There are Dinosaurs, and there are Dickheads....Then there is Ray Martin - Part 1 — Dark Emu Exposed

Nov 4

Nov 4 There are Dinosaurs, and there are Dickheads....Then there is Ray Martin - Part 1

Thank God for Ray Martin.

Not just because he has kept us Australians informed and entertained over the decades during his illustrious media career. But also because he has stepped into our public arena and told us, some would say admonished us, about what he really thinks of the NO campaign, and thus indirectly NO voters, in the recent Voice Referendum.

Ray’s action is a godsend to a website like Dark Emu Exposed as we are now free to use Ray Martin as a proxy for so many of the discussions we need to have as a society, but in normal times we are all too polite to broach.

But these are not normal times.

Our ‘working class’ Prime Minister has just blown $400million plus on a referendum that divided the country. But on reflection, maybe he did us all a great favour?

Having a referendum forced ALL Australians to walk into a voting booth and write YES or NO to indicate their support or rejection of the Great Aboriginal Activist Project that aimed to create two, separate sovereign States on the continent, formerly known as the Commonwealth of Australia.

The people voted a resounding NO to this plan to divide Australians by race. This NO resentment had been building for decades, but until a formal referendum allowed us to register our displeasure, the YES people had always been able to manipulate the media to create the view that the YES sentiment was in the majority, when it clearly wasn’t.

So thank you very much Mr Albanese.

And also a big thanks for spending $400M plus on sending Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price on an accelerated MBA in Political Science, from which she graduated on October 14th with First Class Honours - she went from Zero-to-Hero, all thanks to Labor Party Policy!

A great result for us Centre-Right Voters!!

Now that the tide has gone out on the YES Campaign, we can look at those standing naked, like YES Supporter Ray Martin, and use their ‘lived experience’ to discuss why the YES Campaign failed so miserably. This will also be a form of ‘Truth-telling’ about our nation and its history.

Ray Martin’s Genealogy

Ray Martin has been very open about his family’s history. He has undertaken a number of public disclosures about his family including, a 2009 episode on his old show 60 Minutes as it’s guest, a 2015 Episode of Who Do You Think You Are?, and in the press in 2014 in the SMH, and, more recently in 2022, in the Women’s Day.

And all of this is fine; there is nothing wrong with very popular shows on the history of a celebrity’s family, especially when it shows that Ray is quite happy to share details of his family with the public.

But the moment that celebrity steps over the line and uses their family’s ‘lived experience’ to push a particular political point or ideology, the rest of us, as equal citizens, are entitled to take issue with that celebrity’s position, if we care to, in the interests of fair debate.

Ray’s private life is his affair, but when he weaponises his family for political gain, his actions enter the public sphere, which can affect us all. We are thus entitled to deconstruct his political claims and his evidence, and provide our own counter-claims.

As summarised by Andrew Bolt in the video below, and here in the press, there are valid reasons to question Ray Martin’s use of his ancestry, in this case his Aboriginal ancestry, to make political claims.

In this post we will use Ray Martin’s family history as a way of ‘Truth-telling’ about our nation so we can understand Ray’s claims all the better, as well as understand more about the history of our great country and perhaps why we are the way we are.

Raymond George GRACE - aka Ray Martin - born 20 December 1944, Richmond, NSW

Ray Martin is a ‘fabricated’ name, as Ray openly admits in his various public statements about his childhood.

His mother randomly chose the surname, ‘Martin’, during her desperate escape, with her children, from Ray’s father, the drunken and violent, George James GRACE.

“ 1956, the same year as the Olympics, I was 11 going on 12, and that's when Mum decided that she couldn't take it anymore. And so we fled. My mother was booking the tickets from Sydney to Adelaide, and she had to put her name there. And she was afraid that if she put the name Grace, that Dad or private detectives would find out where we'd gone.

We think there was a sign somewhere there that had Martin on it. And so she wrote the name Martin on the form for the railways, not expecting it would be anything more than just a temporary thing.

But it became very much part of our persona, and a short while afterwards she changed it by deed poll, and I became Ray Martin.…” [and that became Ray’s new family name - the Grace name was ditched]

- Ray Martin in conversation with the ABC’s Peter Thompson on Talking Heads in 2010 [Source: Wayback Machine]

In the same conversation Ray tells Thompson that,

“I'd been at Channel Nine for a couple of months [1979-80?], and he [Ray’s father] came to the gatehouse and he was half drunk, and said who he was and said that he'd left a number. I hadn't heard from him for, goodness knows, 30 years? 25 years?

And I didn't ring up, ‘cos I just felt that he'd gone from my life, my mother was still alive, and I felt it would be an insult, almost a smack in the face for her, if I suddenly resumed a relationship that didn't really exist anymore. [PETER THOMPSON: Did you tell your mother?]

“Yes, I did tell my mother. And she wouldn't have stopped me. She would have been very much in favour of me doing what I wanted to do.

Two of my sisters went to meet him about the same time, and they found that his drinking problem was even worse then, and they didn't resume any more relationship.

There was no bitterness at all. I just thought that we'd moved on. The caravan had moved on. He had no right to come back into my life when I'd grown up, because when there was a responsibility for a father, he wasn't there.” (ibid.)

Now to pass judgement of another man’s relationship with his father is fraught with impertinance. All of us men have had our own unique paternal relationship - many good, many bad and many mixed.

But as we will go into below, Ray Martin was keen for Australians to listen to, and hopefully be influenced by, his views on why we should as a polity vote YES in the Voice referendum.

He promoted himself as being of “indigenous heritage” [nb: small caps “i” in the promo Figure 1] and he confidently appeared on the debate panel with three known Aboriginal women [Figure 1].

A regular Australian TV viewer would therefore be likely to understand that Ray was relying on his Aboriginal ancestry to such a degree that it gave him, he believed, some additional insight, or credence as a respected spokesperson, on a very important political matter like the Voice Referendum, that we, non-Indigenous Australians, lacked.

**Figure 1 - Excerpt of Channel Seven’s Promo on the Voice Referendum**

To our mind, Ray Martin has caught the modern malady known as “origin seeking” (Reference 1, p75).

Sufferers of this malady (I’ve had a dose myself until I worked out what was happening and pulled myself back from the abyss - major symptoms are smugness, tendency to superiority and ultimately the deadly effect of false-pride) began to appear in ever increasing numbers since a new television genre commenced in 2004, with the BBC’s original version of Who Do You Think You Are?

As the writer Matthew Elliot explains,

“…Using genealogy-focused interviews with celebrities and other public figures … [these] … documentary-style narratives, about broader themes and neglected segments of [Australian] history, have far-reaching effects in a contemporary cultural context, where the "normative views" of identity, kinship, and ancestry are being re-imagined, such as in the increased focus on DNA as the source of individual characteristics.

As historian Matthew Frye Jacobsen notes, genealogy may involve a "politics of identity" for the individual, but when millions become involved as participants and observers, it also becomes about "the politics of heritage for the nation at large.” - (Reference 1, p75-6).

This is what Ray Martin and the sponsors promoting him seem to be doing here - Ray has discovered an Aboriginal ‘origin’, which he has obligingly allowed to be politically weaponised by the YES Campaigners, the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and others in the academy and the media (e.g. the ABC).

Ray is part of the massive rise in Australians identifying as Aboriginal, which is having an effect on our public discourse as these new-identifiers seek to reappraise, many would say re-write, our country’s history.

Others in this movement are Radical Leftists who want to change the "normative views" of Australian history [viz: an egalitarian society built on British, free-enterprise capitalism and Western and colonial values and history] into a new version of "the politics of heritage for the nation at large” [viz: a separate Aboriginal sovereignty, fabrications about the evils of colonialism, Aboriginal resistance fighters and massacres, including a repudiation of our colonial, British and Australian imperialistic military history, and a promotion of State control via socialism/Marxism and Progressive policies].

Some readers might think this is a long-bow to draw, but please stay with us as we lay out our evidence.

The Eureka Stockade Rebellion

[Museum guide] “Now Ray this is the Eureka flag – the flag of the Southern Cross …”.

[Ray] That’s a sacred bit of cloth. It represents so much in terms of our independence, doesn’t it? … probably there would be no more important flag in Australia is there?” - (See WDYTYA from 17:44) - [Editor; Really Ray?]

Firstly, the Who Do You Think You Are? episode highlights one of Ray’s ancestor’s as being involved in the Eureka Stockade Rebellion, thus feeding Ray’s obvious desire for ‘pride’ as a claimed Republican and anti-establishment, anti-monarchy, ‘Irish’ rebel himself [Ed. beware Pride as it is the first of the Seven Deadly Sins].

