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Boucaut now held the party together and they travelled at the slower teams’ pace: it took eleven more days for
the party to reach Alice Springs.
Flint’s movements are not known for the next few years. Official records indicate that he was an assistant
operator from 11 September 1871 to 31 August 1873, and that he was then appointed an operator for the next five
years. It is possible that he travelled north to Barrow Creek early in 1872 and that this was his place of appointment.
He was there in August 1872, at which time Sir Charles Todd (who had been on overall charge of the construction
of the Overland Telegraph Line) visited. As Todd remained at the telegraph station for three weeks, he came to
know Flint quite well—as he did the other men also.
Flint was also present at Barrow Creek when on 23 February 1874 the local Aborigines attacked the station.
The men were caught unawares when, having completed their evening meal, they were sitting outside listening to
Stapleton (one of the officers) playing a violin.
F J Gillen recorded the outline details as follows: ‘The staff seeing the natives approaching fully armed... ran...
in the opposite direction, hoping to reach the gateway—which they found guarded by armed blacks. There was
no alternative but to make a rush for the gate and this they did while the cruel spears were thrust at them from a
distance of a few feet. Frank reached the kitchen door only to fall pierced through the heart by a spear, Stapleton
received a spear in the groin and lived a few brief hours knowing that he was mortally wounded; he had a wife
and bairns in Adelaide and to me as an operator in the Adelaide office fell the painful duty of conducting a
telegraphic conversation between the dying man at the Barrow and his heartbroken wife in Adelaide. Flint the
assistant received a severe spear wound in the thigh.’
Flint sent the message of the attack, then Stapleton sent a last message to his wife, dying as he concluded it: all
of the able-bodied men prepared themselves for other possible attacks, which never came. In the ruthless reprisals
by telegraph line staff and bushmen, Flint took no part because of his severe wound.
On 1 January 1879 Flint was appointed Stationmaster, and his salary jumped from 120 Pounds per annum to
200 Pounds. This was a good salary for the times, and the responsibility of his position automatically meant that
he was appointed Justice of the Peace too. Flint, only 20 years of age at the time of the Barrow Creek attack, was
evidently capable and efficient to be appointed Stationmaster at 25 years of age; most other men in positions of
lesser authority can reasonably be assumed to have been older than him, yet there is no indication that he was other
than respected and got the best out of people with whom he associated. This is emphasised by the fact that, within
a year of his initial appointment as Stationmaster (possibly at Barrow Creek), he was appointed Stationmaster at
Alice Springs. As the station at Alice Springs was the key central station on the Overland Telegraph Line, Flint was
service officer with responsibilities for the maintenance of the line and facilities and the general well-being of the
staff, for some 400 kilometres north and south. His salary was increased to 270 Pounds per annum, and it seems
likely that, if not the youngest, he was certainly one of the youngest officers to be given such a senior position of
authority.
For the next 8 years he remained Stationmaster in charge of Alice Springs Overland Telegraph Station,
and during this time his interest in stock became apparent. It is possible that he personally led the search for
better-watered and well-grassed areas to allow the telegraph station stock a chance of survival during the drought
years 1884–85. A large mob of sheep was moved some 40 kilometres north to Painta Springs and it is probable that
Flint Spring, 15 kilometres north of the telegraph station, was named after him and was also used at this time.
In 1886, in response to a request from the Government Resident at Palmerston, Flint sent information about the
numbers of cattle, horses, goats and sheep in Central Australia. In addition he commented on the non-Aboriginal
population, agricultural difficulties, problems caused by uncertain rainfall and potential for a viable horse-breeding
industry. The Government Resident commended Flint for having ‘cordially responded’ to his request, and for
having provided a ‘valuable and complete report of the stock depastured and the general prospects of pastoral
occupations in the southern stations’.
Such activities—the overall running of the southern section of the Overland Telegraph Line and regular
reports—were the more mundane aspects of Flint’s life. Friends had died but he had survived and learned to work
with the country—as his brief comments on rainfall and stock movements suggest. His last great adventure took
place in 1882 at the age of 28 In that year he obtained special leave from his overland telegraph station work to
lead an exploring party east. Constable Shirley, a relative ‘new-chum’ to Central Australia, was a member of the
party; his experience in travelling the north-western portion of what was to become known as the Simpson Desert
sadly did not assist him when, a short time later, he and five others of the party of six perished far to the north of the
Alice. Only a map appears to have survived from this expedition. Although Barclay, Winnecke and Scarr had all
been involved in survey exploration of the general area, Flint led his party more directly east to the general vicinity
of the Plenty River before turning back. That he used an Aboriginal guide for part of the journey is known and, on
the basis of a limited number of Aboriginal place-names, it appears that he also contacted Aborigines and made use
of their knowledge. It was a journey that can reasonably be described as one of minor explorations into an area of
which parts were still unknown to Europeans; it is a pity that the journal has not survived.
In 1887, at 33 years of age, newly married and in the respected position of Senior Station Officer at the
Alice Springs Overland Telegraph Station, Flint contracted rheumatic fever. He died and was buried at the small
telegraph station cemetery one year before the township of Alice Springs (or Stuart Town as it was initially known)
was surveyed and building commenced.
Although so few references to him exist, and no photographs of him are known, he epitomises the early
dedicated Europeans who did their best to ensure that Central Australia was a region worthy of positive recognition
by the rest of Australia.