John George Nathaniel Gibbes
Encyclopedia
Colonel John George Nathaniel Gibbes (30 March 1787 - 5 July 1873) was a British army officer who emigrated to Australia
in 1834, becoming a Crown-appointed member of the New South Wales Legislative Council
and the Collector of Customs
for the Colony of New South Wales for a record term of 25 years.
In his capacity as head of the New South Wales Department of Customs, Colonel Gibbes was the colonial government's principal accumulator of domestic-sourced revenue − prior to the huge economic stimulus provided by the Australian gold rushes of the 1850s − through the collection of import duties and other taxes liable on ship-borne cargoes. Thus, he played a significant role in the transformation of the City of Sydney
(now Australia's biggest State capital) from a convict-based settlement into a prosperous, free enterprise-based port replete with essential government infrastructure.
Gibbes was born and schooled in London
. He saw active service as a military officer during Great Britain's wars against Napoleon which occupied most of the early years of the 19th century.
Then, in 1814, while on convalescence leave from the armed forces, Gibbes married Elizabeth Davis, the daughter of a clergyman, at the 17th-century Church of St Andrew, Holborn
, in London
. Their marriage would give rise to a total of eight children, namely: George (who married Mary Ann Fuller), Eliza (subsequently Mrs Robert Dulhunty
), William (who married Harriet Eliza Jamison), Mary (subsequently Mrs Terence Aubrey Murray), Frances (subsequently Mrs Alfred Ludlam
), Edmund (who married Frances Simmons), Matilda (subsequently Mrs Augustus Berney), and Augustus (who married Annie Bartram).
Following his arrival in Sydney on 19 April 1834, he occupied a seat in the New South Wales Legislative Council
from 1834 until his retirement from politics in 1855. Moreover, he was the Collector of Customs for New South Wales
for an unsurpassed period spanning one quarter of a century, being the incumbent from 1834 to 1859. Indeed, it was Colonel Gibbes' who persuaded the Governor of NSW, Sir George Gipps, to begin construction of the Customs House, Sydney
on Circular Quay in 1844 in response to port's growing volume of maritime trade. This major building project also doubled as an unemployment relief measure for stonemasons and laborers during an economic depression which was afflicting the colony at the time. (The Customs House at Circular Quay replaced inadequate departmental accommodation for Gibbes and his team of officers in The Rocks
area of Sydney.)
Colonel Gibbes resided in a series of historically and architecturally important private dwellings during his time in New South Wales, including the since demolished Palladian-style Point Piper House (also known as Henrietta Villa or The Naval Villa), Wotonga House (now part of the vice-regal establishment known as Admiralty House
on Kirribilli Point), Greycliffe House (which overlooks Shark Beach in the Sydney suburb of Vaucluse
, and, finally, Yarralumla Homestead (now the site of Australia's Government House, Canberra
).
A concise account of Colonel Gibbes' career as a soldier and public servant can be found in The Australian Dictionary of Biography (on-line edition) and also the official Website of the Parliament of New South Wales
, under "Former members". An obituary containing an account of his life was also published in several New South Wales metropolitan and regional newspapers following his death in 1873, including the Sydney Morning Herald of 28 December of that year.
in the English West Country
counties of Devon
and Somerset
with a lineage that can be traced back to the 14th century. (See William Betham
's Baronetage, Volume III, published in London in 1803 for further genealogical information.) Later, during the reigns of Queen Elizabeth 1 and King James I
, they lived in the port city of Bristol where they prospered as Merchant Venturers. Then, in the 1630s, during the reign of King Charles I
, one of his direct forebears, Philip Gibbes, settled on the West Indian island of Barbados
, founding a dynasty of sugar planters and slave owners.
Colonel Gibbes was said to be the illegitimate child of His Royal Highness Frederick, Duke of York, (King George III's second son) and a Gibbes mother. Officially, however, his father was John Gibbes, a Barbadian planter who dwelt part-time in London and was a relative of the prominent baronet
, lawyer and plantation owner, Sir Philip Gibbes. (See the Wikipedia entry for the Osborne-Gibbes Baronets
for further information about the family.)
The Duke and Duchess of York, incidentally, had no children; but the Duke was rumoured to have sired several illegitimate offspring by different mothers over the years. They included:
Young Gibbes was raised in London by John, his nominal father. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School
and privately with a cleric in North Wales
prior to entering the British Army
as an ensign (junior commissioned officer) in 1804. Ten years later, he wed Elizabeth Davis at Holborn in central London. Although a committed Anglican, Elizabeth had already borne Gibbes two children out of wedlock at the time of their marriage. Six more children would be born to the now sanctified union.
and the follow-up assault on Buenos Aires
, which degenerated into a savage sequence of street-fight battles between the British redcoats and the ultimately victorious Spanish defenders of the city.
