Thomas M'Ilwraith
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Sir Thomas McIlwraith (17 May 1835 – 17 July 1900) was for many years the dominant figure of colonial
politics Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...
in
Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...
. He was
Premier of Queensland The premier of Queensland is the head of government in the Australian state of Queensland. By convention the premier is the leader of the party with a parliamentary majority in the Legislative Assembly of Queensland. The premier is appointed ...
from 1879 to 1883, again in 1888, and for a third time in 1893. In common with most politicians of his era, McIlwraith was an influential businessman, who combined his parliamentary career with a prosperous involvement in the pastoral industry.


Early life

Thomas McIlwraith was born in
Ayr Ayr ( ; ; , meaning "confluence of the River Àir"), is a town situated on the southwest coast of Scotland. A former royal burgh, today it is the administrative centre of South Ayrshire Council, and the historic county town of Ayrshire. With ...
,
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 ...
, in 1835, one of four sons of John McIlwraith, plumber and shipowner, and his wife Janet Hamilton ''née'' Howat. His eldest brother,
John John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second E ...
(1828–1902), migrated to
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 ...
,
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
, in 1853; his youngest brother,
Andrew Andrew is the English form of the given name, common in many countries. The word is derived from the , ''Andreas'', itself related to ''aner/andros'', "man" (as opposed to "woman"), thus meaning "manly" and, as consequence, "brave", "strong", "c ...
(1844–1932), co-founded McIlwraith, McEacharn & Co in London with Malcolm McEacharn. D. B. Waterson
'McIlwraith, Andrew (1844–1932)'
,
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 10, Melbourne University Press, 1986, pp. 282–283. Retrieved on 11 July 2009.
David Dunstan
'McEacharn, Sir Malcolm Donald (1852–1910)'
,
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 10, Melbourne University Press, 1986, pp. 263–264. Retrieved on 11 July 2009.
McIlwraith studied
civil engineering Civil engineering is a regulation and licensure in engineering, professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads ...
at the
University of Glasgow The University of Glasgow (abbreviated as ''Glas.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals; ) is a Public university, public research university in Glasgow, Scotland. Founded by papal bull in , it is the List of oldest universities in continuous ...
.


Australia

McIlwraith's brother John's success in
Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...
persuaded him, in 1854, to migrate to
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 ...
where he worked as a surveyor and engineer for the Department of Railways, and subsequently as a partner with Messrs Cornish and
Bruce The English language name Bruce arrived in Scotland with the Normans, from the place name Brix, Manche in Normandy, France, meaning "the willowlands". Initially promulgated via the descendants of king Robert the Bruce (1274−1329), it has been ...
,John Maxwell
'Bruce, John Vans Agnew (1822–1863)'
,
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 3, Melbourne University Press, 1969, pp. 277–278. Retrieved on 11 July 2009.
railway contractors. He also invested in eight pastoral holdings in the Maranoa district in
Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...
. He retained close relations with his brother John, and on 6 June 1863 married Margaret Whannell, sister of John's wife. They had three daughters, Jessie (b. 1866), Mary (b. 1868) and Blanche (b. 1872). He eventually moved to Queensland, but Margaret was reluctant to live in isolated Merivale station. In 1871 she visited Merivale, but soon returned to Melbourne for Blanche's birth. In 1874 they decided to live in Brisbane. Thomas found that she was drinking heavily, and sent her to Scotland where she died in 1877. McIlwraith fathered an illegitimate daughter in Victoria. In 1877 McIlwraith was a founding partner of the
North Australian Pastoral Company The North Australian Pastoral Company (NAPCO) is a large, privately owned, Australian cattle company which operates 14 cattle stations (as well as the Wainui farm and feedlot) covering over 60,000 km2, managing around 200,000 cattle, throu ...
. In 1879 he married Harriette Ann née Mosman. Harriette was the sister of
Hugh Mosman Hugh Mosman (11 February 1843 – 15 November 1909) was a mine owner and politician in Queensland, Australia. He discovered gold in Charters Towers. He was a Member of the Queensland Legislative Council. Early life Mosman was born on 11 Febru ...
, who discovered gold in
Charters Towers Charters Towers is a rural town in the Charters Towers Region, Queensland, Australia. It is by road south-west from Townsville on the Flinders Highway. During the last quarter of the 19th century, the town boomed as the rich gold deposits und ...
, and Cecilia Mosman, wife of his political colleague Arthur Palmer (also
Premier of Queensland The premier of Queensland is the head of government in the Australian state of Queensland. By convention the premier is the leader of the party with a parliamentary majority in the Legislative Assembly of Queensland. The premier is appointed ...
); she gave birth to his fourth legitimate daughter in 1881.


