Mills, Charles (1877 - 1963)

Charles Mills (1877-1963), soldier, businessman and pastoralist, was born on 3 December 1877 at Charters Towers, Queensland, second son of Thomas Mills, English-born pioneer of the Charters Towers and Gympie goldfields, and his Scottish wife Elizabeth, née Buchanan. After education in England at Alleyn's College of God's Gift (Dulwich College) and Hollesly Bay Agricultural College, Mills worked as a jackeroo at Michael Studholme's property Waimate, near Canterbury, New Zealand, and for Robert Gray at Hughenden, North Queensland. In 1907 he married Maud Elsie Jane, daughter of Albert Duckett White of Bluff Downs, and later that year moved to Panshanger, the historic Tasmanian property near Longford built by Joseph Archer, acquired for him by his father.