Adam Lindsay Gordon (19 October 1833 – 24 June 1870) was a
British-Australian poet, horseman, police officer and politician. He was the first Australian poet to gain considerable recognition overseas, and according to his contemporary, writer
Marcus Clarke
Marcus Andrew Hislop Clarke (24 April 1846 – 2 August 1881) was an English-born Australian novelist, journalist, poet, editor, librarian, and playwright. He is best known for his 1874 novel ''For the Term of His Natural Life'', about the con ...
, Gordon's work represented "the beginnings of a national school of Australian poetry".
Early life
Though commonly cited as having been born in
Fayal
Faial Island (), also known as Fayal Island, is a Portugal, Portuguese island of the Central Group or ''Grupo Central'' of the Azores, in the Atlantic Ocean.
The Capelinhos volcano is the westernmost point of the island and is considered the we ...
in the
Azores
The Azores ( , , ; , ), officially the Autonomous Region of the Azores (), is one of the two autonomous regions of Portugal (along with Madeira). It is an archipelago composed of nine volcanic islands in the Macaronesia region of the North Atl ...
, where Captain Gordon had brought his wife for the sake of her health,
Gordon's birthplace was the small English village of
Charlton Kings
Charlton Kings is a contiguous village adjoining Cheltenham in Gloucestershire, England. The area constitutes a civil parish of 10,396 residents (2011).
Landscape
Charlton Kings is situated in the west foothills of the north–south Cotswo ...
near
Cheltenham
Cheltenham () is a historic spa town and borough adjacent to the Cotswolds in Gloucestershire, England. Cheltenham became known as a health and holiday spa town resort following the discovery of mineral springs in 1716, and claims to be the mo ...
, where he was baptised. He was the son of Captain Adam Durnford Gordon and Harriet Gordon, his first cousin, both of whom were descended from
Adam Gordon of Auchindoun, of the ballad "
Edom o Gordon". Captain Gordon had retired from the Bengal cavalry and taught Hindustani. His mother's family had owned slaves in the
British West Indies
The British West Indies (BWI) were the territories in the West Indies under British Empire, British rule, including Anguilla, the Cayman Islands, the Turks and Caicos Islands, Montserrat, the British Virgin Islands, Bermuda, Antigua and Barb ...
until the abolition of slavery in the 1830s, and had received significant financial compensation for the loss of their property. Gordon would in 1859 inherit some £7,000 from his mother's estate.
Gordon was sent to Cheltenham College in 1841, when he was only seven, but after he had been there a year, he was sent to a school kept by the Rev. Samuel Ollis Garrard in Gloucestershire. He attended the
Royal Military Academy, Woolwich
The Royal Military Academy (RMA) at Woolwich, in south-east London, was a British Army military academy for the training of Officer (armed forces), commissioned officers of the Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers. It later also trained officers o ...
, in 1848, where he was a contemporary and friend of
Charles George Gordon
Major-general (United Kingdom), Major-General Charles George Gordon Companion of the Order of the Bath, CB (28 January 1833 – 26 January 1885), also known as Chinese Gordon, Gordon Pasha, Gordon of Khartoum and General Gordon , was a British ...
(no relation, later Gordon of Khartoum) and
Thomas Bland Strange
Thomas Bland Strange (15 September 1831 – 9 July 1925), known as 'Gunner Jingo', was a British officer noted for his service with the Canadian Militia during the North-West Rebellion of 1885. As a Royal Artillery officer posted to Canada, Stra ...
(later known as Gunner Jingo). There, Gordon appears to have been good at sports, but not studious and certainly undisciplined, and like
Richard Henry Horne
Richard Hengist Horne (born Richard Henry Horne) (31 December 1802 – 13 March 1884) was an English poet and critic most famous for his poem ''Orion''.
Early life
On New Year's Eve of 1802, Horne was born at Edmonton, London, son of James Ho ...