Parliamentary career

While working for J V A Bruce, he represented his employers in a dispute with the Victorian government, and attracted public attention. In 1864 he contested the Sandhurst seat in the Victorian Legislative Assembly but won few votes as a free trader. McIlwraith was elected to the Legislative Assembly in the seat of Maranoa in 1868. He joined the ministry of
Arthur Macalister Arthur Macalister, (18 January 1818 – 23 March 1883) was three times Premier of Queensland, Australia. Early life Macalister was born in Glasgow, Scotland, son of John Macalister, a cabinet maker, and his wife Mary, ''née'' Scoullar. Ma ...
in January 1874 becoming Secretary for Public Works and Mines. He resigned from these posts in October of that year. The government of John Douglas was defeated in 1879 after a series of severe
drought A drought is a period of drier-than-normal conditions.Douville, H., K. Raghavan, J. Renwick, R.P. Allan, P.A. Arias, M. Barlow, R. Cerezo-Mota, A. Cherchi, T.Y. Gan, J. Gergis, D.  Jiang, A.  Khan, W.  Pokam Mba, D.  Rosenfeld, J. Tierney, ...
s and McIlwraith became premier for the first time. He quickly worked to ameliorate the colony's finances and with the assistance of a return of agricultural prosperity he turned the
budget deficit Within the budgetary process, deficit spending is the amount by which spending exceeds revenue over a particular period of time, also called simply deficit, or budget deficit, the opposite of budget surplus. The term may be applied to the budg ...
into a surplus. Queensland at this stage was seeing increasing numbers of immigrants and McIlwraith oversaw the colony's economic development. The McIlwraith government introduced the divisional system of
local government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of governance or public administration within a particular sovereign state. Local governments typically constitute a subdivision of a higher-level political or administrative unit, such a ...
to the larger part of Queensland and assisted in establishing a
postal service The mail or post is a system for physically transporting postcards, letters, and parcels. A postal service can be private or public, though many governments place restrictions on private systems. Since the mid-19th century, national postal sy ...
through the
Torres Strait Islands The Torres Strait Islands are an archipelago of at least 274 small islands in the Torres Strait, a waterway separating far northern continental Australia's Cape York Peninsula and the island of New Guinea. They span an area of , but their tot ...
. In 1882 he was
knighted A knight is a person granted an honorary title of a knighthood by a head of state (including the pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the church, or the country, especially in a military capacity. The concept of a knighthood ...
. The Australian colonies were extremely anxious about
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...
colonial activities in the region, it became clear that the German government was planning to annex eastern
New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is ...
, to Queensland's north. McIlwraith took the extraordinary step of attempting to annex New Guinea for Queensland; he employed
Henry Chester Henry Marjoribanks Chester (30 December 1832 – 3 October 1914) was a public servant and police magistrate in colonial Queensland. Chester was born in London, England, son of William Chester, and educated at Christ's Hospital, the London School ...
to proclaim the Queen's sovereignty which occurred on 4 April 1883. This was later disallowed by the British
Secretary of State for the Colonies The secretary of state for the colonies or colonial secretary was the Cabinet of the United Kingdom's government minister, minister in charge of managing certain parts of the British Empire. The colonial secretary never had responsibility for t ...
,
Lord Derby Edward George Geoffrey Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby (29 March 1799 – 23 October 1869), known as Lord Stanley from 1834 to 1851, was a British statesman and Conservative politician who served three times as Prime Minister of the United K ...
on the basis that a colonial government had no authority to annex other colonies. Indignation at this apparent slight to colonial prerogatives incited the gathering of an Intercolonial Convention in November and December 1883, with federation and annexation on its agenda. This proved to be a first step in the federation movement, and more quickly resulted in the establishment in 1884 of the
Federal Council of Australasia The Federal Council of Australasia was a forerunner to the current Commonwealth of Australia, though its structure and members were different. The final (and successful) push for the Federal Council came at a "Convention" on 28 November 1883, wh ...
. Orders were eventually given to establish
British New Guinea The Territory of Papua comprised the southeastern quarter of the island of New Guinea from 1883 to 1975. In 1883, the Government of Colony of Queensland, Queensland annexed this territory for the British Empire. The United Kingdom Government ...
as a protectorate on the southern coast of the eastern coast of New Guinea on 6 November 1884. However, a well-informed German Navy had secretly landed, annexing the northern coast under the name ‘
