When the well-known Condobolin property, “Brotherony”, passed into new ownership to a foreign investor earlier this year, a rich and chequered history of notable former owners passed with it.
“Brotherony” today is a modest-sized mixed farming property of 3337 hectares.
It was sold privately by Ainslie Toole of Landmark Forbes as an aggregation with the adjoining “Everton” of 1444ha, both owned by Chris Jones.
But the “Brotherony” name goes back to the early days of settlement in the Condobolin district, when the property was one of the founding stations on the lower Lachlan River.
It was taken up in the 1840s, initially as two adjoining 16,000-acre runs called “Yaddra” and “Gugong”, by a former convict, Joseph Moulder, who by then had already established himself as a pioneer settler on land adjoining present-day Orange.
Moulder was sentenced to life at London’s Old Bailey in 1816 (for stealing a handkerchief!) and landed in Sydney two years later, aged 20.
In 1833 he married another convict, Caroline Clemens, who would bear him 12 children.
A pardon
After receiving a conditional pardon in 1836, Moulder took up a land grant south of Orange where he built a homestead, “Bloomfield”, and using that as his base, joined the squatting push to the west, where land aplenty was still there for the taking.
Upon Moulder’s death in 1866, management of his Lachlan runs – by this time an aggregation of more than 40,000ha incorporating “Brotherony”, “Moulmein”, “Euabalong” and “Dundoo Hills” – was taken over by his sons Edward and William.
Edward later bought “Brotherony” in his own right, and moved from Orange with his new wife, Johanna Walker from Braidwood, to take up residence in about 1870.
It was said that Johanna saw only one white woman in her first six months.
She and Edward remained on “Brotherony” until the late 1890s, raising a family of four sons and four daughters.
One of their sons, Henry (HC), would later become a pillar of Condobolin as a stock and station agent, successful grazier, long-serving mayor, chairman of the pastures protection board and member of parliament.
Edward himself was a prominent Condobolin citizen in his day, being the first member of the pastures protection board, a founding member of the Masonic lodge, a noted sportsman and author of a book about the west.
When Edward and his brother took over their father’s Lachlan runs in 1868, the country was unfenced and stocked only with cattle, mobs of which the brothers would overland to Melbourne and Adelaide markets. Sheep came later, and by the 1890s, in addition to running 1000 head of cattle Edward was shearing more than 20,000 sheep on “Brotherony” in the 12-stand woolshed that remained in use (in later years, with four stands) until flattened by a storm in 2000.
During Edward’s tenure a handsome homestead – reputedly the first brick homestead between Condobolin and Lake Cargelligo – was built beside the Borapine Creek to replace an earlier structure near the river, and became a social hub of the district.
Drought and rabbits
But like many a pastoral nabob of that era, Edward met his match with the depression, drought and rabbit invasion of the 1890s, and in 1900 “Brotherony” was taken over by the Bank of NSW. Edward and most of his family retreated to “Bloomfield” at Orange.
One son, Bill, remained on “Morven”, a nearby property originally part of “Brotherony”, before later moving to a river block close to Condobolin. The bank as mortgagee in possession installed W.B. Newcomen as manager and in 1906 offered “Brotherony” for sale by auction. Nothing came of this, however, and Newcomen remained in charge until 1909, when he left to take up a block of his own. By this time resumptions for closer settlement had reduced “Brotherony” to a holding of 27,600 acres (11,000ha), which nonetheless enjoyed a Lachlan River frontage of 14 miles (23km) and boasted (according to the auction notice) “the richest description of fattening grasses and herbage”.
Thompsons arrive
The bank eventually offloaded “Brotherony” about 1910 and records show the property as being held by a W.E. Davidson until about 1917, when it was acquired by its next long-term owner, the Thompson family from Cootamundra.
Before that, however, “Brotherony” (under Davidson ownership) had been one of 12 stations fronting the Lachlan downstream of Condobolin which were offered to the government as a 400,000ac (160,000ha) block in 1916, for soldier settlement.
The owners of the 12 stations proposed that the land be acquired by the government at prices ranging from two pounds 10 shillings ($5) an acre to three pounds 10 shillings ($7) an acre, but the government didn’t take the bait.
Brotherony’s rich past
The next owner, George Thompson (known as GT), was a self-made man who, after gaining experience auctioneering at Gunning and Harden, set up in agency business in Cootamundra as George Thompson and Company, in 1891.
Like others, he combined agency work with some astute dealing in stock and land, and at various times he owned (apart from “Brotherony”) “Merringreen” and “Buddigower” at West Wyalong, “Euratha” at Yalgogrin North, “Weelong” at Forbes, “Carumbi” on the Bland and “The Oaks” at Cootamundra.
He also owned a high-country property, Jounama Station at Talbingo, to which he would send more than 10,000 sheep each year from his western stations for summer grazing, and his overall woolclip in his peak years often topped 10,000 bales.
Although George retained overall control, ownership of “Brotherony” was vested in his son Fred, who took up residence there with his wife Lily on his return from the First World War, and managed the property through the 1920s.
By 1928, however, his war ailments from the Western Front required Fred to move closer to medical attention, and he returned to Cootamundra, later moving to “The Oaks” and taking over its management. Management of “Brotherony” meanwhile was taken over by Walter Flohr, a German migrant who had managed stations for George since 1903. In 1935, by which time George was 70, and looking to scale back his pastoral investments, “Brotherony” was put up for auction, this time as a holding of 27,563 acres (11,159ha) of which nearly half was freehold.
But as the year moved on, and war clouds gathered, Thompson had second thoughts and decided any deal was better than no deal. He hived off a river block of 7590 acres (3072ha) as “North Brotherony” and a sale was made at two pounds 17 shillings and sixpence ($5.75) an acre.