Being able to reach into his “origins” like this gives Ray a lot of “cred” - He can place himself firmly within the Republican Left of Australia and he has the heritage to prove it.

As Ray tells us with pride and a chuckle,

“By nature I would have been on the side of the rebels [at Eureka], ‘cause they’re the people I like – I like ratbags and the rebels, I like trouble-makers, I like people who make you think. That’s probably why I want to change the flag and why I’m a Republican.” - (See WDYTYA from 13:35)

A slight complication to this narrative was that, although Ray’s ancestor really was at Eureka at the time, he was on the government’s side as a soldier! He was not one of the rebels! But luckily, as Ray found out, he didn’t hurt or kill any of the Eureka rebels. Phew!

Our point here is that modern day Progressive celebrities with virtue-signalling tendencies, like Ray Martin, are happy to selectively delve into their ancestry on “origin searching” expeditions if the results can be used to showcase their own, modern-day, Progressive politics in particular, or their vision for our society more broadly. This selective use of one’s ancestors deeds has been called “ancestral remembrance.” (Ref. 1, p77).

The corollary of this is, “ancestral forgetting” (Ref. 1, p77) and Ray offers some good examples of this as well. We can now offer these examples as a second piece of evidence for our claim that the Progressive and Radical Left are using Identity Politics to manipulate our history, and the way Australia will see itself in the future.

The Military and Police [Ref. 2] In Ray Martin’s Family

“The successful ruination of Australia’s Bicentenary celebrations in 1988 is the coup the anti-Anzacs wish to emulate. This is spelt out in the book ‘What’s Wrong With Anzac’, edited by Marilyn Lake and Henry Reynolds (2010).

According to this collection of essays, the present commemorations are to be undermined by promulgating a negative counter-narrative, mobilizing victims’ groups, utilizing oppositional front organizations, exploiting the media (and now the Internet and social media), and deploying sympathetic politicians [and celebrities like Ray Martin?]

This strategy of ideological de-legitimation had been pioneered by the CPA [Communist Party of Australia] in 1938 when it promoted the ‘Day of Mourning and Protest’ to undermine the Sesquicentenary, focusing on the convicts, the Eureka uprising, Indigenous issues, and other matters then fashionable on the Left.”

- Mervyn F. Bendle, in Quadrant Magazine, 26 April 2015

When discussing his father, Ray appears to have written-off his father completely, after his father, shortly before his death, attempted to reconnect with Ray in around the year 1980.

Ray says that his sisters did go, “to meet him about the same time, and they found that his drinking problem was even worse then, and they didn't resume any more relationship”.

Ray concludes by saying, “There was no bitterness at all. I just thought that we'd moved on. The caravan had moved on. He had no right to come back into my life when I'd grown up, because when there was a responsibility for a father, he wasn't there.” [Source: Wayback Machine]

In normal circumstances, one wouldn’t presume to discuss another man’s personal relationship with his dad, but for the sake of our exercise in this post we will, especially given that Ray Martin has been completely open about these events publicly.

Additionally, this might not be the whole story in the Martin family, so Ray has probably only described those matters that he is happy to be in the open, and that is what we will focus on.

To many of us on the Centre-Right, Rays actions appear to be typical of the world today - there is no room for nuance, atonement and forgiveness. A person does something that is considered against the narrative, wrong, or even evil, by the standards of the Progressive Left and they are cancelled - forever. Period.

No longer does the mantra - ‘Do the crime, do the time’, which then, under our old Western Christian, and also secular, traditions was followed by a period of rehabilitation and forgiveness - seem to apply any longer to those on the Left.

Ray says his father was a drunkard and a violent man to his wife. That’s it then. He’s irredeemable. Cancelled with no hope of rehabilitation and foregiveness. But Ray doesn’t say why.

For example, were there mitigating circumstances? Was his behaviour curable - did he just need some support, medical or mental, or rehabilitation assistance? Was his role as father, and then a grandfather to Ray’s kids, not redeemable? Did Ray’s kids have any agency in the matter?

We suspect that all our readers would be very sympathetic to Ray’s mother and her decision to leave her violent husband. And, as an 11 year old, it is perfectly understandable under these circumstances that Ray sided with his mother, rather than his father.

