The watch!

Here's my paternal great-grandfather, Francis Gersbach, known to us as Pargie. He's so dapper! 

Mention of his name always elicited the same response - "Oh, he was a lovely (old) man". This wasn't only from my Dad and his sister, Pat, but my Mum, her Mum and even Mum's friends. Everyone knew him well as he shared a home with my paternal grandparents, worked in the family grocery business with my grandfather and was never short of a story. He was responsible for carving the Sunday roast and did it with great precision, I'm told. 

Pargie died six years before I was born but I've always felt close to him. He was on a bus from Neutral Bay to Crows Nest to exchange a suit that he'd purchased earlier in the day when he had a heart attack and died shortly after. He was eight-six. 

From the inscription, Pargie was wearing the watch in the photo. He was surely wearing it on that fateful bus journey in 1947 as he was always well dressed.

The inscription reads-

"Presented to F. Gersbach Esq. J.P. by the Labour (sic) Movement  of Annandale in recognition of his services as Hon Secretary 1913 Campaign"

The election, on 6 December 1913, was for all ninety seats in the NSW Legislative Council. William Holman was returned as the Labor Premier. The Labor Party won three additional seats including Annandale where Arthur Griffith defeated Albert Bruntnell, Liberal Reform Party.

A search of Trove showed Pargie was active in the Labor movement in the first half of the decade:-

  • January 1911 - Pargie nominated (unsuccessfully) as a Labor candidate for Annandale Municipal elections (1)
  • April 1912 - Pargie was an applicant who appeared before the NSW Industrial Registrar in respect of the Shop Assistants' (Metropolitan Retail Grocers) Award (2)
  • May 1914 - Pargie was one of 846 new "gentleman" appointed as NSW Justices of the Peace (3)
  • April 1916 - Pargie was appointed was the Returning Officer for the Electoral District of Annandale (4)
Pargie's first task as Returning Officer for Annandale was in the 1916 Referendum which saw NSW hotel closing times taken back to 6.00pm from 11.00pm. His second and final task as Returning Officer was in the 1917 NSW State Elections.


The family's life changed tragically when his only son, Francis, returned from the First World War as an invalid. He died shortly after in April 1919 with pneumonic influenza. Ten weeks later, Pargie's wife of thirty four years, Margaret Killion, was another victim of the "Spanish Flu".      

That was the end of Pargie's formal association with the Labor Party and involvement with politics. How many times did Pargie look at the watch and think what might have been....


This blogpost has been written as part of a challenge for SAGs "Blogger for DNA Enthusiasts".