, he was asked to leave. Gordon was again admitted a pupil at Cheltenham College. He was not there for long; he appears to have left in the middle of 1852, but the story that he was expelled from Cheltenham is without foundation. Then, Gordon was sent to the
Royal Grammar School Worcester in 1852. Gordon began to lead a wild and aimless life, contracted debts, and was a great anxiety to his father, who at last decided that his son should go to Australia and make a fresh start in 1853 to join the
mounted police
Mounted police are police who patrol on horseback or camelback. Their day-to-day function is typically picturesque or ceremonial, but they are also employed in crowd control because of their mobile mass and height advantage and increasingly in th ...
with a letter of introduction to the governor.
Gordon had fallen in love with Jane Bridges, a girl, aged 17 who was able to tell the story 60 years afterwards to his biographers. Gordon did not declare his love until he came to say good-bye to her before leaving for Australia on 7 August 1853. "With characteristic recklessness, he offered to sacrifice the passage he had taken to Australia, and all his father's plans for giving him a fresh start in life, if she would tell him not to go, or promise to be his wife, or even give him some hope." This she could not do, though she liked the shy, handsome boy and remembered him with affection to the end of a long life. It was the one romance of Gordon's life.
That Gordon realised his conduct had fallen much below what it might have been can be seen in his poems ... "To my Sister", written three days before he left England, and "Early Adieux", evidently written about the same time.
To Australia

Gordon was just over 20 years old when he arrived in
Adelaide
Adelaide ( , ; ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and most populous city of South Australia, as well as the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. The name "Adelaide" may refer to ei ...
on 14 November 1853. He immediately obtained a position in the South Australian mounted police and was stationed at
Mount Gambier
Mount Gambier is the second most populated city in South Australia, with a population of 25,591 as of the 2021 census. The city is located on the slopes of Mount Gambier (volcano), Mount Gambier, a volcano in the south east of the state, about ...
and
Penola. Adam Lindsay Gordon also acted as groom for a period to senior South Australian Police Officer
Alexander Tolmer. On 4 November 1855, he resigned from the force and took up horse-breaking in the south-eastern district of South Australia. The interest in horse-racing, which he had shown as a youth in England, was continued in Australia, and in a letter written in November 1854, he mentioned that he had a horse for the steeplechase at the next meeting. In 1857, he met the
Rev. Julian Tenison Woods, who lent him books and talked poetry with him. He then had the reputation of being "a good steady lad and a splendid horseman". In this year, his father died and he also lost his mother about two years later. From her estate, he received £6944–18–1 on 26 October 1861. He was making a reputation as a rider over hurdles, and several times either won or was placed in local hurdle races and steeplechases.
On 6 August 1859, the ship ''
Admella'' ran aground on the Cape Northumberland shoals, not a great distance from where Gordon is known to have been staying. The ship broke up, many perished (see
main article
Main may refer to:
Geography
*Main River (disambiguation), multiple rivers with the same name
*Ma'in, an ancient kingdom in modern-day Yemen
* Main, Iran, a village in Fars Province
*Spanish Main, the Caribbean coasts of mainland Spanish territ ...
), and many heroic feats were attempted, including an epic horse ride to Mount Gambier to summon help. Some 10 years later, Gordon wrote a poem "From the Wreck", probably inspired by this story, but somehow the popular imagination put Gordon in that saddle, and a number of newspaper articles were written to debunk the myth.
On 20 October 1862, he married Margaret Park, then a girl of 17. In March 1864, Gordon bought a cottage, Dingley Dell, near
Port MacDonnell, and in this same year, inspired by six engravings after Noel Paton illustrating "The Dowie Dens O' Yarrow", Gordon wrote a poem "The Feud", of which 30 copies were printed at Mount Gambier.
