Part 2 – A Scotsman’s final journey
This two-part blog seeks to honour the life of Constable William Murray who perished in the Outback, on or about November 20, 1913. We will explore the chain of events that led to his tragic death, and the reasons behind Murray’s transfer to the Outback. The writer of the Queensland Police Union Journal article, ‘Police Transfers,’ dated August 18, 1923, nearly ten years after the incident, was scathing in his criticism about the police transfer system in the early 20th century.
Lost in the desert
In the late Spring of 1913, Constable William Murray set off on patrol from Clermont Police Station with his troop horse and another carrying a swag and provisions. He was bound for ‘Doongmabulla Homestead’ situated 100 miles north-north-west, crosssing alandscape was sparsley covered in rough native grasslands, brush and the occasional eucalypt tree. An area described in a subsequent report ‘as a land in which a man could get easily lost.’
Murray arrived safely at journey’s end, then for reasons unknown, chose to ride one of the station’s horses to commence his rounds on Monday morning, November 17, 1913. Somehow during that first patrol disaster struck when he became separated from the horse which eventually made its way back to the homestead two days later. When the station hands found the riderless animal, they feared for the constable’s life and commenced an immediate search. They soon found tracks but a shower of rain quashed all hope of rescue as the tracks disappeared in sand.
Police took over the search with trackers and a number of civilians. A newspaper report on Trove describes the hopelessness felt by everyone in the search parties as the days passed, and they realised that there was little hope in finding him alive owing to the extreme heat and scarcity of water in the desert country. Murray lacked the ‘bush skills’ and would have known early on that he was in trouble. Acting-Sergeant Ward reported that Constable Reine from his search party had found remains at 7 am the following Wednesday, after tracking for forty miles. The body was located about 20 miles from Laglan, a 68 kilometre road trip from Doongmabulla today. Murray had been dead nearly a week.
Ironically, he was only a half mile from a kangaroo shooters’ camp where a spring was located. The cause of death was unknown, but we can construe that Murray became separated from the horse, then perished from lack of water.
Policing the Outback, 110 years on
Present day police are offered attractive incentatives to relocate to remote communities. Senior Constable Stephen Pursell, Officer in Charge at Birdsville Police Station for nearly nine years, oversees a staggering 240,000 square kilometres in far-west Queensland bordering the Simpson Desert. That’s 1638 kilometers from his former post at the Sunshine Coast.
Similarly to William Murray those many years ago, Pursell hails from a cold climate, being a native of Tasmania. He relocated to the mainland and served with the Victorian Police Service for many years before making his way to Queensland, where he has served with the Queensland Police Service from 2006.
Both men have that indomitable ‘spirit of adventure’ but the difference in their journeys is that Pursell chose to be transferred to Birdsville. William Murray was exiled to Clermont. Senior Constable Pursell praises the experience of living in the Outback with the support of his wife. His father was a ‘country cop’ in Tassie and he says that ‘deep down I always wanted to give country policing a go.’ Adding that… ‘I have loved the community style of policing, the people, the history, and of course, the rugged scenery of the Outback.’
Stephen Pursell retires from the Queensland Police Service in May 2025. We thank him in advance for his service… but there’s still a little time to say ‘g’day’ in Birdsville.
This story was researched and written using the best archival resources at the time by Debra Austin, a former Museum Assistant at the Queensland Police Museum, and a member of Friends of Queensland Police Museum, a group dedicated to restoring the graves of Queensland police officers who died on duty. Constable William Murray served the Queensland Police Force from 04.03.1910 until that fateful occurrence on or about 20.11.1913 when he perished in the Outback. The Friends of the Queensland Police Museum shall endeavour to locate and mark his grave.
The Police Museum is open 9am to 4pm Monday to Thursday and 10am to 3pm on the last Sunday of the month (Feb-Nov) and is located on the Ground Floor of Police Headquarters at 200 Roma Street, Brisbane.
Contact: E: museum@police.qld.gov.au
“FROM the VAULT – Doomed Patrol to Doongmabulla 1913 – Part 2 – A Scotsman’s Final Journey” by the Queensland Police Service is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (BY) 2.5 Australia Licence. Permissions may be available beyond the scope of this licence. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5/au/legalcode