The Cozens/Byrnes Merchants Networks Project - Updated 27 March 2012

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This file is devoted to presenting basic Timeline information for website readers. The items are often sketchy, and some have been extracted from other websites managed by Dan Byrnes. These Timelines will be added to intermittently, as new data and new e-mail arrives. Book titles will be entered according to the timeframes they treat. -Ed

For 1890++

This is file Timelines18 - To go to the next file in this Merchant Networks Timelines series of files, click Timelines19

Reference items

1889: Re Boyd Dunlop Morehead (1843-1905). (He is son2. Mowle's Genealogy for Ranken. His father's ADB entry.) He is Premier of Queensland, 1888-1889.

1889: London Lord Mayor of 1889 - Sir Henry Isaacs.

1890: November: Re William Lidderdale (1832-1902), Governor of Bank of England. He was born at St Petersburg, entered with Edward Heath and Co., Russia merchants of Liverpool, then joined Rathbone Bros. of Liverpool. (Cassis, City Bankers, p. 84. See Sheila Marriner and Hyde on Swire, qv.) Lidderdale was a partner in Rathbone Bros. and Co. and was governor of Bank of England in November 1890 when Barings found themselves in trouble and needed to be propped up to avert a catastrophe. (See GEC, Peerage, Revelstoke of Membland [on Barings], p. 769, Note b.)

1890: Failure of Westgarth and Co. Re William Westgarth (1815-1889) see an electricscotland webpage on this man and his own ADB entry. He assisted Caroline Chisholm´s activities. He was a firm believer in the ideas of Adam Smith. He early entered the firm George Young and Co. of Leith who were in the Australian trade. Later emigrated to Australia, was at Melbourne by 1840, when its population was 3000-4000. Once saw a corroboreee of 700 Aboriginals. Had firm Westgarth, (Alfred) Ross and Spowers by 1845. By 1850 was elected to represent Melbourne in Legislative Council of NSW. In 1851 he founded the Melbourne Chamber of Commerce. In 1853 produced a book, Victoria, Late Australia Felix. He talked government into subsidizing German workers to locate at the Port Phillip district. He returns to Australia in 1854. Helped a commission examining into the Eureka Rebellion. In 1857 he returned to settle in London to establish as a stockbroker. Contributed items on Australia to Encyclopedia Britannica. Westgarth probably in London dealt with Rothschilds, as did Lanarch, with whom he was closely associated. He returned to Victoria in 1888. He married in 1853 and had three daughters. It is said he "became the centre of the syndicates of speculators who have chiefly controlled Australian loans". In the late 1880s he was trying to convince the Australian colonies to confederate, if only for joint guarantee of colonial debts. In 1862-64 he wanted abolition of convict transportation to Western Australia. He was a co-founder of Colonial Institute in 1869 and one of six-co-founders of the Imperial Federation League in 1884. In 1887 he published a Sketch of the Nature and Limits of a Science of Economics, and was interested in problems of poverty and social inequality. His firm Westgarth and Co. failed in 1890. He had taken £100,000 from it when he retired. Cf., Geoffrey Serle, The Golden Age: A History of the Colony of Victoria, 1851-1861. 1963.

1890: Electricity generated for first time in Calcutta.

1890: US Census uses Hollerith's punched cards.

1890: Dewar invents thermos flask.

1890: U.S. Congress, in its earliest law-enforcement legislation on narcotics, imposes a tax on opium and morphine. Tabloid newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst publish stories of white women being seduced by Chinese men and their opium to invoke fear of the 'Yellow Peril', disguised as an "anti-drug" campaign.
From website based on book: Opium: A History, by Martin Booth Simon and Schuster, Ltd., 1996. e-mail info@opioids.com

1890: Japan: First National Diet- House of Peers (15 yen Tax - not much more than 1% of the population) and House of Representatives - first successful parliamentary experiment outside the West - First national election.

1891: The first American Express traveller's cheque is cashed.

1891: Ammonia refrigerators are increasing in use in German and American homes.

