William Charles Wentworth (August 179020 March 1872)

Due to his mother being a felon and his conception being out of wedlock, confusion has existed around the exact date of William's birth. His father, however, acknowledged him as a legitimate son and he became a part of colonial society as a Wentworth family member.

Early life

William Crowley, as he was then known, commenced his formal education at the age of five on Norfolk Island, "a woman of good character" being his teacher.

Wentworth failed to gain entry into both the East India Company College and the Royal Military Academy. With his career prospects blunted, he returned to Sydney in 1810. He rode his father's horse Gig to victory at Hyde Park in the first official horse races on Australian soil.

<blockquote>On the Eleventh of May our party consisting of Mr. Gregory Blaxland, Lieutenant Lawson and Myself with four servants quitted Mr. Gregory Blaxland's farm on the South Creek and on the 29th of the June Month descended from the Mountain into forest land having travelled as nearly as I can compute about 60 Miles.</blockquote>

In the journal, Wentworth describes the landscapes they were exploring:

Studying in England

Wentworth returned to England in 1816, where he studied law at the Magdalene and Peterhouse colleges at Cambridge University. He became a barrister and was admitted to the bar in 1822.

In between studying and writing, Wentworth also travelled to Europe, spending much of his time in Paris. He formulated an idea of establishing himself as a leader of a pastoral aristocracy in New South Wales and attempted to arrange his marriage with Elizabeth Macarthur, the daughter of the highly influential colonist John Macarthur. Wentworth however failed in this attempt after arguing with the Macarthur patriarch over his convict heritage and a loan. It served as the source material for the first theatrical play set in Van Diemen's Land (modern-day Tasmania), the bushranging melodrama Michael Howe the Terror! of Van Diemen's Land, which premiered in London in 1821.

In 1823, he also published an epic poem Australasia, the first book of verse by a native-born Australian poet, which contains the lines:

:And, O Britannia!... may this—thy last-born infant—then arise,

:To glad thy heart, and greet thy parent eyes;

:And Australasia float, with flag unfurl'd,

:A new Britannia in another world!

As well as describing the scenery Wentworth saw in the Blue Mountains, the poem featured a romanticised portrayal of the lifestyle of Aboriginal Australians. They actively campaigned for self-government and trial by jury by establishing The Australian (not to be confused with the present-day paper of the same name), the colony's first privately owned paper. Governor Sir Thomas Brisbane realised there was little point in continuing to censor The Sydney Gazette when the former was uncensored, and so government censorship of newspapers was abandoned in 1824, and the freedom of the press began in Australia. With an editorial leaning toward the rights of ex-convicts (known as emancipists), the paper was in frequent conflict with Governor Ralph Darling, who attempted unsuccessfully to have it banned in 1826. Wentworth became a director of the Bank of New South Wales in 1825.

That year, Wentworth declared his disinterest in holding public office. "As a mere private person I might lead the colony, but as a servant of the Governor I could only conform to his whims, which would neither suit my tastes nor principles," he reasoned.

Wentworth's support for the rights of emancipists pitted him against the opposing "exclusive" faction. During a public meeting to commemorate the outgoing Governor Brisbane, Wentworth pined to deprive them "of their venom and their fangs”. He moved moved a successful motion requesting that Brisbane lobby Westminster for “the immediate establishment” of trial by jury and “Taxation by Representation.” Wentworth and Wardell opined in The Australian:

thumb|[[Sarah Wentworth]]

On 26 October 1829, Wentworth married Sarah Cox, a convict-descended currency lass whom he had represented in her successful 1825 breach of promise suit. The proceeding had been the first such case in Australia.

Some of these properties were immense and became famous as highly valuable sheep and cattle stations. These included the 120,000 acre Yanko property, the 200,000 acre Tala station, the Wambianna cattle property and the Galathra and Burburgate holdings. Wentworth was able to obtain most of these vast accumulations of land for only the £10 annual squatting fee, and after stocking them, was able to sell the properties for considerable profit.

