’s Sovereign Lord was not King George VI of Britain but Gustaf V, King of the Swedes, the Goths and the Wends, a neutral in this conflict. Back in old Europe, however, the Swedish Crown’s neutrality did not stop a significant number of Swedes from fighting for the Third Reich against their traditional enemy, Russia. Here in Australia, one Swede at least took up arms to fight the Japanese and save the British Empire: Lars Olof Grebst. Uncle Willy, who had cycled through Japan marvelling at their efficiency and who had reported on the Japanese naval victory over the Russians, would not have approved.

Erikson did his basic training at Dubbo. In The Rhythm of the Shoe, he says that he was then “transferred to M.I. as a private.” M.I. stands for Military Intelligence. The Australian Army had no doubt learned that Erikson could speak German and thought he might be useful as a spy. He was more than willing to give it a go with “great ambitions of becoming a kind of male Mata Hari.” He writes that he did undercover work for a few years before his identity was blown and he was transferred back to an infantry unit. This seems to be yet another lie or gross exaggeration. His military records show that, after basic training, on 29 March 1942, he was “transferred to (Chauffeurs Duties) HQ”. This certainly sounds like a good cover for an M.I. spy. However, just over two months later, on 12 June 1942, he was transferred to the “North Aust. Observer Unit.” In his memoirs, he says he was “in a commando unit up north” when the war was over. To add to the confusion, the military records show that Erikson was discharged from the Army “at own request on compassionate grounds” on 23 November 1942. His personal effects were sent by registered mail to Manning Court, Manning Road, Double Bay and he signed for them on 30 November 1942. So his entire military career lasted only nine months. This, however, entitled him to an Australian war veteran’s pension and he ultimately died in an Australian military hospital.

What was the personal crisis that caused Erikson to request a compassionate discharge from the Army in November 1942? Perhaps we will never know. It was 1945 before he learned of his mother’s death. Was he stressed about not hearing from her? I doubt it. More likely his woes were marital and probably to do with unnamed wife number 2, the Englishwoman who left him for his own good only later to marry a man “with two cattle stations and one sheep property.” That is my best educated guess but it is decidedly shaky.

On discharge from the Army, he moved once more, this time to Flat 12, “Headingly”, Elizabeth Bay where he stayed until 20 October 1943. He was then at Barrenjoey House, Palm Beach until 29 February 1944 after which he returned to Headingly until war’s end.

Even though Erikson was no longer pointing a rifle at General Tojo, he continued to work for the Allied cause in another capacity: as inventor. In 1943, the Army Inventions Directorate received two submissions from Hans Erikson. The first, made on 24 June that year, proposed a special water bottle for commandos. Erikson signed the following typed summary:

Mr Erikson when on commando manoeuvres in the Northern Territory found that the slapping of water in the water bottle was audible for a distance of 100 yards on a quiet night. He suggests that water bottles for Commando troops should be constructed with at least 4 compartments, each with a screw top. The noise would be stopped and a knowledge of the contents of the bottle when strict rationing becomes necessary is very essential, and would be easily provided by this type of water bottle.

The Directorate was not impressed and gratefully rejected the idea in a letter to Erikson dated 26 July 1943. They argued that inserting loofah into the bottles would easily stop the noise without adding to the cost and complexity of the units.

Undeterred, Erikson returned with a second idea on 16 August 1943:

Mr Erikson submits the idea that from his observation glass articles remain free from fouling in harbours. He deduces from this that if a ship’s hull were sprayed with glass, freedom from marine growths would result, and much expense and saving of running costs and time would result. The spraying to be done in the manner in which metal spraying on surfaces is accomplished.

One detects a slight hint of ridicule in this notation as if Erikson was beginning to be viewed as eccentric. Again, the Directorate dismissed the idea by letter dated 1 September 1943 citing technical difficulties achieving cohesion between wood and glass and suggesting that collisions with such things as wharves would fracture or pit the glass coating. Perhaps the Directorate’s dismissal of this idea was a little too casual. In Europe at this time, the British and Germans were conducting espionage on developments in polyester resin, the forerunner of fibreglass. They mainly wanted to use it in aeroplane construction but, as we now know, a big part of its future lay in boating. Who knows what the Australian Army may have come up with if they had given Erikson some money to develop his idea?