1890s: Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius and an American, P.C. Chamberlain, independently consider possible problems arising from a CO2 build-up in the atmosphere. Both scientists realise that the burning of fossil fuels could lead to global warming, but neither suspect the process might already have started. (Greenhouse Timeline)

30 May, 1891: Womanhood suffrage movement started in Sydney (Australia) with Rose Scott as secretary.

1892: Maybachs invents carburettor for what will become internal combustion engine.

1892: Japan: 2nd national election

1890s: Re Sir Robert Philp (1851-1922), twice Premier of Queensland. (See on Burns Philp, p. 152 of E. W. Campbell on rich Australian families.) First worked at Bright Brothers and Co. shipping co. Then went to Townsville to co-found Burns/Philp. Suffered in the 1890s depression.

1892: Re William Hillier Onslow, (1853-1911), fourth Earl Onslow, Governor-General New Zealand. Sir, Baronet, KCMG. He was Provincial Grand Master of Freemasons, Surrey, 1895-1911. GEC, Peerage, Onslow, p. 73. He in thepeerage.com is Governor-General New Zealand May 1889-Feb 1892.

1892: By early in the C19th, there were barely a handful of men who could be named millionaires in the USA. Before the Civil War, there were still few millionaires. By 1890, there were about 4000 millionaires in the US, almost half of them living in New York (about 1,800 were in New York, actually). (From a Google answers website)

1893: Financial panic in New York in 1893.

1893: Australian socialist William Lane goes to Utopia, a "new Australia" colony in Paraguay. Lane and his family withdraw from New Australian settlement in Paraguay and go to New Zealand where he becomes a non-socialist, pro-Imperialist newspaper editor. (There was a German utopia in South America at the same time, where Mengeles is later said to have repaired! It was perhaps this German colony which was home to the sister of Friedrich Nietzsche, who later edited her brother's papers?)

1893: The panic of 1893 is followed by one of the worst depressions in US history. See re the 1895 "gold loan of 1895" controversy, with Morgan firm associating with US Govt. At this time, US has no central bank.

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1893: Edison's kinetoscope invented.

1893- 1-2 December, 2001, Corowa, NSW, The People's Conference, a historic conference to help decide on a process to determine on the issue of finding a Head of State for Australia.
(Why Corowa? Because at a conference there in 1893, a process was put forward to enable Australians to decide on Federation).
By 1893: Integrity of colonial histories? Australian Historian F. M. Bladen found that for the first 40 years of New South Wales' history, practically no official records had been kept in the colony, everything had to be got from England.

1894-1895 Sino-Japanese War - victory (control of Korea)

1894: CTR Wilson begins cloud-chamber research after meteorological observations.

1894: Japan: British - agree to relinquish their extraterritorial privileges by 1899.

1894: South Australia becomes first Australian colony to grant women right to vote and to stand for Parliament, assented to by 21 March, 1895. A world first for the women's vote?

1895: Great Plague in India.

1895: Re Gerard Smith (1839-1920), Governor Western Australia 1895-1900. He was son3, once a Colonel, of the family of Smith, Payne and Smiths, the large family of bankers. Cf., Leighton Boyce on Smiths the bankers and Historical Studies, 9, No. 34. May, 1960. He arrived in Western Australia with a gold boom re Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie. He invested unwisely in mining and other speculation and was unfortunate in his choice of partners. Scandals resulted and London disapproved. See his own ADB entry. Stenton, British Parliamentarians, Vol. 1, p. 352-353. Leighton-Boyce, Smiths the bankers. On his return to London from WA he was director of San Paulo Railway Co. of Brazil. A website wonders about his relationship with Henry S[amuel]. King and Co., 65 Cornhill, London, earlier Smith Elder and Co at 65 Cornhill, booksellers, stationers, East India agents, shippers, brokers. Also at address, 45 Pall Mall.

Mid-1890s: Banking problems in Britain. Also in Victoria, Australia. (List of dates for financial crashes and panics)

1895: Re Charles Gipps Hamilton (1857-1955). (thepeerage.com and see websites on the name Turing per Dan Morgan at MIT/USA. He is director of ES&A from 1895-1951 in p. 31 of Merrett on ANZ Bank.

