On 3 March 1915, at the age of fifty-one, Doctor Bond gave up his medical practice at Bruthen and applied for a Commission in the Australian Army Medical Corps. He received a civic send-off, with an evening of music and speeches at the Bruthen Mechanics Hall. An appreciative community presented him with a pair of field glasses and a coin case.

 

Francis Bond was born at Fortitude Valley in Queensland to Augustus Salmond Bond and Jane Bond. He attended Scotch College in Melbourne before studying medicine in England. A widower with three sons (Clive, Charles and Frank), all of whom served in World War 1, and a daughter (Dorothy), Bond embarked on the Ajana on 4 June 1915 with the rank of Captain.

 

Doctor Bond served at Gallipoli before falling ill and being transferred to hospital at Gibraltar on 7 November 1915. When well enough to travel, he was sent to England for ‘investigation’ where he was diagnosed with cancer of the stomach and liver.

 

In February 1916 Captain Bond embarked for Melbourne on the hospital ship Nestor, a painful voyage, during which he had to have injections of morphine to ease his pain. The ship berthed on 13 March, but just a few weeks later, he suffered a heart attack and died at the 5th Australian General Hospital in Melbourne.