Written by Paul Sutton, Researcher The Beerburrum Soldier Settlement was an Australian Government funded, and Queensland Government administered effort, to provide land to repatriated servicemen who had served in the Australian and Imperial armed forces during World War One. The settlement was established in 1916 and ran until terminated during the late 1920s, though many […]
In 1917, Laura Duncan (1875-1955), a determined widowed mother who braved the outback of Queensland, took on the might of the State of Queensland. Mrs Laura Duncan was the then owner of Mooraberrie cattle station situated more than 1000 kilometres north west of Brisbane. The station had been previously under the management of her husband, […]
At the outbreak of the First World War, one of the many tasks of Queensland’s Lieutenant-Governor, Sir Arthur Morgan, was to send secret despatches concerning domestic affairs to the Secretary of the State for the Colonies based in London. The first secret despatches sent after the commencement of war were written on 2 September 1914 […]
This blog post is part of a series of essays commissioned by Queensland State Archives and written by historian Brian Rough. 4 August 1914. Britain, Australia and other Commonwealth nations declared that they were at war with Germany following its invasion of Belgium the day before. Queensland’s Premier, Digby Denham, was advised of the outbreak of […]
Records in the QSA collection can provide insights into the post-war life of former soldiers. One we have found is about Private John Leak VC as a soldier settler. Private Leak earned his Victoria Cross at the battle of Pozieres in the Somme Valley in July 1916. After being discharged from the Australian Imperial Forces […]
Ruth tells us about her lifelong love of pineapples and the significance pineapples have had in Queensland. And some of the records in the collection bring back happy childhood memories for her.
The file Barcaldine: 156 – Item ID70850 (Dead Farm Files – Series ID14050) is a favourite because it is very much alive with details of rural life on a 9000 acre grazing selection in the first decades of the twentieth century. It reveals the struggle to meet selection conditions of fencing and stocking during the severe […]