1895: Re Thomas Fowell Buxton (1837-1915), Governor of South Australia. He is son1, see Burke's Peerage/Baronetage for Polwarth and for Gainsborough. His own ADB entry CDrom version. He became Governor of South Australia on 29 October, 1895. (His own ADB entry). A partner in brewers Truman, Hanbury and Co. Stenton, British Parliamentarians, Vol. 1, p. 61. GEC, Peerage, Haddington, pp. 234ff; Polwarth, p. 572. GEC, Creations after 1901, p. 487

1895: Rise of world's probably first "real" skyscraper, completed in 1895, the 15-floor Reliance building in Chicago's Loop, the central business area. Designed by Charles Attwood of Daniel Burnham's office. The world's tallest structure by 2001 is Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

1895: East Africa Protectorate is organised after dissolution of British East Africa Company.

1892: Maybachs invents the carburettor.

1895: Japan defeats China in battle on Korean soil over future dominance of Korea, then Russia tries to annex Korea - Japan stymies this move in 1905 and in 1910 Japan formally annexes Korea and industrialises it.

1895: East Africa Protectorate is organised after dissolution of British East Africa Company.

1895: Rise of world's probably first "real" skyscraper, completed in 1895, the 15-floor Reliance building in Chicago's Loop, the central business area. Designed by Charles Attwood of Daniel Burnham's office. The world's tallest structure by 2001 is Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

1895: Heinrich Dreser working for The Bayer Company of Elberfeld, Germany, finds that diluting morphine with acetyls produces a drug without the common morphine side effects. Bayer begins production of diacetylmorphine and coins the name "heroin." Heroin would not be introduced commercially for another three years.
From website based on book: Opium: A History, by Martin Booth Simon and Schuster, Ltd., 1996. e-mail info@opioids.com

1896: Henry Ford takes his first car on the roads of Detroit for a trial run.

1896: Modern Olympics movement begins.

1896: Re Charles Wallace Cochrane-Baillie (1860-1940), Baron Lamington, Governor of Queensland. In lineage of Palmers. He is also Governor of Bombay. Ross-Cochrane-Wishart-Baillie. Baron Lamington became Governor of Queensland on 9 April, 1896. See his own entry in Australian Dictionary of Biography.

1896: Herzl writes The Jewish State. "The idea which I have developed in this pamphlet is a very old one: it is the restoration of the Jewish state." Herzl is considered to be the Father of Zionism, a political movement to create a Jewish state.

1897: Re Max Moritz Warburg (1867-1946). It is alleged he was once head of German intelligence and sent Lenin into Russia via Stockholm! Max had also assisted Japan against Russia and this led Max deeper into connections with the German government. So one might imagine the Russians wrote and distributed The Protocols of Zion in retaliation? Protocols were written in 1903 says a wikipedia page, or, produced 1897-1903 perhaps due to the First Zionist Congress held in Switzerland in 1897 and was distributed 1903-1906 in the Russian Empire due to the Russo-Japanese War. Max was also said to be a representative of American Ship and Commerce Line on the board of the Hamburg-Amerika Line. Max a Banker at M. M. Warburg and Co., Hamburg. He advised Kaiser Wilhelm on finance before WWI. From 1933 he was on the board of Reichsbank of Germany, but sold his bank and moved to the USA in 1938.

1897: Vestey Bros, Vestey Group Ltd. William Lord Vestey and brother Sir Edmund established in 1897, being from a Liverpool family butchery group, sons of Samuel a Liverpool provisioner working with meat canning. Firm became a pioneer of use of refrigeration and opened a cold store in London in 1895. Began cattle ranching and sugar cane in Venezuala and Brazil. Operated Other ranching in Australia and NZ. Opened their own shipping operation with Blue Star Line.

1897: David Boyle (1833-?) Seventh Earl Glasgow. thepeerage.com says he is son of Patrick Boyle and Mary Frances Elphinstone. His family was old in Scots shipping and shipbuilding. Created Baron Fairlie. Naval officer and Governor of NZ 1892-1897.

