Billy McCrae was Irish. Before he left for Australia his father pressed a small gold swan pendant into his hand. The swan was set inside a circle, with six symbols engraved around its edge: Protection. Safe Passage. Love. Resilience. Wealth. Happiness. His father told him it would keep him safe.
Billy became an underground gold miner at Kalgoorlie — one of the most dangerous jobs in one of the most unforgiving places on earth. He survived three separate rockfalls that killed the men working alongside him. Three times the tunnel collapsed. Three times he walked out. The other men didn't.
He believed the swan brought him good luck. When his close friend John Carroll said he was going to war, Billy gave him the swan.
Kalgoorlie · 1920s
John Carroll took the swan to the Western Front. In June 1917, at the Battle of Messines in Belgium, he rushed an enemy trench, attacked a machine-gun position and captured the gun, then dug out comrades buried in a shell hole while under heavy fire.
For this action John Carroll was awarded the Victoria Cross, Australia's highest military honour.
He came home a hero. Years later a railway accident cost him his right foot. He kept wearing the swan beside his dog tags.
Years later his great-nephew Wayne, Billy McCrae's grandson, turned seventeen and told John he was joining the Royal Australian Air Force. John took the swan from around his own neck and placed it in Wayne's hands.
“Wayne, this swan will protect you as it did for me.” — John Carroll, V.C.
Wayne was flying a passenger over a copper mine approximately sixty kilometres from Cloncurry when the helicopter suffered a mechanical failure. The aircraft cartwheeled on impact. The rotor blades came through the fuselage. Both of Wayne's legs were severed just below the knees.
There were no belts. Wayne tore his shirt into strips and tied his own tourniquets.
The flying doctor flew him eight hundred kilometres to Townsville Base Hospital. During the flight, Wayne died and was revived three times. He arrived in Townsville alive, barely.
He spent two years in Brisbane Hospital. Thirteen operations. He died on the operating table during one of them and was revived again. His left leg: the entire section removed and rebuilt with his own hip bone. His right leg: a steel rod from knee to ankle, packed with crushed bone harvested from elsewhere in his body.
After all of that, Wayne was working in Africa, assisting with operations during a coup. Enemy combatants opened fire. Wayne was hit twice by AK-47 rounds while running. He survived.
He still wears the swan.
“I can only put my survival down to the swan in the circle.” — Wayne McCrae
The same six symbols engraved into the circle.
A leather band. A certificate of authenticity.
Rhodium plating helps resist tarnish and wear. The meaning is the same.
Twenty years ago I had gold swans made for my closest friends. Not to sell — to share. Gold was expensive. I gave them away because I believed in what the object carried.
Now I've had solid sterling silver, rhodium-plated replicas made. The same six symbols. The same meaning. So others can carry it too.
Made to be worn. Made to be passed on.
Wear the swan · A$250
