ACT Heritage Library Manuscript Collection

HMSS 0321 Noone Family Papers

James Murray Noone and his wife, Margaret, nee White, were were early settlers in the Tidbinbilla district. Three of their sons, Ted, Jim and Jack, served in the Australian Army in World War I.  All three are memorialised on the ACT Memorial. 

Michael Noone, son of Jack Noone, provided family information to support the ACT Memorial entries. 

Edward (Ted) Murray Noone, was one of three brothers, originally from Tidbinbilla, who served in World War I. After completing his schooling at St. Patrick's in Goulburn he became a teacher at Forbes and Newcastle and then moved to Sydney to pursue a career as a journalist with The Catholic Weekly. Noone also worked as a staff reporter with the Daily Telegraph and, at the time he enlisted in April 1916, he was Sporting Editor at the Daily Telegraph. He served with the 15th Field Company Engineers in France and Belgium from April 1917 (at Bullecourt, Polygon Wood and Villers-Bretonneux) and was appointed as a Lance Corporal in March 1918. Noone received a gun shot wound to the shoulder and chest on 29 August 1918 near Peronne. He returned to Australia in August 1919 and was discharged on 11 December 1919. After the war he purchased ‘London Bridge’ near Burra with his brothers Hubert and Jim but they sold it in 1928. He married Rose Marlan and purchased ‘Fairfield’ near Inverell where they raised four children. After the death of his wife Noone retired to a small farm near Tingha where he died on 9 August 1980 aged 91.

James (Jim) Murray Noone was working as a Customs Officer in Sydney when he enlisted in April 1916 and served with the 15th Field Company Engineers in France and Belgium from April 1917 at Bullecourt and Polygon Wood where, in September 1917, he earned the Military Medal. In February 1918 he attended the Officers Cadet School in the UK and was appointed a Lieutenant in November 1918. During 1919 he attended college in Edinburgh before his appointment was terminated in November 1919. He joined his brothers Ted and Hubert in partnership at ‘London Bridge’ near Burra but they sold the property in 1928. He then became a real estate agent and, in the late 1920s, formed a partnership with Leslie Joseph Tingyou (later LJ Hooker) before eventually retiring to Tweed Heads. Noone died in 1985 aged 92 years. He was reputedly the author of a poem called ‘Sunny Jim’ about a mate who was killed near Ypres, published in the Queanbeyan Age 28 December 1917.

John (Jack) Noone served in France from July 1917 with the 3rd Division Trench Mortar Battery as a Gunner before transferring to the 108th Howitzer Battery of the 8th Field Artillery Brigade in April 1918. Between March and December 1919 he attended the School of Architecture in Liverpool and Bedford Square in London. He returned to Australia in February 1920 to be discharged. After the war he purchased ‘London Bridge’ near Burra with his brother Ted, but they sold it in 1928. He died in Sydney in August 1952 and is buried in the Eastern Suburbs Memorial Park.

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