People Australia

John Loyola, 1900 [second from right]

from Worker (Brisbane), 22 December 1900

John ‘Jack’ Loyola (c.1873-1909+)  jockey, shearer, hairdresser and gaoled trade unionist 

Birth: c.1873 in New South Wales. Marriage: ? to Jessie about 1900. Death: unknown. Religion: Catholic. 

• Arrived overland in Queensland in 1882 with his parents and was brought up in Blackall, becoming well-known as a boy jockey. By 1891 he was working as a labourer around Barcaldine and was an early delegate of the Queensland branch of the Australian Workers Union.
• He was working as a shearer, a mate of Dave Bowes, when he was arrested in July 1894 and charged with intimidation at Oodooroo station. Released without charge on 13 July he is said to have crossed into New South Wales.
• Back in Queensland in 1896, when he was in business as a hairdresser and tobacconist at Longreach, he was re-arrested on 13 March and charged with burning down the Ayrshire Downs woolshed on 3 July 1894. Convicted on dubious evidence at the District Court Rockhampton on 8 June 1896 he was sentenced by judge Granville George Miller to 10 years penal servitude. Sent to Boggo Road gaol at first, he served most of his sentence in St Helena island prison, in Moreton Bay.
• Prison records describe him as a native of New South Wales, aged 23, able to read and write, of stout build, weighing 10 stone 7 lbs (66.7 kg) 5 feet 5 ½ inches (166 cm) tall, with a dark complexion, dark hair and brown eyes.
• According to Martin, in gaol Loyola “stuck to barbering but later on developed into the driver of the coach that attends the steamers, with the custody of the stables and fowls. What he doesn’t know about eggs isn’t worth learning.”
• He weighed 10 stone 7 lbs (66.68 kg) on admission. On his discharge by special remission on 14 December 1900 on proclamation of the Commonwealth, he was 11 stone 6 lbs (72.57 kg) [Maybe it was due to the eggs?].
• On release the four men received from the Union Prisoners’ Defence fund a total of £103 13 shillings, which was divided among them.
• Loyola returned to work as a hairdresser and tobacconist in Longreach, where he was a member of the hospital committee in 1904.
• Nothing known of him after 1909.

Sources
Prison record, 1896-1900, Queensland State Archives, ITM92278, DR 23440, p 144; Wises’ Post Office Directory for Queensland, 1902-1909; Queensland Electoral Rolls, 1903 & 1905; Stuart Svensen, The Shearers' War: the story of the 1891 shearers' strike (Brisbane, 1989).