Kaiser-Wilhelmsland Kaiser-Wilhelmsland ("Emperor William's Land") formed part of German New Guinea (), the South Pacific protectorate of the German Empire. Named in honour of Wilhelm I, who reigned as German Emperor () from 1871 to 1888, it included the northern ...
’ three days earlier. News about
German New Guinea German New Guinea () consisted of the northeastern part of the island of New Guinea and several nearby island groups, and was part of the German colonial empire. The mainland part of the territory, called , became a German protectorate in 188 ...
was successfully kept a secret until it finally broke on 22 December that year. The following day an irate McIlwraith told the Queensland parliament that British conduct in this affair constituted "the grossest piece of treachery on the part of the English government to the colonies that has ever been perpetrated". In 1883 a government proposal to raise funds for the construction of a transcontinental
railway Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in railway track, tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel railway track, rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of ...
line by a system of land grants was attacked for
corruption Corruption is a form of dishonesty or a criminal offense that is undertaken by a person or an organization that is entrusted in a position of authority to acquire illicit benefits or abuse power for one's gain. Corruption may involve activities ...
in allocation of grants. McIlwraith lost office to his rival,
Samuel Griffith Sir Samuel Walker Griffith (21 June 1845 – 9 August 1920) was an Australian judge and politician who served as the inaugural Chief Justice of Australia, in office from 1903 to 1919. He also served a term as Chief Justice of Queensland and ...
, in November and retired from politics in 1886. McIlwraith returned to stand for Parliament in 1888, this time as member for North Brisbane. His "National Australia Party" won a majority in the elections and he again became Premier and Treasurer. He came into conflict with the colony's Governor, Sir Anthony Musgrave over the exercise of the
royal pardon In the English and British tradition, the royal prerogative of mercy is one of the historic royal prerogatives of the British monarch, by which they can grant pardons (informally known as a royal pardon) to convicted persons. The royal prerog ...
. Musgrave died in October and McIlwraith petitioned the new Colonial Secretary
Lord Knutsford Henry Thurstan Holland, 1st Viscount Knutsford, (3 August 1825 – 29 January 1914), known as Sir Henry Holland, Bt, from 1873 to 1888 and as The Lord Knutsford from 1888 to 1895, was a British Conservative politician, best known for serving a ...
, to allow the Queensland government to be consulted on the choice of governor. Knutsford refused and appointed Sir
Harry Blake Harry Cooper Blake (June 16, 1874 – October 14, 1919), sometimes known by the nickname "Dude", was an American outfielder in Major League Baseball who played in the late 19th century. He played for the Cleveland Spiders (1894–1898) and for ...
. The local legislature problematically declined to ratify the appointment, but henceforth it was understood that the colonies would be consulted in vice-regal appoinyments. In November of that year ill-health forced McIlwraith to resign in favour of
Boyd Dunlop Morehead Boyd Dunlop Morehead (24 August 1843 – 30 October 1905) was a politician in Queensland, Australia. He was Premier of Queensland from November 1888 to June 1890. Early life Boyd Morehead was born in Sydney, New South Wales, the second son ...
, whereupon he travelled to China and Japan. After his return McIlwraith's relationship with his colleagues deteriorated, and in August 1890 he formed an alliance (later known as the " Continuous Ministry") with his erstwhile foe to become Treasurer in the government of
Sir Samuel Griffith Sir Samuel Walker Griffith (21 June 1845 – 9 August 1920) was an Australian judge and politician who served as the inaugural Chief Justice of Australia, in office from 1903 to 1919. He also served a term as Chief Justice of Queensland and t ...
. In March 1893 Griffith stepped down to join the
Supreme Court of Queensland The Supreme Court of Queensland is the highest court in the Australian State of Queensland. It was formerly the Brisbane Supreme Court, in the colony of Queensland. The original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court allows its trial division to ...
and McIlwraith became Premier again. His health was still poor and in October he resigned in favour of
Hugh Nelson Hugh Nelson may refer to: *Hugh Nelson (Australian politician) (1833–1906), Premier of Queensland, Australia *Hugh Nelson (Virginia politician) (1768–1836), American politician *Hugh Nelson (Canadian politician) (1830–1893), Canadian politicia ...
, contenting himself with the cabinet position of Chief Secretary and secretary for railways until 29 March 1895. The ''Dictionary of Australian of Biography''Percival Searle
McIlwraith, Sir Thomas (1835–1900)
, ''Dictionary of Australian of Biography'', Angus and Robertson, 1949. Retrieved on 11 July 2009.
says: :''McIlwraith was a big man with big ideas, but his indifferent health did not allow him to successfully carry the full burden of them. He was rugged and masterful, possibly on occasions not over-scrupulous, with a habit of getting his own way by sheer force of character rather than by intellectual ability. For nearly 25 years he was one of the greatest personalities in Queensland. ''


