William Charles Wentworth (1790 - 1872)

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Biography

William Wentworth was an Australian explorer.

William Wentworth is Notable.

In 1813 William Charles Wentworth, Gregory Blaxland and William Lawson found a route across the Blue Mountains west of Sydney and opened up the grazing lands of inland New South Wales

William Charles Wentworth was the son of Catherine Crowley and D'Arcy Wentworth. D'Arcy was a distant cousin of the aristocratic Wentworth family. He was born in Ireland in 1762, but had left to train as a surgeon in London. After being acquitted four times of highway robbery, to avoid a further prosecution D'Arcy took the position of assistant surgeon to the new colony of New South Wales and sailed on the Neptune. On board the ship was Catherine Crowley, a seventeen year old girl, who had been convicted at the Staffordshire Assizes in July 1788 of feloniously stealing wearing apparel and sheets from her employer, and sentenced to transportation for seven years.

The Neptune arrived at Sydney in June 1790, as part of the Second Fleet. Shortly after their arrival in Sydney, D'Arcy Wentworth and Catherine Crowley sailed on the Surprize for Norfolk Island, arriving there on 7 August 1790. They had three children at Norfolk Island. Their first child William was born 13 August 1790 on board the ship at Norfolk Island.^[1]

William Wentworth arrived in Sydney in 1796 , with his parents, D'Arcy and Catherine. The family at first lived at Parramatta, where D'Arcy was appointed as Assistant Surgeon, D'Arcy became a substntial landowner, with homes in Sydney, Parramatta, and Homebush.

William's mother Catherine died on 6 January 1800 and was buried in St John's Cemetery Parramatta.

William was sent to England in 1802, where he was educated at a school in London. He returned to Sydney in 1810, where he was appointed acting Provost-Marshall by Governor Lachlan Macquarie, and given a grant of land of 1,750 acres (7 km2) adjoining the Nepean River and Bringelly Creek in the district of Camden, which he named "Vermont".^[2]

The crossing of the Blue Mountains
In 1813 William Wentworth , Gregory Blaxland and William Lawson, four servants, four horses, and five dogs, started a expedition to find a route across the Blue Mountains west of Sydney which would also open up the grazing lands.

Wentworth kept a journal of the exploration which begins by describing the first day of the journey:

On the Eleventh of May our party consisting of Mr. Gregory Blaxland, Lieutenant Lawson and Myself with four servants quitted Mr. Gregory Blaxlands 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 from Mr. Chapmans farm on the Nepean River although I do not imagine that we made more than 40 Miles of Westing.

At the end of their twenty-one-day passage, he later wrote:

The boundless champaign burst upon our sight

Till nearer seen the beauteous landscape grew,

Op'ning like Canaan on rapt Israel's view.

In his journal, Wentworth described the landscapes they were exploring:

A country of so singular a description could in my opinion only have been produced by some Mighty convulsion in Nature – Those immense unconnected perpendicular Masses of Mountain which are to be seen towards its Eastern Extremity towering above the Country around, seem to indicate that the whole of this tract has been formed out of the Materials of the primitive mountains of which these masses are the only parts that have withstood the violence of the concussion

He and Blaxland and Lawson were each granted another 1,000 acres (4.0 km2).^[3] The town of Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains is named after him.^[4]

William Wentworth returned to England in 1816. There he was admitted to the bar, travelled in Europe, and studied at Cambridge University.

In 1819 Wentworth published the first book written by an Australian:

A Statistical, Historical, and Political Description of the Colony of New South Wales and Its Dependent Settlements in Van Diemen's Land, With a Particular Enumeration of the Advantages Which These Colonies Offer for Emigration and Their Superiority in Many Respects Over Those Possessed by the United States of America
In his book he encourages emigration and proposes his ideas for reform.^[5]

In 1822 William Wentworth had completed his legal studies and was called to the bar.

The epic poem "Australasia": In 1823 he was admitted to Peterhouse, Cambridge. He wrote an epic poem "Australasia for the Chancellor's Medal, which achieved second place, and was published that year with a dedication to Lachlan Macquarie. It finishes with 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!

Return to Sydney, a legal career and newspaper proprietor
William Wentworth returned to Sydney in 1824, with Robert Wardell. They were both admitted to practise as barristers, and Wentworth also set up office at Macquarie Place as a solicitor, with a profit-sharing arrangement with solicitor Charles Chambers.^[6] Wentworth and Wardell had brought with them a printing press, and the first edition of The Australian was printed on 14 October 1824.

His father D'Arcy Wentworth died in 1827 and William inherited his property, he became one of the wealthiest men in the colony. He bought land at Vaucluse from John Piper and transformed the small cottage into Vaucluse House.

In 1829 William Wentworth married Sarah Cox (1805–1880). Sarah was the daughter of former convicts and William represented her in court against Captain John Payne for breach of promise of marriage.

William promoted the principles of trial by jury and representative government, and championed the emancipists against the exclusives. He inflamed public opinion against Governor Darling over the Sudds and Thompson case.^[2] When Darling departed in 1831 his ship sailed past thousands of revellers at a "fete" at Wentworth's estate overlooking the harbour. The Australian reported on 31 October: "Rejoice, Australia! DARLING'S reign has passed !".^[7]

In 1835 the Australian Patriotic Association was formed to agitate for an amended constitution. Wentworth was vice-president and submitted two alternative bills for consideration by the British government, with support from Governor Bourke and his successor, Sir George Gipps. Eventually the British government approved an Act granting a degree of representative government in 1842.^[2]

In 1840, in direct opposition to declared British policy, Wentworth and some associates bought from seven Maori chieftains, nearly a third of New Zealand. Governor Gipps blocked the scheme in the Legislative Council. As with Governor Darling previously, Wentworth started a campaign against Gipps in The Australian until the governor's departure in 1846.^[2]

Political Career
Wentworth entered the Legislative Council in 1843 at the head of the poll for Sydney.

He led the squatters in their demand for new land regulations. They won most of their demands in the Imperial Act of 1846.^[2]

He played a leading role in establishing in 1848-49 the first real system of state primary education in New South Wales. In 1849-50 he led the movement that resulted in the founding of the University of Sydney.^[2]

In 1852 the Colonial Office finally agreed that New South Wales should have responsible government. However the select committee which drafted the constitution in 1853, with Wentworth as chairman, only recommended a limited reform. Their proposal had a rural bias of the lower house and the upper house consisting of members of a hereditary colonial peerage. This plan was vociferously opposed in Sydney and public opinion was strongly against it. When the bill was passed there was no hereditary makeup of the proposed legislative council.^[2]

He spent his remaining days in England except for a brief return to Sydney in 1861-62. He lived at Merly House, near Wimborne, Dorset, where he died on 20 March 1872, As he had wished, his body was brought to Sydney, and after a state funeral on 6 May 1873 was laid to rest in a vault excavated in a rock on his estate at Vaucluse. A chapel was later erected over his tomb,

Family

In 1829 William Wentworth married Sarah Cox (1805–1880), with whom he had seven daughters and three sons:

• Thomasine Wentworth (1825–1913)
• William Charles Wentworth (1827–1859) died without issue
• Fanny Katherine Wentworth (1829–1893)
• Fitzwilliam Wentworth (1833–1915) married Mary Jane Hill
• 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), died without heirs.

Note: He also fathered at least one other child out of wedlock with Jamima Eagar, the estranged wife of Edward Eagar

Research Notes

William Charles Wentworth's Birth: 13 August is the date given by D'Arcy in a letter written by him later, although he stated the year 1791. Family tradition has his birth on board the ship between Sydney and Norfolk Island. This is discussed in the thesis: Kathleen Mary Dermody, "D'Arcy Wentworth 1762-1827 : A Second Chance," (PhD thesis, Australian National University, 1990), p.53. https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/bitstream/1885/114504/2/b17627485_Dermody_Kathleen_Mary.pdf

Sources

1. ↑ Kathleen Mary Dermody, "D'Arcy Wentworth 1762-1827 : A Second Chance," (PhD thesis, Australian National University, 1990), p.53. https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/bitstream/1885/114504/2/b17627485_Dermody_Kathleen_Mary.pdf
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6} Michael Persse, 'Wentworth, William Charles (1790–1872)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/wentworth-william-charles-2782/text3961, published first in hardcopy 1967, accessed online 22 May 2021.
3. ↑ 1814 'Classified Advertising', The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1803 - 1842), 12 February, p. 1. , viewed 28 May 2021, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article628859
4. ↑ "Wentworth Falls" Blue Mountains Australia https://www.bluemts.com.au/info/towns/wentworth-falls/
5. ↑ Wentworth, W. C., and Project Gutenberg Australia. Statistical, Historical, and Political Description of NSW [electronic Resource] / by William Charles Wentworth. S.l.]: Project Gutenberg Australia. http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks/e00068.html
6. ↑ Tink, A. A. William Charles Wentworth : Australia's Greatest Native Son / Andrew Tink. Crows Nest, N.S.W.: Allen & Unwin, 2009.
7. ↑ 1831 'No title', The Australian (Sydney, NSW : 1824 - 1848), 21 October, p. 2. , viewed 27 May 2021, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article36865438