In July 1864, Gordon performed the daring riding feat known as Gordon's Leap on the edge of the
Blue Lake. A commemorative obelisk erected there has an inscription which reads:
This obelisk was erected as a memorial to the famous Australian poet. From near this spot in July, 1864, Gordon made his famed leap on horseback over an old post and rail guard fence onto a narrow ledge overlooking the Blue Lake and jumped back again onto the roadway. The foundation stone of the Gordon Memorial Obelisk was laid on 8th July 1887.
On 11 January 1865, he received a deputation asking him to stand for parliament and was elected by three votes to the
South Australian House of Assembly
The House of Assembly (also known as the lower house) is one of two chambers of the Parliament of South Australia, the other being the Legislative Council. It sits in Parliament House in the state capital, Adelaide.
Overview
The House of Assem ...
on 16 March 1865 for the
district of Victoria.
In politics, Gordon was a maverick. His semiclassical speeches were colourful and entertaining, but largely irrelevant, and he resigned his seat on 10 November 1866.
He found a good friend in wealthy fellow parliamentarian
John Riddoch of Penola, and was a frequent guest at his grand residence "Yallum". There he wrote "The Sick Stockrider".
Gordon's time in politics stimulated him to greater activity – poetry, horse racing, and speculation. He was contributing verse to the ''Australasian'' and ''Bell's Life'' in
Victoria
Victoria most commonly refers to:
* Queen Victoria (1819–1901), Queen of the United Kingdom and Empress of India
* Victoria (state), a state of Australia
* Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, a provincial capital
* Victoria, Seychelles, the capi ...
and doing a fair amount of riding. He bought some land in Western Australia, but returned from a visit there early in 1867 and went to live at Mount Gambier. On 10 June 1867, he published "Ashtaroth, a Dramatic Lyric", and on the 19th of the same month, "Sea Spray and Smoke Drift".
Move to Victoria

With his failures behind him, Gordon turned to Victoria, not to Melbourne, which had ignored his poetry, but to Ballarat. In November, he rented Craig's livery stables at
Ballarat
Ballarat ( ) () is a city in the Central Highlands of Victoria, Australia. At the 2021 census, Ballarat had a population of 111,973, making it the third-largest urban inland city in Australia and the third-largest city in Victoria.
Within mo ...
in partnership with Harry Mount, but he had no head for business and the venture was a failure. In March 1868, he had a serious accident, a horse smashing his head against a gatepost of his own yard. His daughter, born on 3 May 1867, died at the age of 11 months, his financial difficulties were increasing, and he fell into very low spirits. DNA evidence revealed a possible child of Gordon's that was adopted by his good friends, however it is possible this child was an illegitimate offspring of a different one of Gordon's relatives.
In spite of short sight, he was becoming very well known as a gentleman rider, and on 10 October 1868, actually won three races in one day at the Melbourne Hunt Club steeplechase meeting. He rode with great patience and judgment, but his want of good sight was always a handicap. He began riding for money, but was not fortunate and had more than one serious fall. He sold his business and left Ballarat in October 1868 and came to Melbourne, and eventually found lodgings at 10 Lewis Street, Brighton. He had succeeded in straightening his financial affairs and was more cheerful. He made a little money out of his racing and became a member of the
Yorick Club
The Yorick Club was a gentlemen's club, private social club in Lowell, Massachusetts, which twenty prominent young Lowell men founded in February 1882."History of Lowell and its people, Volume 1", p. 383, By Frederick William Coburn. The club went ...
, where he was friendly with
Marcus Clarke
Marcus Andrew Hislop Clarke (24 April 1846 – 2 August 1881) was an English-born Australian novelist, journalist, poet, editor, librarian, and playwright. He is best known for his 1874 novel ''For the Term of His Natural Life'', about the con ...
,
George Gordon McCrae, and a little later
Henry Kendall. On 12 March 1870, Gordon had a bad fall while riding in a steeplechase at
Flemington Racecourse
Flemington Racecourse is a major horse racing venue located in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It is most notable for hosting the Melbourne Cup, which is the world's richest handicap and the world's richest 3200-metre horse race. The race ...