After politics

Since 1888 the London directors of McIlwraith's Queensland Investment and Land Mortgage Co. had complained about the practices of the local board, and in 1892 they charged McIlwraith, Palmer and two others with fraud. The remaining years of his life were surrounded in financial scandal and large financial losses by institutions that he was involved with. Although McIlwraith left for England on 15 January 1895, he was still a minister of the Queensland cabinet until 25 November 1897 when the Labor Party with government support succeeded in passing a resolution that he should retire. On 9 December he resigned from the Executive Council. McIlwraith's aspirations for political integration of the Australian colonies centred on the Federal Council of Australasia, and he actively sought the entry of New South Wales into this body. In the 1899 referendum on the creation of a Commonwealth of Australia he urged Queenslanders to vote No to placing Queensland in the "hands of men unacquainted with the past, and who cannot in full share our hopes for the future". McIlwraith died in London on 17 July 1900 and was buried at Ayr.


Legacy

The following places were named after him: *
McIlwraith, Queensland McIlwraith is a rural locality in the Bundaberg Region, Queensland, Australia. In the , McIlwraith had a population of 202 people. Geography Uping is a neighbourhood within the locality (). It takes its name from the former Uping railway stati ...
, a locality in the
Bundaberg Region The Bundaberg Region is a local government area in the Wide Bay–Burnett region of Queensland, Australia, about north of Brisbane, the state capital. It is centred on the city of Bundaberg, and also contains a significant rural area surroundin ...
*
McIlwraith Range The McIlwraith Range is a rugged, dissected granite plateau on Cape York Peninsula of Far North Queensland, Australia. Part of the Great Dividing Range, the McIlwraith Range covers about and lies about east of the town of Coen, and north o ...
, Queensland, a mountain range in the
Cook Shire The Shire of Cook (The Shire) is a local government area in Far North Queensland, Australia. The Shire covers most of the eastern and central parts of Cape York Peninsula, the most northerly section of the Australian mainland. It covers an area ...
State Library of Queensland currently holds the Sir Thomas McIlwraith Papers 1839-1897 which contains legal documents, correspondence, accounts, financial records and telegrams relating to McIlwraith.


See also

*
Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, 1868–1870 This is a list of members of the 4th Legislative Assembly of Queensland from 1868 to 1870, as elected at the 1868 colonial elections held between 14 September 1868 and 6 October 1868 (due to problems of distance and communications, it was not po ...
; 1870–1871; 1873–1878; 1878–1883; 1883–1888; 1888–1893; 1893–1896


Notes


References

* Joyce R. B. & Murphy, D. J. (Ed.): Queensland Political Portraits, St Lucia (University of Queensland Press), 1978.


Further reading

*


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:McIlwraith, Thomas Premiers of Queensland Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly Colony of Queensland people 1835 births 1900 deaths Knights Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George People from Ayr Treasurers of Queensland Scottish emigrants to colonial Australia Alumni of the University of Glasgow 19th-century Australian politicians Mosman family