With income from his position as Postmaster-General, TLM-P was able once again to afford a grazing property. In November 1864, after selling other property/properties, he acquired the 20,000-acre Melcombe property, close to his old property of Bromelton. With its new name Maroon, it would become home to four generations of Murray-Priors.

Maroon is near Beaudesert in the Logan district, south-west Queensland. Mt Lindesay was on Maroon's south boundary. It was country belonging to the Yuggerabul (or Yugarapul or Ugarapul) indigenous group.¹⁾ Evidence of a rock shelter dates their occupation at least back to 1300 BC.²⁾ By 1864 the indigenous owners had been dispossessed and largely decimated though 'tension' continued until the 1880s.³⁾ Originally, the property name was spelt Marroon. Rosa Praed thought the name could be a corruption of the indigenous name for iguana - murrun - due to a legend that an imposing local mountain was created after a girl ate one against tribal rules.⁴⁾ She described Maroon in a number of her books, including as the Doondi station in her novel The Head Station. As Patricia Clarke described it, Maroon had rich river flats but in its outer reaches 'the imposing Mounts Maroon, Barney, Ballow and Clunie overlooked wild, thickly timbered rainforest, rocky gorges and ravines, crater lakes, waterfalls, and rugged scrub country.'^{5) 6)}

The following map from Collin Pfeffer's well-researched The Fassifern Story shows Maroon and adjoining properties.
⁷⁾

When TLM-P bought Maroon, the area was sparsely settled. Rosa Praed recalled that the family went via Ipswich (then the nearest town), and had to hack their way through the Dugandan Scrub to reach their new home.⁸⁾ TLM-P paid £3,000 for Maroon and £1,200 for another property, Heads of Logan. The latter was located between Maroon and his eastern neighbour Telemon: TLM-P incorporated it into Maroon station. Maroon came with 110 cattle, 12 horses and some working bullocks, while Heads of Logan carried 600 cattle and 7 horses.⁹⁾ TLM-P used Maroon for cattle and also imported horses to form a stud there.¹⁰⁾

His timing was unfortunate. TLM-P bought just in time for a prolonged drought. As well, a little over a year after his purchase, the British financial turmoil of 1866 restricted colonial investment and caused a recession.¹¹⁾ Maroon satisfied his desire for land, and provided a rich source for Rosa when writing about Australia, but never bought easy prosperity. It is notable too, that TLM-P acquired it from the Bank of Australasia after the previous owner forfeited it.¹²⁾

TLM-P and Matilda had enough money left over to build a new, red-cedar lined, large home. The 1871 census recorded Maroon as having two houses with 20 people living there, so presumably the original homestead became the workers' quarters.¹³⁾ By 1880, the local council's rate book valued the buildings at £52.10.¹⁴⁾ As with all such properties, there were quarters for the employees, stores for meat and other goods, and workshops. The local Fassifern Guardian described it as one of Queensland's 'most historic homesteads', with 'walls of locally dressed cedar, its impressive fireplaces of Ipswich limestone slabs and its shingle roof'.¹⁵⁾ Maroon by this stage was more like a small village. TLM-P's children, his grandchildren, neighbours and relatives lived there and/or visited. As well, there were employees and their families. The result, Nora wrote to Rosa in 1881, no-one could 'go around a corner … without tumbling over a child'¹⁶⁾

An undated photograph of the drawing room at Maroon.to re do¹⁷⁾ The player piano remains in the family, along with the large painting of TLM-P's father, two of the ornamental vases on the mantelpiece, and the three swords and battleaxe hanging on the wall.¹⁸⁾

A threat to Maroon's viability from the late nineteenth century was the spread of the exotic plant, prickly pear. It was not effectively contained until the mid-1920s with the introduction of cactoblastis.¹⁹⁾

TLM-P's love of art means that we have a number of paintings of and around Maroon. These two are by artist George Hart Taylor²⁰⁾ There are other smaller paintings of the local area by Taylor in the M-P Papers in the Mitchell Library, Sydney.
For more paintings of and around Maroon, click on landscapes.

For sketches of Maroon by an unknown person/s, click on sketches.

The following photos of Maroon homestead was probably taken in the 1910s when TLM-P's grandson Thomas B. M-P, his wife Lizzie and their family lived there.²¹⁾

The next photo comes with the information that it is Lizzie and her young son Thomas at Maroon with the Governor's daughter, c. 1914-15. The most likely candidate is that the governor in question was Sir Hamilton John Goold-Adams as he married in 1911 and had two children. He arrived in Queensland to take up his appointment as Governor of Queensland in March 1915, and left in 1920. From the look on the children's faces, they did not appreciate having to hold hands and stay still for the photograph.²²⁾

An undated photo of Maroon.²³⁾

A copy of the 1914 subdivision sale poster from Collin Pfeffer, The Fassifern Story: a history of Boonah Shire and its surroundings²⁴⁾

This photo from Collin Pfeffer, The Fassifern Story: a history of Boonah Shire and its surroundings²⁵⁾ is of Maroon c.1920, shortly after T.B. M-P sold the property.

An account book for Maroon c.1865-72 has been donated to the ML.

Note: the Beaudesert Museum has numerous holdings relating to the Murray-Prior family, see https://beaudesertmuseum.org.au