Sure the Unanderra woman had already spoken about her experiences of being forcibly taken from her siblings when she was just four years old, for the Servant or Slave documentary that featured on SBS in 2016.

But she had no intention of reliving "that dreadful" period of her life again.

Having been removed from her parents at such a young age, Adelaide spent the next 10 years living at Cootamundra Girls Home, where she was trained for domestic service.

She either personally experienced or witnessed every form of abuse imaginable during her time at the home.

Adelaide went on to work as a 'domestic' for 43 years and now lives an independent and productive life in Wollongong.

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Biographer Julie-Anne Jones said Adelaide's was a story of courage, fortitude and most of all, survival.

The woman herself realised telling her Stolen Generation story would help her healing and possibly others as well.

That's why Adelaide entrusted Cordeaux Heights author Julie-Anne Jones to write her biography.

The two have been friends since meeting at a church community group called Manna House.

They met the Mercury ahead of National Reconciliation Week (May 27 - June 3) to publicize their upcoming book and their own relationship - itself an expression of reconciliation.

"I was four years old when I was taken with my siblings, away from my parents and my people. I never knew my people and I never even knew my mother. I can't remember her," Adelaide said.

In fact it was just recently that the Bundjalung woman finally returned home to Grafton to meet her mother's people.

"I was 80 and it was December, 2018 when I finally went," Adelaide said.

But she almost didn't get there after the train she was in broke down.

"It was frightening...and not just because the train broke down," Adelaide said.

"I was frightened to meet these people that I didn't know. As it turned out they were wonderful but I had no idea they would be during the train trip.

"And, when the train broke down 15 minutes away from Grafton, I thought the worst.

"The engineer said there was no air in the brakes. All I could think was that we could have all been killed."

Returning home was wonderful but brought back a lot of painful memories.

"All nine of us siblings were forcibly taken away from there," Adelaide said.

"Us three older girls were taken to Cootamundra Girls Home. The three little ones were taken to Bomaderry Babies Home and my other three brothers were taken to Kinchela Boys Home.

"My baby sister died at Bomaderry but when my father went to get her to bury her she had already been taken, and he couldn't bury her.

"My baby brother Johnny also died of appendicitis. He had been complaining about the pain but no one believed him and by the time the ambulance came his appendix had burst and he died."

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The irony of this was not lost on Julie-Anne Jones.

"The irony is they were taken originally because they were neglected but then the children in the course of being in the homes were so badly neglected on those occasions. And then when they were sent out to work, so many of them were abused at those places and ran away," she said.

Adelaide often tried to run away while living at Cootamundra but always got caught by the "coppers". On one of those occasions Adelaide said one copper pulled out his penis and said "I'll give you two pounds if you touch it".

"I was shocked. I was only 15. When we got back to the home I ran to the matron and told her what happened. The matron didn't believe a word I said and before long I was shipped out to work in Cowra for the manager of the Aboriginal Mission."

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Adelaide only found some peace when she turned 16 and went to work for a "beautiful woman in Double Bay, who was paralysed from the waist down, and her mother".

"I was there until the age of 59," she said.

"When her mother died, we moved to Rose Bay. She bought a beautiful house there and I lived there very happily for the most part."

The mother left one-third of the Double Bay house to Adelaide. When the house was sold, Adelaide used her share of the money to buy her "nice little house in Unanderra".

But while she was still in Rose Bay she fell pregnant and had a child called Robert, who she is estranged from nowadays.

Adelaide would only say that Robert's father was a well-known Sydney barrister.

In 2016 Adelaide joined her two sisters Rita and Valerie and featured on the SBS documentary Servant or Slave.

Adelaide told the Mercury her sisters were much more emotional in telling their harrowing stories.

"This served them well when we went to Canberra to get our Stolen Generation money. They got much more than the $60,000 I got," she said. "But what I soon realised is that there were a lot of lawyers and hangers-on in the room, and I'm sure they got a fair chunk of the money too."

Adelaide urged young indigenous women to look forward and work hard.

"Don't waste your life and feel sorry for yourself because life does not work like that. You have to earn what you want."

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