But as a grown man, why didn’t Ray attempt to reach out to his father? Perhaps with Ray’s increasing income he could have admitted his father to therapy and rehabilitation?

Only Ray would know and it is not up to us readers to pass judgement on Ray’s private decisions and behaviour in this regard. We can only critiques Ray’s public decisions and behaviour.

So, we believe where our readers can have an opinion is when they assess Ray’s eagerness to embrace “ancestral remembrance” by proclaiming his Aboriginality via his 2X-great-grandmother, the Aboriginal women Bootha (Bertha), and his eagerness to write-off a drunken father, a man who was violent to his wife.

To our mind, these two public positions by Ray gives him considerable kudos as a modern Progressive man himself - Aboriginality - tick; making a stand against Domestic Violence - tick, especially if it involves personal hardship such as sacrificing your own dad.

So in this section we are going to investigate Ray Martin’s (aka Grace) father and his ancestry.

It will be our contention that Ray Martin, either deliberating or unknowingly, suffers from “ancestral forgetting” because that serves the narrative of the Radical and Progressive Left in their ideological drive to re-write "the politics of heritage for the nation at large.”

We also plan to show why Ray Martin’s public support for the YES Campaign was in fact good for the country - his ‘dinosaur & dickheads’ comment pushed a few more waivering voters into firm NOes, thus helping defeat a proposal that would have been bad for the disadvantaged Aboriginal people living in some of the remote disfunctional communities.

In fact, Ray does have the answers to these problems and we will show how his answers are sitting in plain view by studying Ray’s own family and lived experience.

This is a complicated story so stay with us.

The Paternal Family Tree of Ray Martin

Our researchers have constructed part of the paternal family tree for the well-known TV presenter, Ray(mond) George Martin, formerly known as Raymond George Grace (Figure 2 ).

**Figure 2 - Partial Branch of the Alleged *Paternal* Family Tree of Ray Martin (Raymond George Grace). Estimated Aboriginal ancestry shown in red.**
*Disclaimer- This genealogical work has been undertaken in good faith and is based on the publicly available records.

Ray’s father George James Grace (jnr) was born in 1911 and he sadly died in 1982, only a couple of years after he attempted to reconnect with Ray, while Ray worked at Channel Nine.

Ray Martin sees himself as a ‘rebel Irishman’ [see WDYTYA? at 08:40], so let’s see how his father and his paternal line fit that expectation.

On 3 September 1939, Prime Minister Robert Menzies declared that Australia was at war with Germany.

**Figure 3 - Australia declares war on Germany on 3 September 1939** *(Source)*

The very next day after war is declared, the records show that a man by the name of, George James Grace signs up in the Royal Australian Naval Reserve. This man is Ray Martin’s father (Figure 4).

Ten days later, on the 14th of September, he embarks on the ship, Penguin IV, and arrives at his new base in Port Moresby, New Guinea, on the 15th of September.

**Figure 4 - Photograph of George James GRACE (jnr.) ca 1940, (b.1911 - d.1982)** *(Source: Airforce War Records)*

He then spends some several months on the Penguin IV before being “discharged” from the Navy on 25 May 1940, so he can enlist in the Royal Australian Air Force, two days later on 27 May 1940 (Figure 7).

His character whilst in the Navy is described as “V.G.” [Very Good) (Figure 6) while, in a Queensland Police Department report of 10/4/1940, he is listed as having “No criminal record” and that “Inquiries reveal that the candidate’s character is that of a sober, honest and respectable man” (Figure 8).

**Figure 5 - Naval record (page 1) for George James Grace (Ray Martin’s father)** (*Source: National Archives of Australia)*

**Figure 6 - Naval record (page 2) for George James Grace (Ray Martin’s father) detailing his length of service and “discharge”** (deserting?) details (*Source: National Archives of Australia)*
**Transcript of Remarks Column** *“After being temporarily demobilised on 23 May 40 for* ***compassionate reasons*** *rating entered the RAAF on 27 May '40. In view of this action approval was given for him to be regarded as* ***deserter*** and to be discharge S.N.A.R. from the day of his last effective service in the RANR ie 27 May '40. Although DNO Brisbane reported S.N.L.R. to have been put into effect on 7 March 1941. N.B. subsequently approved that full discharge recorded on VS/C should remain as "Demobilised 23 May 40" in view of a decision to pay deferred ? to the rating observing that his service in the R.A.A.F. was satisfactory. File 556/223/1952 is relevant.”
[Editor’s note: It appears he deserted the Navy, but joined the RAAF immediately. He most likely would have been charged with being AWOL, but they decided to drop it as he stuck with the RAAF and his service there was satisfactory to the war effort.]

George James Grace (Ray Martin’s father) skips the navy, but then joins the airforce immediately.

**Figure 7 - Royal air Force Recruitment Record for George James Grace, Ray Martin’s father.** *(Source National Archives)*

**Figure 8 - Queensland Police Check Record for George James Grace, Ray Martin’s father.** *(Source National Archives)*

Thus, the records seem to show that Ray’s father was courageous and had no hesitation in signing up to defend our country. Despite the fact that he had a wife and two small children, he does not appear to have hesitated in signing up as an expression of his patriotism.

He is also a bit of a ‘rebel’ in that he ‘skipped’ the Navy to join the Airforce. Did Ray in fact inherit his claimed “Irish rebelliousness” from his father?

To many of us, this apparent “ancestral forgetting” by Ray Martin, of his father’s contribution to the defence of our country in our time of need, is disappointing.

It seems that Ray can't acknowledge the privilege that he was able to enjoy during the Vietnam War era, when Ray himself was not required to serve our country in the military, as his father had done in WWII, and the 60,000 other young men, fellow citizens of Ray’s, had done during the 1960s and early 70s in Vietnam.

Instead, during the time of the Vietnam War conscription ballots, Ray was enrolled in a university engineering course, which he later abandoned, and then he went to work at the ABC from 1965-69. He then went overseas, to the US from 1969-1978, as a reporter, which kept him out of the country during the final period of the Vietnam War.

There were various ways young Australian men could defer, or get exemption from, the Vietnam War conscription ballots including, being enrolled in a university course, or being a non-resident (that is, being overseas).

The following excerpts provide context as to Ray Martin’s early career in the 1960-70s, and where he was relative to the requirements of the draft for the Vietnam War.

Figure 9 - Excerpt of Ray Martin interview outlining his early career. Did Ray Martin skip between university courses like his father skipped between the military forces? Another unacknowledged trait inherited from his father? *(Source)*

**Figure 10 - Excerpt of Ray Martin interview outlining his early career.** *(Source)*

**Figure 11 - Registration requirement for all eligible young male Australians to be registered for National Service during the Vietnam War**. *Source*

**Figure 12 - Exemption criteria for those young male Australians wishing to avoid being considered for the Vietnam War conscription ballots**. *Source*

So perhaps, not having been in a war himself, makes Ray Martin less understanding of the difficulties and perhaps traumas that his own father may have suffered? We know that in 1947 it was reported that Ray’s father had injuires that affected the use of his right arm - perhaps this led to difficulties in him working?

**Figure 13 - Injuries of Ray Martin’s father as reported in a 1947 court case.** *See Source below in Figure 27)*

We could find no evidence that Ray Martin himself volunteered to enlist in the Vietnam War, despite presumably being qualified to do so.

It is hard for us to know all the facts of the matter, and we don’t in any way condone a father turning to drink and abusing his wife.

However, during this era, there were none of the medical and mental health support services we take for granted today. So we should at least try to understand the pressures that may have led a working class, returned serviceman, whose character was described as an ‘sober, honest, respectable man’ (Fig. 8) on enlisting, but after the War, Ray Martin observed a, ‘“ father [who] was violent towards my mother when he was drunk.” (Source).

People nowadays are not really aware of the difficulties and great disadvantages many working class Australians suffered in the decade after the war, nor how alcohol fuelled men’s working and social lives, often for pleasure and comradeship, but also to ‘drown one’s sorrow’, and how violence was readily connected to drinking [Second Video below and the various court cases that engulfed Ray’s father - Figures 16, 23, 26, 27].

Older Australians such as myself (>65) from working-class backgrounds often vividly remember going with ‘Dad to the pub’ on Saturday afternoons after work [everyone worked Saturday mornings - Dad at the factory with me in tow, Mum rushing around with my young sisters doing the shopping before ALL the shops shut at noon, not to reopen again until Monday morning].