. His head was injured and he never completely recovered.
Death

He had for some time been endeavouring to show that he was heir to the estate of Esslemont in
Scotland
Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...
, but there was a flaw in the entail, and in June, he learnt that his claim must be abandoned. He had seen his last book, ''
Bush Ballads and Galloping Rhymes'', through the press, and it was published on 23 June 1870; it was not successful at the time, but is now regarded as one of the most important pieces of Australian literature. Gordon on that day met Kendall, who showed him the proof of the favourable review he had written for the ''Australasian'' but Gordon had just asked his publishers what he owed them for printing the book, and realised that he had no money to pay them and no prospects. He went home to his cottage at 10 Lewis Street
Brighton
Brighton ( ) is a seaside resort in the city status in the United Kingdom, city of Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, England, south of London.
Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze Age Britain, Bronze Age, R ...
carrying a package of cartridges for his rifle. Next morning, he rose early, walked into the tea-tree scrub by the beach, and shot himself.
In October 1870, a monument was erected over his grave at the
Brighton General Cemetery by his close friends. His wife went back to South Australia, married Peter Low, and lived until November 1919.
Legacy

In the decades following Gordon's death, his work continued to draw increasing praise from literary figures and the public at large, and especially in Melbourne, he was exalted as a genius and a national poet.
Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930) was a British writer and physician. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for ''A Study in Scarlet'', the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Hol ...
and
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Fflahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 185430 November 1900) was an Irish author, poet, and playwright. After writing in different literary styles throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular and influential playwright ...
counted among his admirers, the latter hailing him as "one of the finest poetic singers the English race has ever known". Gordon's reputation peaked in the 1930s, during which time statues and monuments to his memory were erected throughout Australia and Britain. On 30 October 1932, a statue of Gordon by
Paul Montford
__NOTOC__
Paul Raphael Montford (1 November 1868 – 15 January 1938) was an English-born sculptor, also active in Australia; winner of the gold medal of the Royal Society of British Sculptors in 1934.Jenny Zimmer,Montford, Paul Raphael (1868– ...
was unveiled near Parliament House, Melbourne, in a garden now known as Gordon Reserve; and in May 1934, his bust was placed in
Poets' Corner
Poets' Corner is a section of the southern transept of Westminster Abbey in London, England, where many poets, playwrights, and writers are buried or commemorated.
The first poet interred in Poets' Corner was Geoffrey Chaucer in 1400. Willia ...
,
Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an Anglican church in the City of Westminster, London, England. Since 1066, it has been the location of the coronations of 40 English and British m ...
, and he remains the only Australian poet commemorated there.
Over time, the praise he received resulted in a backlash.
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from the 188 ...
jokes about Gordon's verse in his 1949 play ''
Shakes versus Shav
''Shakes versus Shav'' (1949) is a puppet play written by George Bernard Shaw. It was Shaw's last completed dramatic work. The play runs for 10 minutes in performance and comprises a comic argument between Shaw and Shakespeare, with the two pla ...
'', a dialogue between Shakespeare and himself during which Shakespeare laughs at a line attributed to Gordon. Critics dismissed some of Gordon's poetry as careless and banal, but conceded that, at his best, he is a poet of importance, who on occasions wrote some magnificent lines.
Douglas Sladen, a lifelong admirer, in his ''Adam Lindsay Gordon, The Westminster Abbey Memorial Volume'', made a selection of 27 poems that occupy about 90 pages.
His life was dramatised in the 1947 radio drama ''
A Horseman in Arcadia'' and 1948 radio drama ''
Adam Lindsay Gordon'' in which
Peter Finch
Frederick George Peter Ingle Finch (28 September 191614 January 1977) was an English-Australian actor of theatre, film and radio.
Born in London, he emigrated to Australia at the age of ten and was raised in Sydney, where he worked in vaudevi ...
played the title role.