In 1839, Wentworth led a consortium of Sydney speculators in an attempt to acquire a large amount of land in New Zealand from the resident Ngāi Tahu people. In exchange for paying chief Tūhawaiki a lump sum of £100 with an annual payment of £50, as well as £20 upfront and £10 annually for the other chiefs, Wentworth laid claim to 8 million hectares, which amounted to around a third of the entire New Zealand land mass. This included the third of the South Island purchased by Edward Gibbon Wakefield from Te Rauparaha, an enemy of the chiefs Wentworth dealt with. The deed, 1000 words long, was densely written. The Ngāi Tahu chiefs meanwhile received legal counsel from Wentworth, who advised them not to assent to any treaty with Governor George Gipps unless it recognised sales they made.

Budding politician

thumb|[[Wentworth–Bland flag|Flag used by Wentworth and William Bland as candidates for the Legislative Council]]

During the 1830s, Wentworth continued to push his ideals of free emigration, trial by jury, rights for emancipists and elected representation. On 29 May 1835, he chaired a meeting to discuss Henry Lytton Bulwer's proposal for a colonial committee to represent New South Wales. The committee would act through a Parliamentary Advocate, for which Bulwer nominated himself. The attendees resolved to raise £2,000 for the position's establishment, by establishing the Australian Patriotic Association. Someone complained about the £5 fee for directing members; Wentworth reportedly remarked that "ignorance and poverty went together," and argued that the stipulation would ensure "men of talent, education and experience and exclude only the ignorant pretender.” He committed £50 to the organisation.

Co-established by Wentworth and ex-convict William Bland, it is believed to have been the first political party in Australia. While it began as a broad church, division soon grew over the rights of emancipists. This was augmented by Wentworth drafting two bills on its behalf, which proposed not just representative government, but also the repeal of all restrictions on trial by jury. Wentworth was elected to the Council in 1843 for Town of Sydney and soon became the leader of the conservative party, opposed to the liberal-minded members led by Charles Cowper. The political climate in New South Wales had changed, and with Wentworth becoming one of the wealthiest and most powerful landholders in the colony, his views became very conservative.

In 1851, he argued to retain the death penalty, arguing that "hardened felons, convicted of repeated grave offences would be punished best by death" and that such punishment would be "more reformatory in its effects" than any other. He argued that the British Government "had in its system of punishment gone too far, and had gone from the extreme of too great severity to too little." In light of these sentiments, The Australian, the progressive paper that Wentworth was no longer associated with, stated in the early 1850s that Wentworth's opinions were then worth nothing. This preceded Australian federation in 1901. The company devised the railway line between Newcastle and Maitland, though it ran into financial trouble and was bought by the Government during construction. Wentworth foreshadowed the line's extension to Scone up north and Sydney down south; the line ultimately developed into the Great Northern Railway connecting Sydney and Queensland.

At the end of his career, Wentworth would change tact on the issue of land administration, agreeing to land reforms opposed by the squatters.</blockquote>In 1844, there was a push to reform the judicial system to allow evidence to be given by Aboriginals. Wentworth was vociferous in his opposition, claiming that it would be "quite as defensible" to receive for evidence "the chatterings of the ourang-outang as of this savage race," drawing a rebuke from fellow MLC Roger Therry. When the issue was brought before the Council again in 1849, he referred to the proposal as "most fatal to the natives themselves [and] most cruel to the white inhabitants." He simultaneously referred to the hangings of the 1838 Myall Creek massacre perpetrators as "judicial murder" – his obituary reported that "the Crown was thought by Mr. Wentworth, and by many more, to have strained the law against those who slew the savages," with their executions "bitterly and even fiercely resented by Wentworth, and ... perhaps, never forgiven or forgotten." The first Commandant of the Native Police for the northern districts, Frederick Walker, was a personal friend of Wentworth's who also managed his immense property at Tala on the Murrumbidgee.