Invariably, a lack of working class housing, even homelessness, itinerant work and a reliance on alcohol led to huge marital problems. The first video below shows how the scarcity of good housing and rental properties would have undoubtably led to marital stress.

In fact, as another example of “ancestral forgetting” by Ray Martin, this unflattering newspaper report about a court case involving Ray Martin’s family in 1950 might have been Ray’s first experience of ‘being in the news’, even if it was a case about how, as a six-year old, Ray had to walk out from the front of mum & dad’s rental property, around a couple of streets, to enter into the back of the house to use to lavatory!

**Figure 14 - Full story here** *Wellington Times Thu 26 Jan 1950, p3*

From what Ray tells us, these videos and news reports, describe the day-to-day world that his mother decided to flee from with her children in 1956.

The following short film clips from the archives helps Australians today visualize this world of poverty and working men’s relief at the “six-o’clock swill.” Another newspaper article of 1947 (Figure 16) shows that Ray’s father was in the thick of this alcohol-fuelled world of the working man’s Australia after the War.

**Figure 15 - Excerpt for a Ray Martin interview describing his family’s homelessness** - *Source*

**Figure 16 - Newspaper report on Ray Martin’s (aka Grace) father, George James Grace in the world of alcohol-fuelled violence in post War Australia.**
*Source: Windsor and Richmond Gazette Wed 12 Feb 1947, p11*

As our researchers dug through the records, they came across another reason as to why Ray’s father may have been under increasing stress - the arrival of little Ray himself on 20 December 1944.

The war was still on and Ray’s father was serving in the RAAF but, by the beginning of 1945, Ray’s mother was in a serious condition. With her husband away in the service, she was alone with four children - three girls aged 8, 6 and 3, and little Ray aged 4months - and she was receiving constant medical attention for anaemia. She was a mile away from the nearest store and unable to care properly for her children, as her following, plaintive note, and official correspondence, suggest:

Figure 17 - Page 1 of ca early-1945 handwritten note by Ray Martin’s mother requesting her husband’s discharge from the RAAF, despite the War still being on, on compassionate grounds due to her ill-health and her inability to care for her four children *(Source Archives)*

**Figure 19 - A Feb 1945 doctor’s note confirming Ray Martin’s mother’s claims of her ill-health and her inability to care for her four children** *(Source Archives)*

**Figure 20 - May 1945 RAAF correspondence detailing Ray Martin’s mother’s request** *(Source Archives)*

Finally her husband, George James Grace, was given a discharge from the RAAF a few months later in July 1945, on compassionate grounds.

Figure 21 - July 1945 confirmation of the discharge of Ray Martin’s father from the RAAF on compassionate grounds to care for his wife and family. Ray Martin himself was still a 7-month old infant at this stage. *(Source Archives)*

As we thought more about the life of Ray’s dad, we wondered whether there were maybe other reasons that perhaps contributed to him being such a poor husband and father in Ray’s eyes.

From one of his war service records we see that he was only a moderate mechanic, not a great one. His assessment card says he only has, ‘little knowledge of the use of tools’ , which gave him a rating of only a 60% pass.

Interestingly he is rated as ‘very talkative’ and a fan of ‘cricket’, (Figure 22), which prompts us to wonder whether these attributes made him less desirable to employers? Maybe he was inefficient as a mechanic and loved to stand around talking about cricket all day? Was this the reason for his itinerant lifestyle, with his family in tow, as he went from job to job?

And perhaps that is a clue to the apparent failure in the life of George James Grace - he wasn’t a failure as a person as such, but rather he lived in a time when there was a scarcity of opportunities for a man with his skills and temperament - a socializing, talkative man, hopeless at a practical and technical career, who liked cricket.

Sounds a bit like Ray Martin doesn’t it?

But then Ray Martin was privileged to be starting his working life in a ‘new and modern’ Australia.

In the 1960s, Australia was a place that offered a raft of new career opportunities for a man who didn’t have to serve his country in the army, could get paid by the taxpayer for a scholarship to go to university, even if he was a failure at engineering like his dad (Ray abandoned his engineering degree after only three weeks), was very talkative like his dad, and even got paid to talk about his cricketing heroes .

So, maybe father is like son - same man, but just born in the wrong times.