Gordon's works have inspired numerous works in other artistic mediums. The
Australian impressionists of the 1880s and 1890s were said to fuel the "Gordon craze", titling a number of their landscapes after lines from Gordon, including ''The Dawn Faintly Dappled'' (
Charles Conder
Charles Edward Conder (24 October 1868 – 9 February 1909) was an English-born painter, lithographer and designer. He emigrated to Australia and was a key figure in the Heidelberg School, arguably the beginning of a distinctively Australi ...
), ''Above Us the Great Grave Sky'' (
Arthur Streeton
Sir Arthur Ernest Streeton (8 April 1867 – 1 September 1943) was an Australian landscape painter and a leading member of the Heidelberg School, also known as Australian Impressionism.
Early life
Streeton was born in Mount Moriac, Victoria ...
) and ''Whisperings in Wattle Boughs'' (
Frederick McCubbin
Frederick McCubbin (25 February 1855 – 20 December 1917) was an Australian artist, art teacher and prominent member of the Heidelberg School art movement, also known as Australian impressionism.
Born and raised in Melbourne, Victoria, McCubb ...
). In 1886, inspired by a paper titled "The Open Air Elements in Gordon's Poems", members of the Melbourne bohemian artists' society the
Buonarotti Club illustrated studies of his poetry.
Film director
W. J. Lincoln
William Joseph Lincoln (1870 – 18 August 1917) was an Australia, Australian playwright, theatre manager, film director and screenwriter in the silent film, silent era. He produced, directed and/or wrote 23 films between 1911 and 1916.
One ob ...
based two films on poems by Gordon: ''
The Wreck'' (1913) and ''
The Sick Stockrider'' (1915). He also directed the 1916 biopic ''
The Life's Romance of Adam Lindsay Gordon
''The Life's Romance of Adam Lindsay Gordon'' is a 1916 Australian feature-length film directed by W. J. Lincoln, based on the life of poet Adam Lindsay Gordon.
Unlike many Australian silent movies, part of the film survives today.
According to ...
'', starring
Hugh McCrae
Hugh Raymond McCrae OBE (4 October 1876 – 17 February 1958) was an Australian writer, noted for his poetry.
Life and career
McCrae was born in Melbourne, the son of the Australian author George Gordon McCrae and grandson of the painter and ...
in the title role. Unlike many other early Australian silent films, much of the film survives today. One of Gordon's poems, "
The Swimmer", forms the libretto for the fifth movement of English composer Sir
Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestr ...
's song cycle ''
Sea Pictures
''Sea Pictures, Op. 37'' is a song cycle for contralto and orchestra by Edward Elgar. It consists of settings of a poems by five different authors. A version for piano was often performed by Elgar. Many mezzo-sopranos have sung the piece.
The ...
'', and Elgar also set to music another of his poems, "
A Song of Autumn". Composer
Varney Monk
Varney Monk (born Isabel Varney Desmond Peterson; 18 January 1892 – 7 February 1967) was an Australian pianist and composer, best known for writing the musicals ''Collits' Inn (musical), Collits' Inn'' (1932) and ''The Cedar Tree (musical), Th ...
set three of her songs to Gordon's poems.
After a
particularly trying year for the British Royal Family,
Elizabeth II
Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 19268 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II, her death in 2022. ...
quoted from one of Gordon's more famous poems in her Christmas Message of 1992, "Kindness in another's trouble, courage in one's own..", but did not mention the poet's name. The same, full poem was also quoted by
Diana, Princess of Wales
Diana, Princess of Wales (born Diana Frances Spencer; 1 July 1961 – 31 August 1997), was a member of the British royal family. She was the first wife of Charles III (then Prince of Wales) and mother of Princes William, ...
during a speech in
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...
in 1996.