1897: First Zionist Congress (Basle, Switzerland) declared Palestine the Jewish Homeland. Participants developed a structure of government which could be transferred to Palestine at some future time, including the World Zionist Organization to link all Jews together, the Jewish National Fund to acquire land, a committee to manage finances, a political committee to govern the land.

1898: Tobacconist Sir Hugh Dixon (born Sydney 1841-1926) Partner with his brother Thomas Storie (1854-1932) a medical practitioner. (See http://www.airgale.com.au/dixson/d5.htm and his own Australian Dictionary of Biography entry online. Manufacturer and philanthropist. The tobacco business received much impetus from the American Civil War and his firm expanded to Melbourne and Adelaide as Robert Dixson and Co. He was of British-Australasian Tobacco Ltd. A Chair of City Bank of Sydney and Strand Elecric Lighting Co. Owned Strand Arcade Sydney. In 1897-1898 was president of Chamber of Manufacturers of NSW. This family engaged in art collecting.

1898: Re Albert Frederick Calvert (1872-1946). He was managing director of Big Blow Gold Mines and Consolidated Gold Mines of Western Australia on the Pilbarra Goldfields. (See his own entry in ADB online.) Wrote The Exploration of Australia, 1901 and The Discovery of Australia, 1902. Also wrote on Australia, re The Aborigines of Western Australia. He once financed an expedition 1896-1897 to fill in remaining blanks of mapping of Australia, Perth to Kimberley. He seems to be noted in an illegible Encyclopedia of Freemasonry. He had four sons. Racing losses in 1898 bankrupted him and he lost interest in Australian and turned to writing about Spain.

1898: Hawaiian Islands in the Pacific Ocean are transferred to the United States.

1899: "Everything that can be invented has been invented." Charles Duell, director, US Patents Office.

11 October, 1899: Outbreak of Boer War.

10 April 1899, Baron Tennyson, son of English poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, becomes Governor of South Australia.

1899: France proclaims protectorate in Laos, South-East Asia.

1899: Edward Fleet Alford is director of Jardine Matheson, 1894-1899. (From Keswick)

1899: Re UK shipbuilders, John Willis and Sons. See John Crosse, ´John Willis and Sons, shipowners, 1830-1899´, Mariner´s Mirror, Vol. 58, 1972, pp. 397ff.

1899: Governor NSW Henry Robert Brand (1844-1906) His sister Gertrude became mother of governor Sir William Robert Campion (1870-1951) of WA. Brand was governor of NSW 1895-1899. His second wife had one son and three drs. See GEC, Peerage, Hampden of Glynde, p. 288. Viscount Hampden became Governor of NSW on 22 November, 1895.

1899: Robert Inglis is a director of Jardine-Matheson 1899-1904. (From Keswick)

1899: London Lord Mayor is Alfred James Newton. Was with a group of financiers, the Mendel Group, involved in retailing and stores. Had an interest in New Zealand Gold Extraction Co. Was once with a brother in a steamship company. He founded City Imperial Volunteers for Boer War. (He is London Lord Mayor London in 1899 in Valerie Hope, p. 159.)

1899: Charles Edward Bright (1829-1915). Shipowner. Bright was married to Anna Maria Georgiana Manners-Sutton, daughter of a governor of Victoria, Sir John Henry Thomas Manners-Sutton (d. 1877) second Viscount Canterbury. The firm in 1857 before the droughts of 1865-1866 had decided to move into business in Ceylon, Mauritius, India and China. In Sydney they dealt with Crawley and Smith, and in Melbourne with Octavius Browne. He had three sons and a daughter. By 1863 the firm moved into NZ trade to Otago. In 1881 the Australian firm was absorbed by English firm Antony Gibbs and Sons. They are partner with William Hamilton Hart. He and brother Reginald arrived in Melbourne during gold rushes. CE Bright arrived in Melbourne in 1854 and founded Bright Bros. and Co., steamship and general agents for Royal Insurance Co. of Liverpool and London. He became president of Melbourne Chamber of Commerce. Gave services to 1880 Melbourne International Exhibition. In mid-1890s he returned to England. Retired from family business in 1899 and gave attention to "financial interests". He was chairman of directors in Great Britain and Ireland of National Mutual Life Association of Australasia. (See thepeerage.com, his own entry in Australian Dictionary of Biography online. See the lineage from Burke's Landed Gentry for McCulloch of Auchindinny. See pp. 30ff of Merrett on History of ANZ Bank.) Noted essay by G. J. Whitewell in Appleyard and Schedvin. Noted, p. 126 of McCaughey et al on Governors of Vic.

