In August 1966, wigged and gowned and newly admitted as a barrister of the Supreme Court of Queensland, I was the first woman thus attired to walk into a Qld courtroom of men and appear for a client. In 2006, I retired after 40 years in practice in Qld and then NSW. In 2005 the office of the DPP in Qld named a set of Chambers after me. At the launch, I made a promise to do something about telling ‘my story’.
So I peered into a collection of stuff I had filed or put aside thinking it might be useful one day. Here was a veritable mosaic of materials evidencing the things I had done both inside and outside the law: hence the title Res Gestae —Things Done. For 34 years I had been involved in editing authorised law reports for PNG, NSW and Local Government for all of Australia. The format fell into place: the ‘story’ became a collection of reflections, meditations, and philosophical perspectives on, e.g., things educative, legal, ethical, romantic, fraternal, domestic, etc, with each topic providing scope for consideration of historical and social aspects of the times in which I lived.
Book by Naida Haxton:
