General Sir Ralph Darling (1772 – 2 April 1858) was a British Army officer and colonial administrator who served as Governor of New South Wales from 1825 to 1831. His period of governorship was unpopular, with Darling being broadly regarded as a tyrant. He introduced austere policies that resulted in croneyism, prisoner abuse, curtailment of press freedoms, discrimination against emancipists, obstruction of representative government, theatrical entertainment bans and injustices toward Indigenous Australians. During his time as Governor, a significant area of eastern Australia was explored by the British with local geographical features being named after him including the Darling River and the Darling Downs, along with Darling Harbour in Sydney.

Early life

Born in Ireland around 1772, Ralph Darling was the eldest son of Christopher Darling, an English sergeant, and later military adjutant, in the 45th Regiment of Foot of the British Army. While his father was away on service during the American Revolutionary War, it is likely that Ralph spent his childhood in either England or Ireland with his mother and siblings.

In 1785, the 45th Regiment was transferred to the Caribbean island of Grenada where Christopher Darling became the regiment's quartermaster. He took his family, including Ralph aged 13, with him.

Military secretary and lieutenant-colonel

In August 1796, Darling's efforts were rewarded and he was appointed as military secretary to Sir Ralph Abercromby, the British commander-in-chief in the West Indies. He was also promoted to the rank of captain in the 27th Regiment and was involved in the invasion of Trinidad in 1797. Darling accumulated wealth from his promotions and the prizes of war attained from military operations, and in 1801 he was able to buy a commission as a lieutenant-colonel in the 69th Regiment.

Acting Governor of Mauritius

In February 1819

Darling also failed to restrict the slave trade into Mauritius, overturning many of the anti-slavery policies brought in by the previous acting governor Gage John Hall. There were around 55,000 slaves labouring on plantations in Mauritius while Darling was in charge, with some being designated as government slaves working directly for the Darling administration. Chain gangs of female slaves were used by Darling as street sweepers and he also imported hundreds of convicts from Ceylon to work as forced labourers building roads and other government infrastructure. However, Darling was able to pass some restrictive acts against newspaper editors which resulted in the jailing of one of his most vociferous critics, Edward Smith Hall, who was the editor of The Monitor.

The government advisory bodies of the Legislative Council of New South Wales and the Executive Council were also stacked with close ideological associates of Darling such as Archdeacon Thomas Hobbes Scott and Alexander Macleay. Darling consulted with these councils only irregularly and mostly for issues he regarded as unimportant. This opposition to representative government also extended to the courts where he obstructed or delayed civilian trial by jury reforms, preferring to keep appointed military juries especially for criminal cases.

Darling's nepotism also extended to those he chose to explore the uncolonised regions of New South Wales. In particular, Captain Charles Sturt, who was related through marriage to Darling's wife, was selected to conduct important expeditions into the interior of the continent over more qualified candidates such as the surveyor Sir Thomas Mitchell. In order to expedite the many land grants Darling made, he actively encouraged the charting and surveying of the colony. In 1826 he defined the Nineteen Counties which were the limits of location in the colony of New South Wales. From 1831 the granting of free land ceased and the only land that was to be made available for sale was within the Nineteen Counties.

In 1826, Darling deployed the New South Wales Mounted Police to the Hunter River area to subdue Aboriginal resistance. Lieutenant Nathaniel Lowe of the police led a number of operations characterised by the summary executions of supposed Aboriginal ringleaders. At least two large massacres of Aboriginal Australians were also perpetrated by the mounted police and armed colonists at this time. An investigation exonerated Lowe of any wrongdoing, while Darling himself encouraged and supported the settlers (who were often of a military background) in their "vigorous measures" against the Aboriginal people. Darling issued a proclamation in 1831 banning trade in heads out of New Zealand saying that there was reason to believe that the trade tended to increase the sacrifice of human life.