A feature of the property was its long river frontage, the latter much enhanced by the permanent back-up of water from the Booberoi Weir – a structure erected by the government as a depression project in the 1890s.
Less enticing to potential buyers was the property’s remoteness. Although today “Brotherony” is an easy 40 minutes’ drive from Condobolin on mostly sealed road, it wasn’t always thus. Jan Martin, a grand-daughter of Fred Thompson, says when her father (Norman, but known as “Jim”) used to accompany his grandfather George in the early 1940s on car trips from Cootamundra to “Brotherony”, he had more than 40 gates to open – and there were as many more between there and Condobolin. The property again failed to sell at auction, but the knowledge that “Brotherony” was for sale had set tongues wagging, and by 1939 a prospective buyer had emerged in the person of Allen Marsh, whose family had long held the “Glenleigh” property at the junction of the Belubula and Lachlan rivers.
As told by his grandson Warwick, Marsh had wanted to buy just the river country, and had made George Thompson an offer, but Thompson had rejected it, insisting the whole property had to go, or nothing. But as the year moved on, and war clouds gathered, Thompson had second thoughts and decided any deal was better than none. He hived off a river block of 7590 acres (3072ha) as “North Brotherony” and sold for two pounds 17 shillings and sixpence ($5.75) an acre.
To that, Marsh added the nearby homestead block of about 500 acres (200ha), bringing “North Brotherony” to its present area, on which Warwick now runs a 1000-head cattle breeding operation. Allen Marsh was a brother of Bill Marsh, then a well-known stock dealer at Forbes, who also owned, in partnership with another brother Alf, the riverfront properties “Walla Wallah” and “The Island”.
Allen and wife Rebecca moved into the old brick homestead, where they lived until Allen’s death in 1967, after which Rebecca moved to Sydney. Unoccupied since then, the building stands as a local landmark, but today as just a shell. When Warwick’s father Colin was married, a weatherboard house from Sydney was erected on another part of the property, on the site where Warwick – who took over the property in 1998 – now lives in a new brick home with his wife Hilda and their two young children.
After selling the river country, the Thompsons sold other portions, so that by 1952 when it next hit the market, all that remained of “Brotherony” was 9412 acres. This area, managed since the Second World War by Fred’s eldest son Colin, at least retained the station woolshed. It also had a manager’s residence, built in 1939, and under subsequent owners this became the main homestead.
Although unsold at auction, the property was sold privately the following year, this time to well-known sportsman and thoroughbred breeder, Laurie Morgan, who annexed an adjoining block to build his holding to 13,500 acres.
From a Yea, Victoria, farming family, Morgan had made a name for himself in southern circles playing Australian Rules football for Fitzroy, before moving to NSW where he switched to polo and was soon at the top of the game.
His crowning achievement, however, during his time on “Brotherony”, was to compete with the triumphant Australian equestrian team at the 1960 Rome Olympics, where he won two gold medals in individual and team events.
For his three-day event win at Rome, Morgan rode a horse called Salad Days, which he had bought for 50 pounds ($100) two years earlier when it caught his eye while inspecting sheep on a property at Wellington.
Brotherony’s soils force industry advancement
The gelding Salad Days had been retired from the track after an unsuccessful turf career and was “skin and bone” when Morgan bought it, but under his instruction and care at “Brotherony” the horse showed its true colours and carried its owner to stardom.
As well as running sheep on “Brotherony”, Morgan was one of the first in the area to practise broadacre cropping on a serious scale, using a bulldozer to haul a big disc plough through the heavy loam soils. Morgan’s son Warwick, who grew up on “Brotherony” with his sister Luise, has written a biography of his father, which chronicles his multi-faceted sporting career as well as his successive pastoral adventures.
Two years before selling “Brotherony” in 1963, Morgan with his brother Doug took over the lease of the 4400 square kilometre “Balbirini” in the Northern Territory, and he later acquired the 10,400ha “Doboy” near Grafton.
As his wife Anne had no wish to relocate to the Top End and “live rough”, Morgan also bought a 320ha Tarcutta property, “Hambledon”, to serve as their home base after selling “Brotherony”.
Entitled ‘Too Tough to Lose’, Warwick’s book gives full credit to his late father’s achievements in sport and business, but also reveals the stresses imposed on family, friends and associates by obsessive “winners”, such as Morgan clearly was.
After the Morgans, “Brotherony” was held for nearly 20 years by Lachlan Brettschneider, a local farmer of long standing who had property also at Mount Hope, and then briefly by Ian Clark, before being bought by Len Jones in 1984. Len Jones also had another property in the district, as well as a trucking company and business interests in Condobolin. His son Chris took over “Brotherony” when Len later moved to Orange, and the property was soon back in the news.
Successive sales of portions of “Brotherony” by Morgan and Brettschneider had by this time reduced the property to an area of about 2300ha, but another build-up phase saw an adjoining block of about 1000ha tacked on in 1995, followed in 2003 by the adjoining “Everton”, which once again gave “Brotherony” direct river frontage. It was while farming on “Brotherony” that Chris Jones developed the twin disc drill airseeder that won him the Rural Innovator’s Prize at the 2001 Australian National Field Days at Orange.
The seeder attracted widespread notice, operating at much higher speeds than existing seeders, and in 2005 Jones sold the manufacturing rights to the United States company Amity Technology in Fargo, North Dakota.
Following the property’s recent sale by Chris Jones, “Brotherony” has reverted to an all-grazing operation, this time based on cattle, thus opening another chapter of one of the lower Lachlan’s illustrious former stations.