1819-1899: Re Apcar, Eastern shippers. From a genforum item: "John Feltham" To: >Sent: Wednesday, July 03, 2002 2:43 PM - Subject: Re: [India-L] (Fwd) Re Alexander Apcar - Date sent: Wed, 03 Jul 2002 09:10:20 +1000 From: Peter Wright > Send reply to: pcwright@melbpc.org.au
Subject: Re: [India-L] (Fwd) Alexander Apcar - To: johnf@ballyhoo.com.au
On Tue, 2 Jul 2002 12:24:41 +1000, you wrote: Dear John: Some notes on the Apcar Line - Brothers Arratoon and Gregory Apcar from New Julfa in Persia founded Apcar and Company in 1819. Initially a trading company in Bombay, it moved to Calcutta. Here it ventured into the shipping business and soon carved out a niche for itself offering freight and passage as well as transporting their lucrative cargo - opium. By the mid-1840s, the 275-ton brig Arratoon Apcar was plying the Calcutta, Penang, Singapore and China circuit, calling in at Singapore nearly every second month. A few years later, the Ararat and the 400-ton Catherine Apcar, named after Arratoon's wife, had joined the fleet. Keeping abreast of the times, the company began introducing steam clippers in the 1850s. The 315-ton Lightning and 593-ton Thunder were soon joined by a new 938-ton Arratoon Apcar and in 1858 by the Armenia - large vessels for country shipping. In March 1861, the much-admired new 240-ton screw steamer Thunder [a ¨fine specimen of naval architecture¨] arrived at Singapore having made the journey from Hong Kong in only 5 days and 2 hours. However, she was outdone by Lightning who lived up to her name, setting a 4-day-20 hour record for the journey in November 1862. Newer and larger steamers joined the fleet. The first steamer Catherine Apcar built in 1865 was 1019 tons; a few years later she was joined by the 1476-ton Hindustan and the 1471-ton China. The Japan, commissioned in 1872, rather appropriately called at Kobe, Yokohama and Nagasaki. A modern 2153-ton Arratoon Apcar was built in 1873. For about 25 years, until the 1870s, the Apcar clippers dominated the opium trade departing with their cargoes from Bombay or Calcutta, calling at Singapore and then on to Hong Kong or Canton River. In August 1856, Lightning was on her fifth Calcutta-China trip and had transported 10,006 chests of opium to China since October 1855. In 1865, out of the 43 listed sailings of opium ships to China, 17 were Apcar ships: Arratoon Apcar, Armenia, Catherine Apcar, Lightning, Thunder and T A Gibbs. By the 1880s, the Apcar Line was running monthly services between Calcutta and Hong Kong calling in on Singapore and Penang on each leg of the trip. Their vessels, black-funnelled and flying the Apcar flag were a familiar sight in the roadstead and alongside the wharves. The 1890s saw two new additions to the fleet. In 1891 a new 3,250-ton steam ship Lightning joined the fleet. She was a "handsome schooner rigged vessel with clipper bows and electric light through out." Her cabin passengers were accommodated, old style, in the poop. Deck passengers were mainly Indian and Chinese workers bound for Singapore and Penang. In July 1893 the Japan celebrated her 100th and last trip and was replaced by a new 2715-ton Catherine Apcar. Lit throughout, she accommodated 16 first class and 9 second class passengers, with her deck space designed for the China trade. She had a clipper stern with a figure of her namesake. The last upgrade of the ships occurred around the turn of the century. In 1899, the Arratoon Apcar was replaced with a modern 4,510-ton namesake while in 1902, the 4563-ton Gregory Apcar entered service. The Japan, the largest and considered the finest of the fleet arrived in Singapore for the first time in December 1906. By 1906 these five ships maintained a ten-day circuit from Calcutta to Hong Kong, calling in at Singapore and Penang. The Catherine Apcar, Aratoon Apcar and the Lightning were Royal Mail Steamers. [Maharaja to milk cow travelled on the Apcar Line]. Besides the well-heeled first class passengers, there were others. Thousands of workers desperate for jobs in Singapore, Penang and elsewhere in Malaya came as deck passengers from China and India. Over 1,000 at a time were squeezed on board. In March and April 1908 nearly 3,000 passengers were carried from Hong Kong to Singapore and Penang. Livestock also formed part of large consignments. Sheep, goats and cattle from India -- often upwards of 1,200 beasts -- were carried to Singapore and Penang. Both expensive Australian race horses en route to stables and ordinary working horses also sailed with Apcars. The ships had a good safety record over the years being especially designed to cope with the rigours of the region. Able to ply against monsoons, yet sail with them and above to withstand the odd typhoon. In 1912, the Apcars decided to sell their business. Lord Inchcape of the British India Steam Navigation Company snapped up this opportunity to enter the Calcutta-China run and bought the fleet. The ships retained their names and were still referred to as the Apcar steamers, with sailings still advertised under the familiar and trusted Apcar Line name. Until 1914 the Apcar steamers maintained their regular services between Calcutta-Singapore-Hong Kong - Japan, their mainstay continuing to be labourers and cargo. During the war, all ships bar the Japan were used as troop carriers and then utilised under the Liner Requisition Scheme. P&O then took over British India and sailings were advertised as P&O - British India and Apcar Line. The Apcar ships plied their regular routes until the outbreak of war in the East. But new ships with new names had replaced the old familiar ones. The end of these stalwart ships was predictable and ignominious. The Lightning, Gregory Apcar, Japan and Catherine Apcar were sold to Japanese scrap yards. The Arratoon Apcar was taken out of service in 1922 and turned into an accommodation ship for transient coolies at Singapore. A decade later she too, was sold for scrap. Apcar Alexander Apcar was a grandson of Arratoon Apcar. The sons of the family were educated at Harrow, returning to India to join the family firm or perhaps practise law. Nadia Wright ... -- Forwarded message follows ------- Date sent: Mon, 1 Jul 2002 09:17:18 -0600 From: "david stewart" To:

1901: Sydney merchant George Thornton (Sydney 1819-1901) - as a somewhat ignored figure in Sydney business life. (Notes here are taken from a website on Thornton.) George Thornton was born on 23 December 1819 in Macquarie Street, Sydney, son of Samuel Thornton (c1782-1842) and Sarah Thornton (nee Madden; c.1790-1827). Samuel and Sarah were married in London in about 1810. In 1813 Sarah was arrested and tried (as Sarah Thorn), along with two other women, for stealing cards of lace from a shop in London. She was found guilty, despite one of the three confessing to being the only perpetrator of the crime, and transported to New South Wales for life. Sarah travelled on Broxbornebury, arriving in Sydney on 28 July 1814. Samuel followed her a few months later as a free passenger on Somersetshire.
Initially working as a tailor after a good education, Samuel later set up a business as a publican in George Street, Sydney. In 1839 he received a grant of 100 acres at Bankstown, where he raised about 20 head of cattle and sold salt pork. George married Mary Ann Solomon at St Phillips Church of England, Sydney, on 4 August 1840. They had five children between 1841 and 1856: George, Frances, James, Florence and Fanny. In the 1850s George and his family were living at Nelson’s Bay, Coogee. Working life In about 1836 George joined the Customs Department as a storekeeper and by 1840 he had set up his own business as a customs house agent in Elizabeth Street. In April 1849 he advertised the formation of a partnership with Walter Church operating as customs house agents and shipbrokers. The business was known as Thornton and Church and was based at Customs House, Circular Quay. In 1859 he joined the firm Tucker & Co., wine and spirit merchants situated in George Street.
George Thornton’s political career began in 1847 when he was elected to the Sydney Municipal Council for Cook Ward. He served as mayor in 1853 and again in 1857. In 1858 he was elected to the Legislative Assembly, holding the seat of Sydney until April 1859. In 1867 he was returned to the Legislative Assembly for Goldfields West holding this seat until December 1868 when he resigned his position to travel to England. He was appointed to the Legislative Council in 1877, serving until shortly before his death in 1901. In 1880 he became a founding councillor of the New South Wales Aborigines Protection Association, and on 29 December 1881 he was officially appointed Protector of the Aborigines. He was founding chairman of the Aborigines Protection Board in 1883. He was interested in indigenous place names and in 1892 with the politician Richard Hill he published Notes on the Aborigines of New South Wales.
Amongst positions he held were: director and chairman of the City Bank of Sydney, trustee of the Savings Bank of New South Wales, chairman of the Mutual Insurance Society of Victoria. He was a New South Wales commissioner for five international exhibitions and in 1880 he sat on the royal commission into the fisheries. He was appointed a magistrate for the district of Sydney in the mid 1850s. He was a Freemason under the Irish constitution, and founding provincial grand master from 1857-67. Thornton had a great passion for water sports and participated in regattas on Sydney Harbour; was vice-commodore of the Sydney Yacht Club in 1859, a founding member of the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron in 1862, and founding president of the Sydney Rowing Club and of the New South Wales Rowing Association. He was treasurer on the committee of the inaugural Double Bay Amateur Regatta held on 1 January 1867.
In August 1856 a number of allotments at Darling Point along Yarranabbe Road were offered for sale by the auctioneers Bowden and Threlkeld. On one of these allotments facing present day Thornton Street a house called Longwood was built. George Thornton purchased this house at an auction sale in March 1859 for £2500. In 1862 Thornton engaged the architect William Weaver to carry out alterations and additions to the house, with further alterations and additions carried out to the design of the architect G. Allen Mansfield in 1872. Thornton later moved residence several times in Sydney.
Thornton resigned from Wollahra council in February 1864 due to his planned departure for England. On his return from England the following year, the ship on which he was travelling, the Duncan Dunbar, was wrecked on a reef off the coast of Brazil on 7 October 1865. Thornton took a leading role in establishing some order after the accident, and following their rescue 10 days later, the passengers presented him with an address thanking him for ‘his untiring exertions’ on their behalf noting that is was ‘impossible to over-estimate the value of such services’. He was further honoured for his role in the rescue on his return to Australia in 1866. He died at his Lang Syne, at Parramatta, where he had moved by 1896, on 23 November 1901, aged 82. He was buried in Rookwood cemetery and was survived by his wife Mary Ann and daughter Fanny. Thornton’s obituary in Sydney Morning Herald lamented the passing of ‘one of the most picturesque characters which have graced the political and sporting life of New South Wales’.

