Thanks for the information on William Shields. I think the prison records are for him but I don't know when or where he died. His son came to Australia and apparently didn't have much if any contact with his family. My mother says that when her father had a few too many to drink he would want to go back to Ireland but my mother remembers her mother saying that he couldn't go back "or they would get him". Makes me wonder what he was up too before coming to Australia, ie did he desert again or was he Irish Brotherhood, or maybe IRA, he was a very staunch catholic There was never a reason given for this but I did find a prison record for him in 1915 for deserting the Connaught Rangers. My mother told me that her father, the son of the above William, had a severe head injury in the first world war and that he had a plate in his head which affected his eyesight in one eye and also affected him, again when he had too much to drink.