History also tells us that during the 1850’s, in Australia, people from all walks of life were abandoning their jobs to rush to the goldfields seeking their fortunes. Because of staff losses in the rural sector, the large agricultural companies in Australia advertised in England and Germany for workers to come to Australia and work for them under contract. Young, enterprising people in Germany who were becoming tired of the conditions at the time, no doubt would have accepted the challenge to emigrate to Australia, with the hope of a better future.
The arrival of Conrad and Louisa in Australia was just ten years after the beginning of the Gold Rush period. There was a great need for shepherds as there were no fences on the runs. However, within just a few years, shepherds were no longer needed, as one significant discovery of the 1860’s and 1870’s was the use of the fence (fencing wire was invented in 1859). The opportunity to purchase land, as in “Slatey Gully”, certainly would have appealed to Conrad in 1874. The First Selections Act of NSW, 1861, attempting to put small farmers on the land, made it easier for purchasing land.
(Sources: World Encyclopedia ‘Hamburg Emigration’, State Archives)