1955 Holden FJ

A single gun shot, the tragic death of an only child & heart break that was hidden in a Gundagai barn for almost 30years.
It sound like the story line from a crime novel but this story came into my life in the most unexpected way when I bought a rare 1955 Holden FJ Ute.
The FJ is part of Australian motoring history and something I’d always wanted to own, for me it symbolised the Australian dream, freedom and the coming of age in Australian manufacturing.
Peter Prentice was the bloke I had bought the car from and he told me the vehicle was from a farm in the Gundagai area & was kept in a shed for 30 odd years. He’d bought the car and had plans to restore but it had remained in his own farm shed for another 15 years. The day we brought it home on a trailer was very special, days later we connected some makeshift parts and had it running. I would spend next three years hand restoring this iconic Australian car and thought it would be great to track down some of its history.
Reaching out to the community of Gundagai I was surprised to receive a late night call from local Larry Foster. He remembered the green Holden Ute being owned by the Gundagai Shire President, Owen Edward Hume Vincent. Owen was a proud, well respected, hard working man who’s family name has connections within the community including a local sports oval dedicated to him. He and his wife Adeline also ran the Post office and telephone exchange from the 1830’s family built home called “Stonelea” in Wambidgee just 30km outside of Gundagai. The family would use the Ute to collect the mail from the train station and return home so locals could come and collect. The trusty FJ served the family well while also working on the family farm for ten years. Larry then told of how one day the Ute was mysteriously parked in a farm shed and left for decades.
Larry told of how Owens only son Geoffrey then 19 took the Ute for a drive with a friend & the farm dogs in tow. He often took the Ute out to check the farm and always had a rifle ready for shooting foxes.
At some stage during this days adventure a gun was knocked over in the rear of the car and a shot rang out , Geoffrey was killed & died in the cabin.
He also told of the overwhelming grief that took over the family, parking the ute in a hay shed totally surrounded by bales shielding their eyes from a memory and heart break that gripped Geoffrey’s parents for the rest of their lives
“So if your ute is the one previously owned by the Vincent family it would have a bullet hole through the rear drivers side cab,” Larry suggested.

It had been four years since I began restoring the vehicle but I do remember picking up bullet shell casings out of the rear tray area and repairing what I though was a bullet hole with a flexible filler. Bullets and holes were nothing unusual for farm utes of that era as many were used as paddock bashers, only to finish their lives target practice under a tree somewhere as they finally rusted their way back into the earth so I hadn’t thought of the significance of these items at the time.
I finished the late night call with Larry, raced out to the garage, flipped back the covers and looked behind the drivers seat. The bullet hole is there! I dug at my repair with a knife and revealed a perfect bullet hole, no doubt about it.
I messaged Larry a picture of the hole and the ute at which he replied with a surprised emoji! Had I really bought a car in which a young man past away? Could this car really be significant in the history of a town and the Vincent family? Larry flicked me an image of what he believed was the ute outside The Coolac hotel in 1965, parked under a tree with shearer’s drinking on the verandah and I flicked him pictures of the words Coolac/Gundagai that can be seen under the original paint on the driver side.
My resolve to dig further into the history only deepened from here and with the help of friends I manage to track down many locals and family members who confirmed the same story. The Gundagai mayor Abb McCalister, the current owner of Stonlea Ian Bone & many many others confirmed the story while Peter Coggan a friend of Geoffrey’s also remembers riding & shooting in the Ute.
I eventually connected with John Vincent the first cousin of deceased Geoffrey and bizarrely I had worked with his wife Liz while I had been a cadet photographer at the local paper. John had moved from Gundagai in 1959 and now lives only 10minutes from my family home.
John and I met and he added even more details to the story.
“Geoffrey was the apple of his fathers eye, the Vincent child destined to continue the family name and inherit the property, he ate tomato sauce sandwiches and loved shooting, it may have been the familiarity with these weapons that saw it loaded on a bipod in the rear of the vehicle” he said. “The boys, Geoffrey 19 and a friend did indeed take the Ute out with the dogs on the 23rd January 1965 and it was late in the afternoon, they were stopped when the incident happened.” “Geoffs friend standing on the passenger side as Geoffrey whistled the dogs back into the Ute” “Geoffrey was half way into the drivers door as the dogs knocked over the gun and the rifle fired through the back of the seat and into Geoffrey’s kidney or lower chest region”
This happened around 2km from the family home in a remote paddock and you can only imagine that in the time it would take to get back to the homestead for emergency help poor Geoffrey had bled out in the front seat.
This may also be the reason for the vehicle having not having the original bench seat inside when I purchased the car.
After this event John told of the ute being buried deep inside the hay shed. He believes its highly likely it may have gone for decades without new property owners even knowing the vehicle was behind those bales. This was confirmed by Peter Prentice, who bought the car from Gundagai and recalls the family he purchased from had no idea the vehicle was behind there till a month or so before it was sold.

Local librarian Cindy helped to uncover police and local media reports. The Gundagai Independent reported two days after the accident on its front page “Tragic death of Gundagai shire presidents son” “Geoff Vincent victim of shooting accident” the article suggested the accident happened at 7.30 pm as the boys were returning from fox shooting and the dogs did trigger the loaded gun that had its muzzle pointing towards the drivers cabin. Geoff was shot as he was getting into the ute but seemed to have fallen out of the vehicle and his poor friend had to bundle his injured mate into the car as he frantically raced for help. As if this scenario wasn’t tragic enough Owen Vincent was already fighting his own medical issues and was a patient at Gundagai hospital. His only son Geoffrey was pronounced dead and the devastating news was delivered to him in his own hospital bed. The death report prepared by then coroner Ian Hickson reads “Geoffrey died from a bullet wound to the right lung received when a rifle in the rear of the utility accidentally discharged”
Media reports went on to detail how Geoff was a likeable young lad who enjoyed his cricket and shooting, the game scheduled to be played that weekend was abandoned as a sign of respect.

I think in life things happen for a reason, why had I resisted doing a full restoration of the vehicles exterior? Why had I not welded up the bullet hole in the drivers cabin? and how fortuitous is finding the closest surviving relative only 10km from where I currently live.
For me every bump, dent and rusty scratch on the exterior of the FJ will serve as a reminder of an unlucky scenario and two families pain. I’m glad the Ute was hidden and inadvertently protected from the weather, surrounded by hay in the shed and I will endeavour to drive it with the pride and respect it deserves, hopefully handing it onto my own son where it can begin to write another family story all over again.
I will get the FJ back to Gundagai & Coolac soon, re visit the pubs and places it had worked and share the yarn about the less famous Gundagai dog that created history over a beer or three with locals

The Ute has been restored using all the original parts and only modifications are for safety, seatbelts, indicators and 12volt power.