Figure 22 - Extract from Ray Martin’s father’s Air Force admission form showing that the inspection officer described him as “talkative” and only having “little knowledge of the use of tools” with just a “Pass” and a score of “60%” *(Source: archives).*

Perhaps when we all look back on our own ancestors, we should not be too hard on them if they disappoint us, according to the standards of our today. Perhaps they are more like us than we care to acknowledge. For perhaps their biggest failing was merely being born in the wrong place, at the wrong time.

Perhaps we need to check our hubris before we make grand judgements on the life of others - are we really qualified to speak because of what we have done and achieved and really know, or are we just grandstanding because of who we are based on our DNA or our identity group?

The point of all this is that, would Ray Martin call his dad a ‘dinosaur or a dickhead’, for not seeking help for his condition?

If George James Grace ‘didn’t know’ how to improve his life, control his drinking and domestic violence, why didn’t he ‘go and find out’ as perhaps Ray would admonish?

Perhaps, George James Grace just gave up and ‘voted NO’ because no one - his wife, the airforce, the church (he was Roman Catholic), or society itself - was able to explain the details to George on what was required to be a good citizen, husband and father?

Often officialdom did try to help George, but was it enough? For example the courts did give him the benefit of the doubt when he was charged after a drunken incident - it was noted that in the past he had had a good record which helped him avoid severe sentences (Figures 23A,B&C) [other examples below as well].

**Figure 23A,B&C - Newspaper report of drink driving charge by Ray Martin’s (aka Grace) father, George James Grace.** *Source: Windsor and Richmond Gazette Wed 11 Jun 1947, p9*

But from 1947 onwards, things started to go bad for Ray’s Mum and Dad on a regular basis. Ray’s father tried to re-enlist in the airforce in 1947, after having been discharged on compassionate grounds in 1945. However his application failed due to his failure to qualify medically (Figures 24 & 25 ).

**Figure 24 - Correspondence for the re-application of George James Grace to re-enter the airforce.** *(Source: Archives)*

**Figure 25 - Correspondence for the medical failure of George James Grace to re-enter the airforce.** *(Source: Archives)*

Once incident in particular, regarding a court case on 9 May 1947, resulted in a newspaper report with the intriguing headline, “Wild Doings in Sawmill Yard”, (Figure 26), which was ultimately settled in a court case some months later and reported as, “Long Assault Hearing Concludes” (Figure 27). Both George and the other protagonist in this long running, but petty case were found to be “equally guilty” and fined 5 pounds each with no costs.

**Figure 26 - Start of Assault Case involving Ray Martin’s father.** ***Long Read here***

**Figure 27 - Conclusion of Assault Case involving Ray Martin’s father.** ***Long Read here***

The really interesting thing about Ray Martin’s appearance on Who Do You think You Are? was his keen desire to find ancestors that reinforced the way he viewed himself, as Ray told us.

Actually, there was no need for Ray to go all the way back to the Eureka Stockade to his 2X great-grandfather to look for ‘rebels, ratbags and trouble-makers’. His own mum and dad could have provided the evidence he craved.

The Communist Connections

Firstly, we found a very interesting Communist Party of Australia (CPA) connection in Ray’s family.

It seems that his mother wrote a letter during the War to the Labor Prime Minister of the day, Ben Chifley, complaining about her husband’s ‘victimisation’ by the airforce due to his 12-year-long CPA membership (Figure 28).

The records show that her concerns were unfounded - her husband’s membership of the CPA was not known to the airforce and he was not victimised because of it (Figure 29).

**Figure 28 - Correspondence from Mrs Grace (Ray’s mother)**. *(Source Archives)*

**Figure 29 - Correspondence regarding Mrs Grace’s (Ray’s mother) request**. *(Source Archives)*

Some readers may be wondering what is it with the surprisingly large number of ex- and current-Communists, who seem to be leading the promotion of the Yes Campaign for the Voice - Marcia Langton; Teela Reid and Thomas Mayo, are examples.

Is Ray Martin too taking some hidden relish in being the son of a long-time ‘rebel ratbag’ CPA member?

Wouldn’t it be funny if Ray Martin was promoting the Yes Campaign because he too was in fact, a closet communist?!

Secondly, Ray only has to read the court transcripts of his father’s and mother’s alleged ‘ratbag’ actions on the day in May 1947, described in the court case above (Figures 26 & 27), to feel pride with some familial ‘trouble-makers’.