Wentworth employed a large number of Aboriginal stockmen.<blockquote>...instead of the clergy and pastors of the several denominations being allowed to impart religious instruction in the schools, the children be allowed to be absent from school one day in every week exclusive of Sunday, for the purpose of receiving such instruction elsewhere...</blockquote>Wentworth's amendment passed and National Board of Education was established in 1848 following a change of governor; schools were established for both sexes.thumb|Wentworth was instrumental in the establishment of the [[University of Sydney]]Wentworth was also key in the establishment of the University of Sydney, one of the first public and secular universities in the British Empire.</blockquote>

He promoted access on the basis of merit rather than religious or social status.<blockquote>No doubt on the subject of education great and deplorable apathy had existed in the colony; but while he wished not to excuse the community from their share of the blame, he must confess that this apathy seemed to him to be more chargeable on the Government than on the public. If it was the duty of the governments of other colonies to provide education for the people, that duty became infinitely more imperious here. If it was the duty of the State to instruct the free and virtuous population of those colonies, how much greater the necessity to enlighten the tainted population of this ... it was the paramount duty of the Government to provide for the instruction of the people, and to reclaim it from the mood taint attaching to it, by elevating and enlightening the minds of its inhabitants.</blockquote>Wentworth was vociferous on the university's secular mandate, declaring that clergy "ought to be excluded altogether from ... [its] management ... its gates must be open to all whether they were disciples of Moses, of Jesus, of Brahmin, of Mohammed, of Vishnu or of Buddha." praised Wentworth for his efforts to establish the university. The paper perceived "in some of his recent actions evidence of a latent consciousness of not having discharged, his duty to his country, and of a desire to make some expiation for his culpable neglect, not to use a stronger term."

It took two attempts on Wentworth's behalf before the plan was finally adopted, culminating in the passage of the University of Sydney Act 1850 (NSW) on 24 September 1850. Wentworth was among the first members of the university's senate.

Wentworth helped endow the new university. Donations he made funded the establishment of the Wentworth Medal in 1854 and the Wentworth Fellowship in 2020. The 1972-built Wentworth Building is named after him, and a statue of him stands in the Great Hall.

thumb|The [[Parliament of New South Wales, Australia's oldest, was devised chiefly by Wentworth. A portrait of him is displayed in the Legislative Assembly chamber]]

In 1853, Wentworth chaired a committee to draft a new constitution for New South Wales, which was to receive full responsible self-government from Britain. His draft provided for a powerful unelected Legislative Council and an elected Legislative Assembly with high property qualifications for voting and membership. He also suggested the establishment of a colonial peerage drawn from the landowning class. He remarked that he "agreed with that ancient and venerable constitution that treated those who had no property as infants, or idiots, unfit to have any voice in the management of the State." This draft aroused the bitter opposition of the democrats and radicals such as Daniel Deniehy, who ridiculed Wentworth's plans for what he called a "bunyip aristocracy". The draft constitution was substantially changed to make it more democratic, although the Legislative Council remained unelected.

Once in England, he founded the 'General Association for the Australian Colonies', whose object was to obtain a federal assembly for the whole of Australia. His combined wealth at the time of his passing was £170,000 ().

Marriage and family

Wentworth had hoped to marry Elizabeth Macarthur, daughter of Elizabeth and John Macarthur, believing such a Wentworth–Macarthur union would ensure him as the head of the pastoral aristocracy. Macarthur did not approve the marriage, however, particularly after Macarthur and Wentworth had a dispute over a loan of money. Carol Liston, biographer of Sarah Wentworth, noted that her commissioning of various domestic duties was fundamental to the success of her husband and children. William and Sarah had seven daughters and three sons:<sup>:21-22</sup>