The Sudds Thompson scandal

thumb|Convicted soldiers, Joseph Sudds and Patrick Thompson, chained with spiked iron collars

In keeping with official policy and the governor's own disciplinarian instincts, Darling's administration certainly strengthened the punitive aspects of transportation. Perhaps the most controversial act of his tenure was the harsh treatment of soldiers Joseph Sudds and Patrick Thompson, who in 1826 had committed theft in the belief that seven years in an outlying penal colony would be an easier life than two decades of army discipline. As an example to others, the Governor personally modified their conviction and had them humiliated in front of their regiment, placed in irons and assigned to a chain gang. Darling also ordered spiked collars to be attached to their necks, which were in use during his time in Mauritius as implements to prevent slaves from being able to rest their heads. Less than a week after the conviction, Joseph Sudds died while undergoing this punishment. the following claims regarding Governor Darling's "act of tryanny" of 22 November 1826 are made: "it was given forth that Sudds had died from combined dropsy and bronchitis. Mr. Wentworth – a native-born Australian barrister, of some eloquence and intense capacity for hating – would not rest satisfied with this explanation, and little by little the facts of the case leaked out"; "the ingenious Darling had placed round their necks spiked iron collars attached by another set of chains to the ankle fetters. The projecting spikes prevented the unhappy men from lying down at ease, and the connecting chains were short enough to prevent them from standing upright. Under the effects of this treatment Sudds had died. Public fury now knew no bounds. Tradesmen put up their shutters as though in mourning for some national calamity. The fiercest denunciations met the Governor on all sides, and he was accused of wilful murder".

After Sudds' death, Thompson was taken in a bullock-cart to Penrith gaol, and thence conveyed to "No. 1, Iron-chain-gang party" on Lapstone-hill, being at the face of the Blue Mountains. At three o’clock on the first day he was taken out and set to work with the gang, having the spiked collar that had killed Sudds on his neck the whole time. After eight hot days of this work Thompson refused to continue working and was taken to gaol and was finally sent on board the hulks. Thompson was eventually ordered to rejoin his regiment (Sydney Gazette, 28 March 1829), and was sent back to England in October 1829 (Australian, 23 October 1829).

Eliza's widowed mother Ann Dumaresq was a devout philanthropist, and lived in Cheltenham. Eliza was influenced by Hannah More and Sarah Trimmer. In Australia, she consulted the penal reformer Elizabeth Fry, with reference in particular to female convicts. She was also involved in the establishment of the Female School of Industry at Parramatta.

After Darling's position in New South Wales ended, the family returned to England. They lived at Cheltenham, then Brighton where Darling died in 1858.

Named after Ralph Darling

The following features are named after Ralph Darling or members of his immediate family:

  • Darling River
  • Darling Harbour
  • Darling Downs
  • Darling Scarp, also referred to as the Darling Range or Darling Ranges
  • Darling Causeway, a landform in the Blue Mountains
  • Darling Street, the main thoroughfare of Balmain
  • The Sydney suburbs of Darlinghurst and Darling Point

The Logan River in South-East Queensland was named the Darling River in 1826 by Captain Patrick Logan, in honour of the then-Governor Darling. However, Darling decided to, "[return] the compliment by renaming the river the Logan, to recognise Logan's enthusiasm and efficiency."

Darling appears as a character in the radio play Spoiled Darlings and the mini series The Patriots.

References

Sources

  • Duyker, Edward (June 1985), "An Elegant Defence of a Colonial Governor", Australian Rationalist Quarterly, No. 22, p. 14.

Additional resources listed by the Australian Dictionary of Biography

  • Historical Records of Australia, Series I, volumes 12–17
  • Edw. Smith Hall (1833), Reply in Refutation of the Pamphlets of Lieut.-Gen. R. Darling (London: R. Robinson [sic])
  • L. N. Rose (1922), "The Administration of Governor Darling", Journal and Proceedings (Royal Australian Historical Society), vol 8, part 2, pp 49–96 and vol 8, part 3, pp 97–176
  • Parliamentary Debates (Great Britain) (3), 29, 30
  • Parliamentary Papers (House of Commons, Great Britain), 1828 (538), 1830 (586), 1830–31 (241), 1831–32 (163, 620), 1835 (580)
  • A. S. Forbes, Sydney Society in Crown Colony Days (State Library of New South Wales)
  • manuscript catalogue under Ralph Darling (State Library of New South Wales)
  • Darling's Commission as NSW governor (document scans, discussion)
  • Detailed discussion of the Sudds and Thompson case
  • Colonial Secretary's papers 1822–1877, State Library of Queensland- includes digitised correspondence, reports and letters written by Darling to the Colonial Secretary of New South Wales, including matters relating to the Moreton Bay settlement

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