My name is David Rodney Broughton. Born in the Lady Weigall Hospital in Barmera, South Australia on 31st August, 1947.

Lady Weigall Hospital years ago... not UFO

My father is David Broughton. (no middle name). Born 21st March 1923 in Eston (Grangetown) Ormesby, Yorkshire. County of York. England and whose parents were William Broughton and Margaret Ellis.

My Mother's birth certificate states... Gwendolyn Josephine Dunstan, born on 17th June, 1929 in Broken Hill, NSW. Australia. (The date on which I met the love of my life, Dianne Parrott in 1989.... and on her sister's birthday too) 

But I knew my mother as Marie Turner at various times in my childhood which I believed was her "stage name" - as a nightclub singer and entertainer in Kings Cross of Sydney. Her Father was Cyril Montgomery Dunstan, though I believe Gwendolyn continued to be a Broughton.... for me; she had said.

My parents were married on May 27th, 1946 at the Church of Christ in Berri. New South Wales. Australia, where I suspect my mother had family.

I always remembered my mother as a very beautiful woman, particularly within. She had a huge warm smile and a feeling of love radiating from her, the memory of which has sustained me throughout my life.

She played the Hawaiian guitar and sang songs that had me transfixed at the smoothness and emotional beauty of her voice.

My father was handsome and had a character I never forgot. I looked up to him and thought he was a good man. He rode a motorbike with sidecar and "played the spoons". His sense of humour was an obvious and endearing personality characteristic.

He left me in the care of a small children's home in the Adelaide Hills for about a year where I remember I turned 4 years old and learned that "if you eat meat - you will go to the devil". I also learned how to turn the handle of a large milk separator machine. I was fascinated with the science of it.

Unfortunately I was not allowed to receive the present of a train with racks from my father for my 4th birthday. I was dumped in a water pond on the property where rubbish was tossed away.

Soon after that my father David took me to a home in Adelaide at 11 Smith Street, Walkerville where I remember a life very similar to those portrayed in the Boys Town movies starring Mickey Rooney.... and I attended the Walkerville School.

It was at the Walkerville home I last had contact with my father when I was about 6 or 7 years old at around Easter Time. He left me a chocolate Easter Egg and Bunny during the night. For some reason I woke in the dormitory - perhaps because I heard his voice that night. I remember it well as I sat up in my bed in the dead of night straining to listen to his words  at the front door, but being a child awakened from a sound sleep, I lay down again fell back to sleep... and perhaps from what I heard, I remember feeling sure I would never "see" him again.

While I was visiting Sydney down from Walcha (where I lived in the Ohio Boys Home) for the "Selection Board" into the Army, (I was 15 years of age in late 1962), I had an amazing experience.

Acting on a childhood memory, I did what the Child Welfare Department could not do. I found my Mother.... living in Surrey Street of Sydney's Kings Cross. Her life had been difficult.

My mother and I separated company in February 1965-6 over a typical teenage outburst of anger and protest that I have regretted to this day.

About a year later, I thought I recognised her getting into a taxi one morning while I was waiting at a bus stop in William Street, Kings Cross to go to work near the city (Sydney). The woman I was looking at was dressed in a most unusual way and she stood out in the crowd. All heads around me were turned in her direction as she appeared.

She caught site of me and seemed to want to recognise me, but I was not sure who she was and if it was me she was looking toward. In a moment I thought it was my mother, but was overwhelmed suddenly by a wave of embarrassment as I saw the way she was dressed and the state of her health. I became immediately afraid to be recognised by all those people around me as associated with this very strange looking person.

I felt myself become heavy as I stood there feeling like a total fool. I never saw her again and have hated myself for not dealing with that moment. It WAS one of the 'deciding moments' of the rest of my life..