When an Australian farmer enlisted was any provision made to look after the farm?

[rolt968]

Two brothers, John Taylor McWilliam  and George McWilliam were farming at Lasswade, Kupunn, Dalby, Queensland.

Unfortunately I don't know if they owned the land or were managing it for someone else.

John Taylor McWilliam enlisted on 30 April 1915. Presunably this left George running the farm. However George enlisted on 11 February 1916 (I was a little suprised about this).

Would some provision have been made available to make sure that production on the farm continued?

RM

[aconnolly]

Hi RM - can't give you a specific Australian answer but the age of most volunteers was of course young and few were themselves owners of farms - most were sons of the owners or workers employed on farms.  Whilst it did introduced hardships for some owners I'm unaware of any specific rules prohibiting farm workers form attesting in NZ.   I cannot find any examples in NZ of farms failing due to workforce shortages probably as local communities rallied to assist if labour was short. But the geographic vastness of Australia's farming regions may have made local support much harder.  I am aware of younger sons leaving school earlier than probably anticipated to return to the farm as older brothers or workers had left.

Andrew

[frev]

15 hours ago, rolt968 said:

Two brothers, John Taylor McWilliam  and George McWilliam were farming at Lasswade, Kupunn, Dalby, Queensland.

Unfortunately I don't know if they owned the land or were managing it for someone else.

John Taylor McWilliam enlisted on 30 April 1915. Presunably this left George running the farm. However George enlisted on 11 February 1916 (I was a little suprised about this).

Would some provision have been made available to make sure that production on the farm continued?

RM

George only enlisted after the farm was sold:

https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/213757669

Cheers, Frev

[rolt968]

Thank you, Frev,  that is excellent. Also thank you, that's a website I haven't come across before.

The McWilliam brothers are commemorated on four memorials/ rolls of honour in the Dalby area.

To add to the picture, George McWilliam was killed on 8 July 1917, James McWilliam, 50 CEF died of wounds on 22 June 1917.

Yet another brother served as wireles operator in the Merchant Service.

RM

[stevenbecker]

Mate,

I should add that there was no help on the farms when there owners enlisted.

You will find that one son would remain to look after the farms/stations in most cases when there was limited help.

I have a number of son's and or the famlies, applying to return home because the person left to ran the farm could not, for what ever reason

The father in many cases either got ill or died which left the mother to run the farm

While the women were capable of running a farm, many because of the labor shortage had no help.

S.B