From the newspaper report of that court case, we learn that the man making allegations against George James Grace (Ray’s father) stated that:

As he approached, Grace [Ray’s father] said, 'Here comes the b—— with no brains,' witness [Matheson] continued. He said to Grace, 'Get off the premises. You have been warned not to trespass here.' Grace then used a certain expression to him, and he seized Grace by the shoulder and began to lead him off the property.

Grace broke free and seized a piece of 3x2 wood about seven feet long, and struck him on the thigh with it, witness continued. He then ran towards his own back yard, which adjoined the mill yard. He stopped, and, picking up a piece of 4x2 wood about two feet long, threw it at witness, saying, 'I'll kill you, you b--- .' The piece of wood hit witness on the forehead and knocked him down.

Witness added that he jumped to his feet and said 'You black b —— .' Mrs. Grace then ran out and tried to pacify Grace, who said to witness, 'You b---. You accept my hospitality and ate my food, and tried to rape my wife. You bone head, I'll get you twelve months.' Witness replied, 'You will?' …

Grace then picked up a piece of timber about nine feet long and began jabbing it at him, saying, 'You big b----, you can't fight. I can beat you.' Witness grabbed the piece of timber, and Grace ran into his own back yard, then turned and said,'I'll kill you, you----. I'll get you. '… [excerpt from newspaper report].

In his defence, Grace (Ray’s father) instead claimed that:

Matheson [his adversary and co-accused] said, 'You black b ? ,;' and punched him [Grace] on the jaw, knocking two teeth from his dental plate, witness [Grace] continued. He said to Matheson, . 'Why don't you get wise to yourself? Aren't you in enough trouble now, without looking for more?' He walked away, but Matheson rushed after him with a piece of timber in his hand. Witness picked up a piece of tomato stake, and said, 'Now get away out of here.' Matheson hurled the piece of timber at him, and hit him, but not a hard blow.

William Bell [another witness] then took Matheson by the arm, saying, 'Come away Ron; don't be a fool,' witness continued. Witness turned to walk away, when Matheson rushed at him, knocked him over on his face, got astride him and began punching his shoulders and neck. Witness then heard his wife [Ray’s mother] tell Matheson to go away, or she would call the police, and Matheson then walked away …

Corroborative evidence was given by Mary Jane Grace [wife of the previous witness & Ray’s mother] as to the alleged assault by Matheson on Grace.

MAGISTRATE'S COMMENT

The magistrate remarked that as regards the alleged assault by Grace on Bell there were 'suspicious circumstances,' but the evidence was 'a little bit vague.' and he could not possibly be satisfied on the evidence that there was any real assault on that occasion. The information was therefore dismissed.

As regards the counter charges, Grace v. Matheson and Matheson v. Grace, he was satisfied that assault took place on both sides. Matheson might have had some cause, but he was legally guilty of assault, as he followed Grace on to the latter's premises.

He [the Magistrate] was satisfied that there was an assault in each of these instances, and he would not award any costs in these cases. Matheson and Grace were each fined, £5, in default 10 days. [excerpt from newspaper report]

This brings us back to the use and misuse of ancestry as a political weapon - are we NO voters ‘dickheads’ for failing to follow the directives of Ray Martin, a proud Aboriginal man after finding an Aboriginal 2X great-grandmother in his ancestry, or are we old enough to remember a video of the real Ray Martin, who some might say is a lot more like his dad that he has let on about?

We should track down that edgy comedian in the video, John Safran, and see if he agrees with Ray’s comment, “I like ratbags and the rebels, I like trouble-makers…I like people who make you think.”

Who’s the dickhead now?

References

Ref. 1 : Matthew Elliott, The Inconvenient Ancestor: Slavery and Selective Remembrance on Genealogy Television, Studies in Popular Culture , SPRING 2017, Vol. 39, No. 2 (SPRING 2017), pp. 73-90. Copy here

Ref 2 : We were originally going to discuss the police in Ray’s family, but this post became too large, so we will consider them in a subsequent post.

In Ray’s Defence - A Video in his Own Words

Postscript - As our research developed, we found that Ray Martin (aka Grace) had a large, interesting family tree. Many of the branches of Ray’s tree will provide us with stories that will form the basis of long conversations about our country’s history.

We will develop these stories, interwoven within Ray’s family history, over subsequent posts.

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