William Denison

47

William Denison : biography

3 May 1804 – 19 January 1871

Honours

The Institution of Civil Engineers in England bestowed upon him the prestigious Telford Medal for his paper on his experiments testing the strength of Canadian timber. He was one of the first recipients of this prize.

Denison was knighted before leaving for Tasmania and was created a K.C.B. in 1856. The federal electoral Division of Denison and the Tasmanian Division of Denison are named for Denison.

Early life

Denison was the third son of John Denison, of Ossington, M.P. for Chichester and was born in London, England and educated at Eton College and the Royal Military College and entered the Royal Engineers in 1826. In November 1838 he married Caroline Hornby.

Governor of Madras

In India his training as an engineer was useful in connexion with irrigation of which he was a strong advocate. In November 1863, when Lord Elgin died, Denison for two months became Governor-General of India. In March 1866 he returned to England and prepared his Varieties of Vice-Regal Life, which appeared in two volumes in 1870. He died in East Sheen, Surrey and was survived by his wife, six sons and four daughters.

Governor of New South Wales

In 1856, Denison became both Governor of New South Wales and "Governor-General in and over all our Colonies of New South Wales, Van Diemen’s Land, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia", a new title, which implied a role in encouraging co-operation between the colonies. In response to the Crimean War, he strengthened Sydney’s defences, strengthening the batteries on Dawes Point and building Fort Denison. He inaugurated the bicameral system of representative government in New South Wales, and showed wisdom and tact in his dealings with the problems which arose, including the handing of executive power to the new Parliament. He successfully opposed the Colonial Office’s initial decision to put New England and the Clarence Valley in the new colony of Queensland. In 1859, he appointed Queensland’s first Legislative Council and began the process of electing a Legislative Assembly, inaugurated on 22 May 1860. While he opened the colony’s first railway in 1855, he ignored the problem of different rail gauges despite his role as Governor-General, although he was more active in developing arrangements for paying for postal connections with the United Kingdom, ameliorating inter-colonial tariffs and co-operation over the provision of lighthouses.

Denison was responsible for closing the penal colony on Norfolk Island and for resettling the mutineers of the Bounty from Pitcairn Island. He initially instructed that the Island, except for certain public reserves would be vested in the Pitcairners, and was then forced by the Colonial Office to withdraw the vesting of land, leading to a lasting grievance. When visiting New Zealand gave sensible advice to Colonel Gore Browne, which if followed, might have averted the New Zealand land wars. In November 1860 he received word that he had been appointed governor of Madras, and left Sydney on 22 January 1861.