Book Review

Angels of Augustus.

By Stephanie Somerville

A TRUE ACCOUNT AS COMPELLING AND AMUSING AS THE OUTBACK ITSELF

This is the heartwarming true story of two pioneering women who became heroes of their day.

1940s Australian rural and city culture comes to life through the unforgettable experiences of the courageous Methodist Deaconess Nursing Sisters in Angels of Augustus.

In 1946, Marjorie Wilkinson and Ethel Helyar arrived in the Australian outback town of Brewarrina with nothing but their district bags, authority to perform marriages, baptisms and burials – a rarity for women of the era – and an ambulance named Augustus.

In a heart-rending drought, they began the first free-to-patient mobile health care the region had ever seen and became living legends remembered through the generations.

Patrolling a remote region of 35,000 square miles, Marjorie and Ethel crossed state, race and religious divides on a pioneering journey that both united and challenged their personal lives.

Yet their belief in a compassionate cause and their sense of humour overcame severe hardship in the most unusual of circumstances.