Picture: Jonathan Ng
AUNTY Grace Connolly's mother and grandmother are dead, but they are not at rest. She still feels them both around her, still hears her mother's screams.
As women who lived through Australia's forced removal policy they bore the scars and carried the pain that came from having children ripped from their arms and never knowing why.
Aunty Grace will speak at a symposium at Campbelltown Civic Centre this Friday to help organisations grasp the impact the Stolen Generations still have on their Aboriginal clients today.
"I've done what I was supposed to, I've got an education and I'm English-speaking so now I'm going to use it to tell their story," she told the Advertiser. "Being an Aboriginal person I can't put what I've learned on a shelf."
It was a chance discovery that prompted Aunty Grace to delve into her own family's past.
"My son went on an excursion to see an exhibition in the city called Living Memory in 2008 and he saw his grandmother sitting there in one of the photos."
Several years later, she's still piecing it all together.
"It made me want to go to the archives to do the family tree but reading all that stuff is not nice, I don't understand why it happened," she said.
"I feel they are still here and I need closure for them.
"All I hear is my mother screaming — she used to scream in her sleep and she wouldn't talk about stuff.
"It's very emotional, it's very sickening, and it's hard for my kids seeing me go through it.
"We're all the same, we all bleed red. Why do something so cruel and so inhumane? I prayed to God: 'Why did it happen?'. And He can't give me an answer."
"I hope I can put them at rest by doing the family tree and pursuing the truth."
Local elder Uncle Ivan Wellington said the scars from the Stolen Generations were still felt deeply in the community and hoped Friday's symposium would help create understanding.
"I find a lot have never healed from what went on, a lot have never recovered," he said.
Details: For more information or to RSVP phone Alana Rossmann, 4628 4837 or email alana.rossmann@tacams.com.au.