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Published in The Gazette, the Journal of the Toowoomba & Darling Downs Family History Society Inc. Vol 27 No 1, March 2014
Frank's story the copyright of Mary E. Metcalfe while the Society retains copyright of its journal.

“Palparara”. "Intrigued by this name I set out to discover more about the address of my husband’s grandfather on the 1913 electoral roll for Maranoa Division.

What might the country have been like around there? A travel blog on the Simpson Desert mentioned that Palparara was actually the name of an indigenous tribe. Before long, I had learned from Trove newspapers that it was also the name of an outback station, located on Farrer’s Creek north-west of Windorah, beyond the Barcoo and the Thomson Rivers, in the Gregory North district, What might an energetic healthy thirty-year-old be doing in that location? Knowledge I gained in 2009 from a personal outback camping trip down the Birdsville Track enabled me to visualise the landscape of dry sandhills, changed at times by the flooding of Cooper Creek.

The person of my interest, Francis Lewis Altmore von Stieglitz, (Frank) was born far from there in Launceston, Tasmania on 10th September 1883 to parents Edgar Boyne von Stieglitz, sheep farmer, and his wife, Eleanor Beatrice Thomson, daughter of Queensland MHR, Peter Thomson of Wivenhoe Station, so revealed The Queenslander. Edgar was a son of early Tasmanian colonist, pastoralist, coroner and parliamentarian, Francis Walter von Stieglitz who had emigrated from Ireland, and his wife Anne Ransom.

Frank von Stieglitz became a drover after his childhood spent around Wombo Forest, Chinchilla. Oral history reports that Frank had his own camel team and had worked as a mailman on the Birdsville Maree Track. He joined the Skuthorpe Brothers buckjumpers and was employed also by the well known cattle baron, Sidney Kidman. It should not be too hard, I thought, to find evidence of Frank’s activities.

Trove newspapers revealed various owners of “Palparara” as being Adam and Robert Hay; Dalgety Ltd; Sidney Kidman; and from 1910, and more into Frank’s timeline, the name Edmund Jowett entered the columns. Immediately my attention was engaged, as Jowett was the very man for whom my own grandfather, James William Caton, worked from 1920, as Manager of his several eastern seaboard properties. Jowett was to the sheep industry what Kidman was to cattle, according to The Northern Miner of 10th September 1910. Stock were often driven to the Adelaide markets, so I imagined Frank Stieglitz (as he signed on his WW1 service record) in the saddle. Evidence of his occupation as a drover appears in both the Chronicle and the Advertiser in 1914 showing him moving stock for S. Kidman.

No further newspaper mention could I find of Frank till his return from the trenches, via the City of York, in 1919. The unfortunate description “gassed” was written across his documents in records at the National Archives that bear testament to his army service in the 25th Battalion. He disembarked on 24 February in Adelaide. Frank’s address on the electoral roll that same year was Windorah, Queensland.

Was he in sufficient health to work once more in the outback? In the intervening period Frank had served as an Australian infantryman on the Western Front, and as a consequence of his German origins, changed his name by Deed of Attestation in 1918 to his mother’s maiden name – Thomson. Only one other brother of the five, Aubrey Rudolf Frederick von Stieglitz did the same. The AIF Project on line summarises all the brothers’ military service and their safe return.

From this point my search deviated from “Palparara” to centre on the Frank Thomson who returned to England to marry his physiotherapist, Flora Annie Perry, at Stourbridge on 20 June 1920. They later took a soldier settler’s block at Mt Abundance, near Mitchell, known as “Studley Downs”.

“Palparara” then disappears from the scene, though I did note from The Courier Mail that Edmund Jowett remained its owner to his death in 1936, when my own grandfather was still his Manager.

“In sickness and in health” is indeed a significant phrase for any shell shocked, gassed war veteran. Unpublished memoirs of Frank’s daughter, Margaret, (my mother-in-law) reveal the life pursued by Frank and Flora on their return to Australia where their four children, Edgar, Margaret, Lewis, and Norman were born.

Never again was Frank as robust as in the pre-war years he spent in the outback. A report of his outback life, with an accompanying photo, appears on the e hive website, as part of an entry for the Stockman’s Hall of Fame. The Courier Mail of 16 April 1938 reported the death of Francis Thomson at his residence at Sutton Avenue, Sandgate on 12 April 1938 – the second son of the late Edgar Boyne von Stieglitz, and Mrs von Stieglitz of Toowoomba.

I wonder how much of his spirit our children have inherited!"