By 1945, the writing was on the wall for the Third Reich. No doubt Erikson had been keenly following all the news from Europe and Scandinavia in particular. In Nazi-occupied Denmark and Norway, the resistance movements were becoming emboldened and in neutral Sweden herself, those who had been pro-German in 1939 were now out of favour and the Government was secretly assisting the Allies. In February 1945, Erikson sent a cable to his mother pleading for contact. Unbeknown to him, she had been lying buried in Östra begravningplatsen in Gothenburg for three years, a few gentle paces uphill from Uncle Willy’s mausoleum. One can only imagine his sense of isolation and confusion when the news finally arrived: his mother, the woman he loved and resented, was no more. The Grebst clan was well on the way to extinction.

Hans Erikson in Sydney - the famous smuggler?

On the morning of Thursday, 29 October 1931, Sydneysiders opened up the pages of the Sydney Morning Herald to read the following article about a drug trafficking court case:

The story of how a man carrying 3,000 veronal tablets fell into a trap set by Detective-sergeant Wickham, of the Drug Bureau, was given at the Central Police Court yesterday. Trevor Grafton Smith, 24, accountant, admitted he was attempting to dispose of the veronal at a chemist’s shop in the city when intercepted by Detective-sergeant Wickham. Smith was giving evidence against Lars Olaf Grebst, 26, described as a journalist, who was charged with having solicited Smith to obtain possession of veronal. Grebst was fined 250 pounds, in default 500 days’ imprisonment.

Smith said that he had been living in the same house as Grebst, and had known him for some months. Grebst one day asked him whether he could dispose of some veronal and arranged for him to meet Franz Schrader, whom he described as a “determined looking German”. Witness met Schrader several times and on October 21 was handed a large cardboard box containing 3,000 veronal tablets. He walked from Hunter Street to a chemist’s shop in another part of the city with Schrader following about 10 to 15 paces behind him. As soon as he walked into the shop he was arrested by Detective-sergeant Wickham. Witness and Grebst were each to receive a “cut” from the proceeds of the sale.

Gertrude Elizabeth Driver said that she had lived with Grebst for about two years. She had seen him smoking opium, and he had told her that he had been engaged in the drug traffic in South Africa and China, and had been sentenced in both countries. Only three weeks ago Grebst asked her whether she knew anything about veronal. She replied that she did not, and he told her that he wanted to know what effect it had on the person who took it.

Grebst: Did you not tell me that you would perjure your soul to get me five years in gaol?

Witness: No.

Grebst, who stated that he had worked his passage to Australia from Sweden, gave evidence that he married in May last, but was unable to support his wife. When Schrader asked him whether he could “get rid of some veronal”, he declined to have anything to do with it.

Addressing the Magistrate, he said that Smith, who had been caught red-handed, was trying to pull him into the case, because he (Smith) had been told that if he could prove he was somebody else’s tool, he would get a lighter sentence. Mrs Driver’s evidence had been spite because of his marriage.

Franz Schrader, 39, salesman, was charged with having had veronal in his possession on October 22. Detective-sergeant Wickham said that he searched Schrader’s flat at Bondi early in the morning of October 22. He said to Schrader, “I have been informed that you have 12,000 veronal tablets to dispose of.” Schrader replied, “I don’t know anything about veronal.” Witness found a bottle of aspirin in the bathroom, and two white tablets near the bed. Schrader said, “They are aspirin.” Witness examined them and found that some were marked “aspirin” but others were plain. He had them analysed and found that the plain ones were veronal tablets.

The hearing was adjourned until Wednesday next, when a charge against Smith of having had veronal in his possession will also be heard.

Sydney is a well-known haunt of crooked accountants and in a famous episode in the 1970s, many of them used the bottom of the harbour as a filing cabinet for their incriminating documents. Trevor Smith was not the last dodgy bean-counter Erikson would become mixed up with in his time hanging around the Sydney underworld. The veronal case – which saw Erikson go to jail – is dealt with in chapter 11 of The Rhythm of the Shoe entitled “Lifer’s Lane.” In this chapter, he seems to blame his own cowardly insecurity and exaggerated lying for his demise. He writes:

… my line with women was always one of swashbuckling. The tales I used to tell about myself were usually connected with smuggling on the high seas. My repertoire was terrific. In fact, the only smuggling I had ever done was on a lake called Bodensee. This lake nestles between Switzerland, Austria and Germany. My smuggling consisted of catching a ferry at Bregenz in Austria, travelling the few miles across to Lindau in Germany and returning. In Lindau I bought three packets of cigarettes and smoked them in Austria. To me, at the time, it was terribly romantic and daring. Although this was my only smuggling venture it served as the basis for some of the most hair-raising stories I have ever invented. The worst part of telling adventure stories is that you have to improve on them all the time. If you don’t, you get so sick of them yourself, that you can’t bear repeating them. At least that is what happens to me. After years of enlarging on my tales of buccaneering there was not a single type of bastardry that I had not committed. How these lies can backfire on one is best illustrated by [the veronal case].[1]

Erikson’s version is that his friend – Smith the accountant – had asked him to get veronal tablets for trafficking. Erikson actually had no idea what veronal was. But having previously painted himself as a big opium smuggler, his ego made him agree to get the stuff. In truth, he had no intention of lifting a finger. Three weeks later, he was suddenly arrested. Smith had got veronal from somewhere and been caught red-handed trying to hock it in a chemist’s shop. He had named Erikson rather than disclose his real supplier. The police had no bother at all finding witnesses to say that Erikson had told them he was a drug smuggler. The worst was an ex-girlfriend – Gertrude Driver – whom he had once told that he smoked opium. Erikson had not been defended by a lawyer, thinking it unnecessary if he just went in and told the truth. He argues he would never have been convicted if he had had a lawyer. Certainly, he may not have been aware that the English-Australian legal system is adversarial and judges do not see it as their role to make a party’s case for him, that being precisely the function of the lawyer.

In The Rhythm of the Shoe, Erikson says his marriage was only five weeks old at the time of his conviction on 28 October 1931. This is another one of those memory lapses evident in the book. It was more like five months. His marriage certificate shows that he married Diana Constance Jenkins at St John’s Church, Darlinghurst, Sydney on 27 May 1931. Her occupation was listed as “stenographer” and his as “hunter.” Their address was Rockwall Crescent, Pott’s Point. Erikson’s father was noted as “deceased” and his mother’s name as “Wally Amalia Klatzö.” Erikson married four times and Diana Constance was wife number one. In The Rhythm of the Shoe, he does not name any of his wives but describes number one as “a blue-ribbon nymphomaniac” with an “insatiable sexual appetite” that reduced him “almost to a gibbering wreck” such that he was relieved to be sent to jail. He expected her to pay the 250-pound fine because she had 500 pounds of his money but she abandoned him instead. According to the newspaper report, Erikson stated in court that he had been unable to support his wife so the notion of her holding 500 pounds of his money seems more than a little incongruous. The only reasonable conclusion I can come to is that Erikson is lying or exaggerating in his book in true Grebst style. In any event, he went to prison feeling “alone and deserted and full of hate.”

The “Lifer’s Lane” chapter in The Rhythm of the Shoe is Erikson’s writing at its best. Playful, insightful, poignant. I defy anyone to read it without shedding a tear. A true raconteur, Erikson was deeply interested in the human condition and how people cope with extreme trials and tribulations. In prison, he edited an illegal newspaper for inmates, each edition featuring one of the “lifer” murderers. He couldn’t resist penning and publishing a derogatory poem about the Governor that made its way to the Governor’s desk. Luckily for Erikson, the subject of the poem didn’t seem too offended by it and let him off with a caution.

