Frederick Stanley McIntyre was born on 14th November 1918 at 4h 40m am, at 199, Calder Street, Govanhill, Glasgow. The informant was the child’s father, William McIntyre, who was entered as present, on 4th December at Glasgow.
| Frederick Stanley McIntyre |
| 14th November 1918 - 4th November 1970 |
Frederick Stanley McIntyre was born on 14th November 1918 at 4h 40m am, at 199, Calder Street, Govanhill, Glasgow. The informant was the child’s father, William McIntyre, who was entered as present, on 4th December at Glasgow.
Stanley, as he was known in the family, served in the Far East during World War II and was permanently traumatised by a period of captivity in a
Japanese Prisoner of War Camp in Burma. The above somewhat rudimentary greetings card dates to this time.
The mystery of Stanley’s disappearance following emigration to Australia in 1948 weighed heavily upon his younger
brother Norman as the years became decades and in 1987 he made a determined but unsuccessful attempt to find out
what had happened. A response was received from the Salvation Army:
THE SALVATION ARMY SOCIAL SERVICES
INVESTIGATION DEPARTMENT
110-112 MIDDLESEX STREET, LONDON E1 7HZOUR REF 584/3538 B
19 March 1987
Mr. Norman D. McIntyre
68 Canford Road, Wallisdown
BOURNEMOUTH
DorsetDear Mr. McIntyre
We are sorry to have to tell you that in spite of very extensive enquiries our colleagues in Tasmania and Australia have been unable to locate your brother, Mr. Frederick Stanley McIntyre.
We realise how very disappointed you till (sic) be, but would assure you that everything possible has been done.
There are no further leads open for us to follow and regretfully we must now close the file.
Muriel E. Cox
Major Mrs.
for
Colin Fairclough, Major
Investigation Secretary
Handwritten on the back of the above typewritten letter is a letter written by Norman to Eba in a hand which is appreciably shakier than it had been forty-odd years before:
23rd APR. 87 Dear Eba,
As you can see, after an 18 months search for Stan theres no dice.
He was a very rough, tough boy, and in late ’46, he was still in “BURMA condition” very friendly to me and Mum and no more the only ones there were no holding him in.
I remember when travelling from East Kilbride to VIC Rd. in a very crowded bus, he put his fist thru an upper deck window!
I used to walk him over the Sheughans to Balmaha, but I could never tire the bugger out “Where we gaun noo?” he’d say and we’d strike for ROWARDENNAN.
And fights? He never willingly got me into fights, but at least once per night and with no choice, I was embroiled in one, usually with 3 or 4 involved, and he used to go straight in, fists flying. I used to “piss myself” laughing when he turned to me, all 4 on the deck, and say like Alan Breck in “KIDNAPPED” MAN, AM I NO A BONNIE FECHTER?
Up at the Baths, there were always a couple of lorries revving-up full blast, and he’d walk up to the drivers and say “You’re only wasting guid petrol, yuh bluddy neds ye!”
That was Stan. Left in APRIL ’48 on EMPIRE BRENT for OZ!
A tougher man there never was. How in hell did he survive in that CARLEY FLOAT hundreds of miles in shark-infested waters? On his way to FREETOWN.
Because he was as rugged as teak and as good as gold, and he loved you, Eba, Mum, Ian, Don and Ted.
As honest as the day was long!
P.S. I no longer have that photo taken in NAIROBI with Stan.
Sincerely,
NORM.
There matters rested until a recently-discovered distant Australian cousin kindly consulted
ancestry.com.au on our behalf and was able to find
confirmation that Frederick Stanley McIntyre did indeed arrive in Melbourne, in the State of Victoria, on board the
Empire Brent, having departed from 199, Calder Street, Glasgow. He was entered as a general labourer. This
appears to be the voyage referred to by Peter Plowman, in Australian Migrant Ships 1946 - 1977, p. 72.
According to this source, the Empire Brent sailed from Glasgow on 31st March 1948, arriving at
Melbourne on 7th May.
The SS Empire Brent in 1948
The Australian Electoral Roll for 1949 lists Fredrick Stanley McIntyre as resident in North Yallourn, in the
Sub-District of Wonthaggi, Victoria, occupation ‘trimmer’. This appears to signify a coal or bunker trimmer, who
cleaned the coal bunkers.
Yallourn was a company town whose entire life span was just sixty years, from the 1920s until 1983. It was built
between the 1920s and 1950s to house employees of the State Electricity Commission of Victoria, which operated the
nearby Yallourn Power Station complex. The town was demolished between 1968 and 1983 to make way for further mining.
Our relation also succeeded in locating two newspaper articles. The first of these, Barrier Miner (Broken Hill,
New South Wales), Friday, 9th October 1953, p. 3, reads:
GAOLED FOR VAGRANCY A 34-years-old man who pleaded guilty to a charge of having had insufficient lawful means of support, was sentenced to 14 days’ imprisonment by Mr. W. H. Hall, S.M., in the Court of Petty Sessions today.
The man, Fredrick Stanley McIntyre, was found sleeping in a shed at Sturt Park early this morning.
Constable J. Maguire said that McIntyre had 3d. in his possession and had no other clothes or possessions.
Witness said that defendant arrived here yesterday from Mildura and admitted having worked only two days in the last three weeks.
A brief and untitled item in the Barrier Daily Truth (Broken Hill, New South Wales), Saturday, 10th October 1953, p. 6, provides additional details:
In the Court of Petty Sessions yesterday, Fredrick Stanley McIntyre, a 34-year-old labourer, was sentenced to 14 days’ imprisonment with hard labor for having insufficient lawfl (sic) means of support.
This indicated that Stan was still alive in 1953, more than five years after his arrival in Australia. It seems
that, for reasons of his own, he made the conscious decision to turn his back on his family. Perhaps he was waiting
until he had some good news to send. Most likely, that good news never came.
There the trail went dead and what became of Uncle Stan remained absolutely mysterious until the breakthrough
discovery, courtesy of
Find a Grave,
on 14th November 2021, which, coincidentally, would have been his birthday, of information relating to
his burial; too late, unfortunately, for his sister or brothers to be informed. This pointed the way to his death
certificate, which established that Frederick Stanley McIntyre had died on 4th November 1970, in the
Royal Derwent
Hospital, New Norfolk, Tasmania. Notice in particular the ominous statement:
The Hospital was created to provide in-patient treatment and rehabilitation of mentally ill and mentally handicapped persons, including treatment of alcoholics.
The Royal Derwent Hospital was also given as his usual place of residence. The certificate additionally disclosed
that Stan never married. The death was registered on 7th November 1970.
The deceased’s parents were entered as unknown but since his date of birth was correctly given as 14th
November 1918, his place of birth as Scotland and his period of residency in Australia as 22 years, it is taken,
beyond all reasonable doubt, that the essential questions surrounding Stan’s disappearance have now been resolved.
An Inquest Form 1A (Ref: SC195-1-122-341-70) signed by Jack Glover, Esq., Coroner, on 6th November
1970, archived as part of Libraries Tasmania’s online collection, discloses the following further particulars. Frederick
Stanley McIntyre had been admitted to the Royal Derwent Hospital on 22nd January 1970 and was a patient
in Ward 1 at the time of his demise.
A Medical Certificate issued by Dr. Oberlin-Harris revealed the causes of death as cerebral haemorrhage, pre-senile
dementia and chronic alcoholism.
The Coroner, sitting without a jury, ruled that the deceased had died of natural causes and that no further
enquiries were necessary.