A Land Fit for Heroes?

Cruwys’s Advance was approved on 8 July 1920.[1]  His block Farm No. 12 on Bective Soldiers’ Settlement was in the County of Parry, Parish of Somerton, Tamworth Land District.  This block had provisionally been allotted to T.G. Adamson on behalf of his adopted son G.Y. Watson when he was on Active Service.  Adamson subsequently declined the offer and Cruwys took up the block on 7 June 1920.[2]

The farm that Cruwys took up was one of the dry blocks on Bective.  Consequently approval was sought to add the full cost of obtaining water to the capital value of the farm in line to what had happened to other settlers on Bective. The costs included those for a windmill, boring and other equipment.[3] This was approved on 16 November 1920.[4] In August 1922, two of Cruwys’s geldings died and he was expected to replace with  two others of the same value.[5]  He exchanged two other geldings originally purchased with his advance money, for five cows.  This exchange was not acceptable to the Soldier Settlement Board as items listed for use from the original Advance money could not be exchanged without prior approval.[6]  Cruwys stated that he needed them for his dairy farm and the block was not suitable for anything else.  He was not in a financial position to replace the dead horses.[7]

On 17 October 1923, Inspector Garland reported that Cruwys was making no effort to develop the holding but was using it for agistment purposes. Garland believed  that it would be more advisable ‘to allow a better man to be put in occupation if one could be found’.[8]  Cruwys was given 14 days to show why his occupancy should not be terminated.  He was at this time married with one child aged three and was not drawing a military pension.  The District Surveyor reported on 18 October 1923, that Cruwys, was an unsatisfactory settler with no prospect of meeting his liabilities, ‘nor did he show any intention of trying to do so’.[9]

Inspector Garland reported from Manilla on 19 August 1924, that at that date Cruwys was working as a motor driver in the Newcastle District.  Approval was given by the Under Secretary for Lands on 1 July 1926 to write off an amount of £511.7.4.[10]

Footnotes

[1] SRNSW: Lands Department; NRS 8058, Returned Soldiers loan files; [12/7060 No. 5049] Kelso Ernest Cruwys, Application for Advance 8 July 1920,

[2] Ibid, RSS Branch Office Memorandum 7 December 1920.

[3] Ibid 16 November 1920.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid, A.A. Watson Director of SS to K. Cruwys, 2 August 1922.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid, Office Memorandum 25 September 1922.

[8] Ibid, Under Secretary for Lands Report 1 July 1926.

[9] Ibid, District Surveyor 18 October 1923.

[10] Ibid, Under Secretary for Lands Report 1 July 1926.

Sources used to compile this entry:

State Records NSW:  Lands Department; NRS 8058, Returned Soldiers loan files; [12/7060 No. 5049] Kelso Ernest Cruwys.

National Archives of Australia: B2455, First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers (Kelso Ernest Cruwys) online: http://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/scripts/Imagine.asp?B=3473910