Whatever lessons the 1931 veronal case taught Erikson at the time, it didn’t seem to stop him cultivating a reputation as a smuggler. Not even after his name-change in 1939. Intriguing evidence of this is found in the diary of the painter, Donald Friend (1915-1989). On 10 July 1946, a day when Friend was working on the painting “Woman with two tired children,” he noted in his diary:

Then at night to one of those boring but not unpleasant cocktail parties. Kirsova was there, the smuggler Hans Erikson (still at large) and Alice Danciger. Also the French-Dutch critic Konyn, with whom I got on very well, and with whom I returned home to sit drinking and talking till late. We have in common many tastes and certain vices.[2]

Still at large? I assume Friend was taken in by Erikson’s hair-raising tales of smuggling on the high seas. And I can’t help but reflect how annoyed Uncle Willy would have been to learn that his nephew was mixing with non-traditional painters akin to Zorn and Liljefors back in Sweden. To say nothing of Friend’s “vices” in the form of paedophilia!

---

[1] TROTS, p. 89

[2] Paul Hetherington (ed.), The Diaries of Donald Friend, Volume 2 (National Library of Australia, 2003) p. 394

Hans Erikson in Melbourne

In Sir Sidney Myer’s Footsteps

Apart from his far-flung Outback adventures, Hans Erikson seems to have spent most of his time in Australia living in cities. In this regard, he was a typical local. 7 out of 10 Australians live in crowded, sprawling, unplanned, polluted cities on the coastal belt of the continent. Of those 7, 6.5 drive around in huge 4WD utes, wear RM Williams cowboy hats and try to act like the stars of a spaghetti Western. It’s a ridiculous macho façade Erikson would have seen through easily having himself experienced the real hardships of the Outback for many years. From the wilderness, he went first to Melbourne and then Sydney. Australia’s two largest cities are different in character and temperament and remain bitter rivals. As the tedious cliché goes, Melbourne is a European-style city founded by free settlers whereas Sydney is an ex-convict jail that is now USA hip. It was the stupid rivalry between these cities that placed Australia’s new national capital, Canberra, in a frosty sheep paddock west of the Range in southern New South Wales rather than on a tropical island off the north Queensland coast where life would have been much sweeter for the politicians and public servants. Erikson was no stranger to foolish intercity rivalries. Sweden’s two largest metropolises, Stockholm and Gothenburg, are ancient adversaries. All the bright and talented young Gothenburgers usually end up in Stockholm, attracted by the lure of the Royal Court and big money. This was a temptation cast before Uncle Willy who steadfastly turned his back on all invitations to leave his beloved Gothenburg and join the crowd at Arty-farty Central in the royal capital. And, as I now know, Gothenburg repays his loyalty by erasing him from her memory banks! She is a cold-hearted mistress, indeed.

In The Rhythm of the Shoe, Erikson tells us that his world collapsed when he received news from his father that Uncle Willy’s estate had been squandered. The silver spoon he was expecting to jiggle about in his mouth suddenly turned into a wooden toothpick. After he pulled himself together, he heard about a refugee who had arrived in Melbourne with nothing and ended up a millionaire. His name was Myer. So Erikson set off for Melbourne with plans of doing the same. He would be a millionaire even if he had to earn it himself.

But, of course, he soon found that “whatever Myer had had I didn’t.” He tried everything: vacuum salesman, shire engineer, insurance inspector, surveyor for Lloyds, fitter, toolmaker, census taker, lift driver, butler and “an efficiency expert in a furniture factory (lasted six months).” For a while, he worked as a sales manager with a real estate company on the Mornington Peninsula. He got the job by concocting his own glowing reference from a fictitious real estate company in Durban, South Africa. With typical bravado, he pretended to know everything about real estate selling and was soon left in charge of the office while the boss went on a work trip to Sydney. During this time, clients of the firm began to appear in the office complaining that the block of land they were shown by the salesman and thought they were buying – sitting on top of a hill with glorious ocean views – wasn’t the block noted on their contract. They were actually buying a block of land “in the middle of a swamp.” A true Robin Hood/Ralph Nader, Erikson gave them all their money back. Not surprisingly, his boss returned from Sydney in a rage and sacked him on the spot. His response: “at the time I felt very hurt as I knew that I had done a mighty job for the good name of the firm.”

It was time to leave Myer’s Melbourne and move to Sydney, Australia’s first city, built on the blood and toil of Old England’s worst criminals: swindlers, forgers, pick-pockets, rapists, murderers. Maybe he would fit in better there?