wp25ee431b.png
Jane Badger Books
wp022a3c10.png
wp1399559f.png
wpa42706b1.png
wp7ce553f3.png
wp29c71232.png
wpec25b5c1.png
wp0e7a9b80.png
wpec911a24.png

Mary Elwyn Patchett (1897-1989) grew up on a cattle station in Texas, Queensland.  She was a solitary child, spending her time with pets and the animals from the bush, and it is this world on which she drew for her books - the dustjacket of Tam the Untamed said “humans, especially young ones, were looked upon by her in the way most people regard tigers.”

After working as a journalist in Australia, from 1931, she lived and worked in England.  Although she only returned to Australia for holidays, it is there that  her books are set.  Her first book, Ajax the Warrior, which was originally broadcast on BBC Children’s Hour, drew heavily on her childhood.  

She continued to work for Children’s Hour over the years, and continued to write for children on many subjects.  Inspired by the idea of space flight, she wrote Lost on Venus and Kidnapped in Space.  She acted, and also owned a beauty salon for a time.  Her books were translated into many different languages, and she was considered to be the most widely read Australian children’s author of her time.

Mary Elwyn Patchett wrote one major pony series:  The Brumby.  Her Ajax series does involve horses, but apart from Tam the Untamed, they are peripheral. Her Summer on Wild Horse Island is a standalone book.  Whatever you might think of its story, the book is notable for having some of the nastiest cover illustrations in the pony book world.  Not one edition is a winner.

Her books, though, are excellent reads.  She does not flinch from the harsh realities of the Australian bush, and neither does she drift off into the romanticised oddities which afflicted the last of Elyne Mitchell’s Silver Brumby series.  The Brumby series does have one peculiarity: Rebel Brumby’s dustjacket says it is the eighth Brumby book, but Austlit in her entry mentions only seven, as listed below.  It may be the series’ hero, Joey Meehan, pops up in another, otherwise unrelated, book, so if you know which it is, do please let me know.

If you want to read her, the first two books of the Brumby series, which were printed in paperback by Puffin, are very easy to find indeed.  Alas the same is not true for the rest of the series, though you might be able to find some of them in their American printings, which are more widely available.  Most of the Ajax series can be difficult.

The bibliography is only intended to include her horse books.  It’s perfectly possible that I’ve missed some, so please let me know if you’ve spotted things I’ve left out or got wrong.

Sources:
Austlit
Children’s Series Fiction. NCC. 2004
The
Brumby Series

Many thanks to Hannah Fleetwood, Susan Bourgeau and Lisa Catz for help with the photographs.
 

Mary Elwyn Patchett


The Brumby Series

The Brumby
Come Home, Brumby
Circus Brumby
Stranger in the Herd
Brumby Foal
The Long Ride
Rebel Brumby

 


The Ajax Series

Ajax the Warrior
Tam the Untamed
Treasure of the Reef
Return to the Reef
Outback Adventure
The Call of the Bush
The End of the Outlaws
The Golden Wolf
Ajax and the Drovers
Ajax and the Haunted Mountain

 

wp5bde601d_0f.jpg

Ajax the Warrior
Lutterworth, London, 1953, illus Eric Tansley, 183 pp.
As
Ajax, Golden Dog of the Australian Bush, Bobbs-Merrill,Indianapolis, 1954

This is the story of a girl and her animals: Ajax the dog, her ponies Buck and Belle, and all
sorts of other pets. She lives a free, solitary life on her father’s cattle station, and has many
adventures.

Tam the Untamed
Lutterworth, London, 1954.  Illus Joan Kiddell-Monroe
Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis, 1955, illus Gerald McCann

Treasure of the Reef
Lutterworth, London, 1955, illus Joan Kiddell-Monroe

Return to the Reef
Lutterworth, London, 1956, illus Joan Kiddell-Monroe

wpb0e5ae34_0f.jpg

Cry of the Heart
Lutterworth, London, 1956

wp3955552f_0f.jpg

Second of the Ajax series. Tam is a beautiful, wilful silver horse whom only his mistress can handle.  He is the son of the famous buckjumper Bobs, and has inherited his hatred of strangers and his savage fury.  Eventually, Tam’s real needs are recognised.

