Lake Placid Monument

A small stone memorial cairn on the southern side of Lake Placid Road at Lake Placid, near the Barron River, which commemorates the opening of the Smith and Douglas Tracks.

Transcript of the inscription on Tom Volkman’s monument, Lake Placid Road
1988 Mulgrave Shire Bicentennial Project.

On 13 August 1988, when Mulgrave Shire Council re-dedicated the Smithfield Cemetery as part of their Bicentennial commemorations, Mulgrave Shire mayor, Tom Pyne, and Tom Volkman, unveiled a plaque at Lake Placid Road, Caravonica, near the spot where the Smith and Douglas Tracks crossed the Barron River.

Tom Volkman.

Tom Volkman incorrectly claimed that he was a descendant of the Smithfield pioneer, Old Bill Smith, and that Smith was his maternal great-uncle. However, Volkman's great-uncle was not the William Smith who arrived in Australia in 1850, died by suicide in 1877 and was buried in Smithfield,1 but a different William Smith who arrived in Australia in 1863, died in 1879 and was buried in Thornborough.2

Volkman was born in 1918 and died in 1989.3 His parents were Anne Eliza Cummings4 and Thomas Paul Volkman,5 who got married in 1914 at Thornborough.6 Tom was their only child.

Anne Cummings' parents were Anne Eliza Smith,7 and Joseph Cummings.8 Anne, Joseph, and Anne's brother William Smith, came to Queensland from Liverpool in 1863 as assisted migrants aboard the S.S. Rockhampton.9 Ten days after arriving, Joseph and Anne got married in the temporary Church of England building at Rockhampton.10 William Smith and another passenger from the immigrant ship, Margaret Murphy, were the witnesses.11

Anne and William Smith's parents were Christiana Coe and Charles Smith, whereas Old Bill Smith of Smithfield's parents were Mary (or Marian) Martin and Henry (or William) Smith.12 Whether there was any family connection between Anne Smith and 'Old Bill Smith', the Smithfield pioneer, has not been established, but Old Bill Smith was not Tom Volkman's maternal great-uncle.

William Smith's grave, Thornborough Cemetery, 1879
This is the grave of Tom Volkman's great uncle.

• ^1. William Smith, died Smithfield 26 December 1877, Queensland death certificate 1879/C359. ↩

• ^2. William Smith, died Thornborough 29 September 1879. ↩

• ^3. Thomas Joseph Volkman, born Thornborough, 5 August 1918, Queensland birth certificate 1918/C8561, died Mareeba, 28 May 1989, Queensland death certificate 1989/54080. ↩

• ^4. Annie Eliza Cummings, born Rockhampton, 10 May 1874, Queensland birth certificate 1874/C3198, died Mareeba, 3 June 1945, Queensland death certificate 1945/C1546. ↩

• ^5. Thomas Paul Volkman, born Brisbane, 4 March 1877, Queensland birth certificate 1877/C20146, died Mareeba, 19 June 1961, Queensland death certificate 1961/C1735. ↩

• ^6. Thomas Paul Volkman married Annie Eliza Cummings at Thornborough on 27 May 1914, Queensland marriage certificate 1914/C1386. ↩

• ^7. Anne/Annie Eliza Smith, born 1840 to Christiana (nee Coe) and Charles Smith, died  Thornborough 27 November 1916, aged 76, Queensland death certificate 1916/C294, and buried in the Cummings Family plot at Thornborough Cemetery. ↩

• ^8. Joseph Cummings, born Great Britain, 17 June 1839, arrived in Australia as an assisted migrant on the S.S. Rockhampton on 13 October 1863, died Thornborough, 14 August 1912, Queensland death certificate 1912/C1723. ↩

• ^9. 'The Immigrant Ship Rockhapmton', The Courier, [Brisbane], Friday 23 October 1863: 2. ↩

• ^10. Joseph Cummings married Anne Eliza Smith in Rockhampton on 23 October 1863, Queensland marriage certificate 1863/C294. ↩

• ^11. Registers of immigrant ships’ arrivals in Queensland ports as kept and used by the Immigration Department from 1848 to 1912, Queensland State Archives. ↩

• ^12. Old Bill Smith of Smithfield married Mary McKee in Cooktown in 1875, where he listed his date of birth as 1833 and his parents as Henry Smith and Mary Martin. On his death certificate, his details, provided by his widow, listed his date of birth as 1822 and his parents as Mary Martin and William Smith. ↩