  • Fitzwilliam Wentworth (1833–1915) married Mary Jane Hill, daughter of George Hill
  • William Charles Wentworth III (1871–1949) married Florence Denise Griffiths, daughter of George Neville Griffiths
  • William Charles Wentworth IV (1907–2003) (known as Bill Wentworth, Liberal member of Parliament 1949–77, inaugural Minister in charge of Aboriginal Affairs under the Prime Minister)
  • Diana Wentworth Wentworth married Mungo Ballardie MacCallum (1913–99)
  • Mungo Wentworth MacCallum (1941–2020)
  • Sarah Eleanor Wentworth (1835–1857)
  • Eliza Sophia Wentworth (1838–1898)
  • Isabella Christiana (Christina) Wentworth (1840–1856)
  • Laura Wentworth (1842–1887) married Henry William Keays-Young in 1872.
  • Edith Wentworth (1845–1891) married Rev. Sir Charles Gordon-Cumming-Dunbar, 9th Baronet in 1872.
  • D'Arcy Bland Wentworth (1848–1922).

In 1830, he fathered a child, Henry, out of wedlock with Jemima Eagar, the estranged wife of Edward Eagar. Wentworth had supported her with money and a house on Macquarie Street after Edward abandoned her. Wentworth Park in Sydney's Inner West was named after Wentworth in 1882.

The University of Sydney Wentworth Medal was established in 1854 from a gift of £200 from Wentworth. It was initially presented to the best essay in English prose and now rewards "an outstanding essay addressing a nominated question."

A large portrait of Wentworth was erected in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly in 1859 following a motion from Sir Henry Parkes.

The Wentworths' estate in Vaucluse became Australia's first official house museum, established as such in 1915. Wentworth is recognised in the name of the Wentworth Memorial Church, built in honour of servicemen and women of the Second World War. The church and the adjacent Wentworth Mausoleum fall within the former boundaries of the Vaucluse estate.

Wentworth and Wardell's clash with Governor Darling was dramatised in the 1940 radio play Spoiled Darlings and the 1962 TV series The Patriots, both broadcast by the ABC. Wentworth also appears as a character in the 1935 film Heritage (1935).

In 1963 he was honoured, together with Blaxland and Lawson, on a postage stamp issued by Australia Post depicting the Blue Mountains crossing. He was again in 1974 on the anniversary of the first independent newspaper being founded.

A statue of Wentworth, sculpted by Pietro Tenerani of Rome, stands at the University of Sydney. Another statue of Wentworth is located on the exterior of the Department of Lands building in Sydney. A bust of him was unveiled in Coronation Park, Wentworth Falls in 2016.

Historian Manning Clark described Wentworth as "Australia's greatest native son," which Jeremy Stoljar writes "seems to have been a description of Wentworth's standing in the colony at the time – specifically, at about the time of Wentworth's marriage in 1829". K. R. Cramp of the Royal Australian Historical Society refers to him as "Australia's greatest son" in his booklet William Charles Wentworth of Vaucluse House, first published in 1918. Wentworth's contemporary Robert Lowe referred to the unselfish devotion to his nation by "this great son of Australia".

Works

  • A Statistical Account of the British Settlements in Australasia, 1819
  • Australasia: a poem written for the Chancellor's Medal at the Cambridge commencement, July 1823, London: G. and W.B. Whittaker, 1823

Sources

  • Barton, The Poets and Prose Writers of New South Wales (Sydney, 1866)
  • Rusden, History of Australia (London, 1883)
  • Sir Bernard Burke. [https://books.google.com/books?id=PsccAAAAMAAJ] History of the Colonial Gentry Vol 1: 1891: pps.95-97: Wentworth
  • Lewis Deer and John Barr: Australia's First Patriot: The Story of William C. Wentworth: Angus & Robertson Ltd.: Sydney 1911.
  • K. R. Cramp, M. A.: William Charles Wentworth of Vaucluse House: A.H. Pettifer Government Printer: Third Edition 1923
  • Michael Persse: Wentworth, William Charles (1790–1872)