Bibliography - pony books only

The Call of the Bush
Lutterworth, London, 1959, illus Wildsmith

The End of the Outlaws
Lutterworth, London, 1961, illus Roger Payne

Come Home, Brumby
Lutterworth, London, 1961, illus Stuart Tresililan
Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis, 1962

wp89ea6d18_0f.jpg
wp1d83ab76_0f.jpg
wp92c4a13d_0f.jpg

The Brumby
Lutterworth, London, 1958, illus Juliet McLeod
Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis, 1958 (Brumby, the Wild White Stallion)
Lutterworth new editions 1969
Lutterworth new edition 1974, cover Michael Charlton (far right)
Puffin, pb, 1964

wpbc3ca591_0f.jpg
wp598e68be_0f.jpg
wp619ee8e0_0f.jpg

Outback Adventure
Lutterworth, London, 1957, illus Joan Kiddell-Monroe

Joey dreamed of building up a ghost herd after a silver horse runs with the brumby herd on his father’s land.  The herd is scattered by stockman, and Joey’s favourite, The Brumby, is a killer, but he still believes one day the horse will return to the lands where he was born.

Just as Joey’s fencing is nearly complete, the Brumby leads the herd off into the mountains. Joey is determined to go after them and bring them home.

Ajax and the Haunted Mountain
Lutterworth, London, 1963, illus Roger Payne

Circus Brumby
Lutterworth, London, 1962, illus Stuart Tresililan

The Golden Wolf
Lutterworth, London, 1962, illus Roger Payne

 

wp050d06d9_0f.jpg
wpc194141f_0f.jpg
wp7dd2cecd_0f.jpg
wpc5976547_0f.jpg
wpcb883817_0f.jpg

Quarter Horse Boy
Harrap, London, 1970, illus Roger Payne

“Tod was a stable boy and horses were his whole life. Even as a baby he had spent all his time in the stables at
Booramby, the Austalian cattle ranch where he was born.  When Nakimer, the owner of the ranch, bought the
famous Quarter Horses to start a new breeding line, Tod lost his heart to Perina. He thought of the foal as his
own - but Nakimer had other plans. Rather than be separated from Golden Perina, Tod ran away with him into
the outback...”

 

Rebel Brumby
Lutterworth, Guildford, 1972, illus Roger Payne

wp4ca6ad8b_0f.jpg

The Long Ride
Lutterworth, London, 1970, illus Michael Charlton

wpc95ca803_0f.jpg

Summer on Wild Horse Island
Brockhampton Press, Leicester, 1965, illus Roger Payne
Meredith Press, USA, 1967
Knight, London, pb, 1975

wp37d38a21_0f.jpg
wp8c2410ad_0f.jpg
wp0cba708b_0f.jpg

Brumby Foal
Lutterworth, London, 1965, illus Victor Ambrus

wp32b4dec5_0f.jpg

Joey’s Lippizaner colt, Star, is stolen by a Brumby mare.

Danny and David discover an island off the Great Barrier Reef, on which there are abandoned horses.

In 1862, an explorer and his mare trekked 4,000 miles through Australia.  Joey Meehan, on his grey mare Polly, sets off along the same trail.

Joey finds drawings done by Walli, an outcast aborigine boy, showing a herd of wild horses.  Joey has to decide who has a better claim to the horses, but meanwhile there are other men who have seen and coveted the wild horses.

Stranger in the Herd
Lutterworth, London, 1964, illus Stuart Tresilian
Duell, Sloan & Pearce, New York, 1967

Joey’s beautiful mare, Amanda, is stolen, and her daughter is adopted by a brumby herd.

Ajax and the Drovers
Lutterworth, London, 1964, illus Roger Payne