1901: Re Adrian Louis Hope (1860-1908), first Marqis Linlithgow. (His own entry in ADB, cdrom version.) He was Governor of Victoria 28 November 1889 to 12 July 1895. (See p. 285 of McCaughey et al on Governor of Victoria, the family had made its money in Scottish lead mines from C17th.) He can also be descended from forebears of Prince Rupert. (GEC, Peerage, Hopetoun, pp. 575-576.) See H. G. Turner, First Decade of the Australian Commonwealth. 1911., p. 12. He was deputy-governor of Bank of Scotland 1904-1908. Had worked with naval architects. He left a fortune of more than £260,000 net. He became the first governor-general of the Commonwealth of Australia (after Federation) but resigned as Governor-General of Australia as the salary was too low. (thepeerage.com.)

Below are items still uncollected

1890: The USA has 8.4 million people engaged in agriculture, of whom 35 per cent are hired labourers and 18 per cent are labouring-class tenants. (Cited in Theodore W. Allen, The Invention of the White Race, Vol. 1, Racial Oppression and Social Control. New York, Verso, 2002., p. 153)

1899: Henry Robert Brand (1844-1906) His sister Gertrude became mother of governor Sir William Robert Campion (1870-1951) of WA. Brand was governor of NSW 1895-1899. His second wife had one son and three drs. See GEC, Peerage, Hampden of Glynde, p. 288. Viscount Hampden became Governor of NSW on 22 November, 1895.

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