Dingley Dell, Gordon's property and home from 1862 to 1866, are preserved as a
conservation park and as a
museum
A museum is an institution dedicated to displaying or Preservation (library and archive), preserving culturally or scientifically significant objects. Many museums have exhibitions of these objects on public display, and some have private colle ...
. The museum houses early volumes of his work, personal effects, and a display of his horse-riding equipment.
In 1970, Gordon was honoured on a postage stamp bearing his portrait issued by
Australia Post
Australia Post, formally the Australian Postal Corporation and also known as AusPost, is an Australian Government-State-owned enterprise, owned corporation that provides postal services throughout Australia. Australia Post's head office is loca ...
.
On 20 September 2014, Gordon was inducted in the Australian Jumps Racing Association's Gallery of Champions.
The suburb
Gordon
Gordon may refer to:
People
* Gordon (given name), a masculine given name, including list of persons and fictional characters
* Gordon (surname), the surname
* Gordon (slave), escaped to a Union Army camp during the U.S. Civil War
* Gordon Heuck ...
in Canberra, Australia's capital, is named after Gordon.
Poetry collections

* ''
Sea Spray and Smoke Drift'' (1867)
* ''
Bush Ballads and Galloping Rhymes'' (1870)
* ''Poems of the Late Adam Lindsay Gordon'' (1879)
* ''Racing Rhymes and Other Verses'' (1901)
Selected individual works
* "
A Song of Autumn" (1868)
* "
The Sick Stockrider" (1870)
* "
The Swimmer" (1870)
* Poetry by ''Adam Lindsay Gordon'' was set to music by French-Australian musician Theodore Tourrier (1846-1929) in 1904
See also
*
Australian literature
Australian literature is the literature, written or literary work produced in the area or by the people of the Australia, Commonwealth of Australia and its preceding colonies. During its early Western culture, Western history, Australia was a ...
*
Yorick Club (Melbourne)
*''
The Life's Romance of Adam Lindsay Gordon
''The Life's Romance of Adam Lindsay Gordon'' is a 1916 Australian feature-length film directed by W. J. Lincoln, based on the life of poet Adam Lindsay Gordon.
Unlike many Australian silent movies, part of the film survives today.
According to ...
''
References
Further reading
*
* Kramer, Leonie,
Gordon, Adam Lindsay (1833–1870), ''
Australian Dictionary of Biography
The ''Australian Dictionary of Biography'' (ADB or AuDB) is a national co-operative enterprise founded and maintained by the Australian National University (ANU) to produce authoritative biographical articles on eminent people in Australia's ...
'', Volume 4, Melbourne University Press, 1972, pp 267–269. Retrieved on 24 December 2008.
*
*
*
*
* Coventry, CJ. "Links in the Chain: British slavery, Victoria and South Australia," 1(1) ''Before/Now'' (2019)
Links in the Chain: British slavery, Victoria and South Australia*
*
* Michael Wilding, Wild Bleak Bohemia: Marcus Clarke, Adam Lindsay Gordon and Henry Kendall: A Documentary, Melbourne, Australian Scholarly Publishing 2014
External links
*
*
*
The Adam Lindsay Gordon Commemorative CommitteeAdam Lindsay Gordon (1833–1870)Gravesite at Brighton General Cemetery (Vic)
Dingley Dell Cottage and Museum at Port MacDonnell, SA
''Sighs of Sorrow''– A song cycle by Xavier Brouwer on the poetry of Adam Lindsay Gordon
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gordon, Adam Lindsay
1833 births
1870 deaths
1870s suicides
19th-century Australian poets
Australian people of Scottish descent
Australian politicians who died by suicide
People educated at the Royal Grammar School Worcester
Members of the South Australian House of Assembly
Suicides by firearm in Victoria (state)
Settlers of South Australia
19th-century Australian politicians
People from Gloucestershire
British emigrants to colonial Australia
Burials at Brighton General Cemetery
19th-century Australian male writers
People from the Colony of Victoria