In 1809, Captain Gibbes was called in from staff officer duties in Southern England and given orders to take part in a massive amphibious operation that was about to be mounted across the English Chanel, from Kent
, with the aim of directing a smashing blow against Napoleon's forces stationed in the Low Countries of Europe. This operation, known as the Walcheren
campaign, turned into a military disaster for the British, however, when their military machine got bogged down in the marshy, muddy, miasmic countryside that guarded the approaches to Antwerp, which was their ultimate battlefield objective. This delay gave their French foe ample time to regroup and reinforce their lines with fresh troops. Moreover, an alarming number of British soldiers had begun to collapse and die in their camps from a virulent form of malarial fever that they had contracted after one of the mission's fthe successes—the ferocious bombardment and capture of the strategic town of Flushing
.
Gibbes was one of the disease's victims. Near death, he was evacuated back to England to recuperate from his illness for a protracted period on half-pay and share in Britain's collective loss of face when the failed Walcheren campaign was wound down and terminated by the government. Once Gibbes had recovered his health sufficiently, he was reinstated to the army's active-service list. Henceforth, he would serve his country as a staff officer at various military stations in southern and northern England (chiefly in the counties of Berkshire
and Yorkshire
), and reaching the rank of brigade major in the process.
Following the cessation of hostilities with France in 1815, following Waterloo
, Gibbes went back on the army's half-pay list. During this difficult period, he appears to have contracted a bigamist marriage in Quebec
with the daughter of a wealthy Canadian industrialist named Matthew Bell, according to information supplied by the College of Arms
in London. Gibbes managed to return unscathed to England (and his legal wife Elizabeth) after this strange episode.
They voyaged back to London and moved into a secluded house, Fulham Lodge, in the west of the metropolis, which formerly belonged to a mistress of the Duke of York
. Gibbes, meanwhile, had applied successfully to the British Board of Customs for a transfer to the collectorship at the North Sea
trading and fishing port of Great Yarmouth
, in the English County of Norfolk
. He would occupy this new post until 1833, working with military-style diligence to improve physical conditions and work practices at what he discovered, on arrival, to be a somewhat rundown red-brick customs house, situated on Great Yarmouth's main quay. He strengthened, too, the law-enforcement partnership which existed with the naval coast guard, in order to counteract smuggling along 'his' section of the Norfolk-Suffolk coast. Privately, he also set about building a small network of potentially productive friendships and acquaintanceships with certain well-connected members of East Anglia's naval-officer class and the region's leading merchants and established families. In 1831, he and Mrs Gibbes had the satisfaction of seeing their eldest child, George, advantageously wed a local East Anglian girl (see below), while some years later, their youngest daughter, Matilda, would marry into the Norfolk landed gentry (below).
Nonetheless, Gibbes never felt completely happy during his tenure in Norfolk. So, he decided to leave England permanently, and emigrate to the Port of Sydney
, in the Colony of New South Wales, on the east coast of mainland Australia
. His motives for emigration were multiple. First, the Australian billet paid significantly more money than he was currently receiving in Great Yarmouth. Secondly, he had grown tired of the area's cold winters, buffeting North Sea gales and rusticated habits. Thirdly, he felt frustrated by the lack of promotional opportunities to be had for a middle-aged man within the Customs service in England.
In 1833, the Board of Customs in London accepted Gibbes' application to be appointed the next Collector of Customs for New South Wales under an exchange arrangement with his counterpart in the port of Sydney. Soon after his arrival in Sydney on 19 April 1834, he was sworn in by Governor Richard Bourke
as a Crown appointee to the colony's governing Legislative Council. During his time as a Legislative Councillor, he would serve on a number of maritime-related government boards and parliamentary committees. Perhaps his most important contribution in this regard was to recommend the introduction of gaslight into Sydney, as chairman of the committee charged with examining this proposal. The subsequent establishment of the Australian Gas Light Company
at Darling Harbour during the 1840s would transform the lifestyle of Sydney's 19th-century residents in terms of street-lighting and domestic illumination, and, later, gas cooking. For details of Colonel Gibbes political career, access Gibbes' entry on the New South Wales Legislative Council Website.
. (Point Piper House was torn down in the 1850s and the site redeveloped.)
Physically, Colonel Gibbes was a compact, spare person with grey eyes and receding light brown hair. He looked taller than he was because he walked with an erect military carriage. Contemporary accounts portray him as an urbane, cultivated gentleman and record how his wife, children and in-laws figured as prominent members of Sydney society throughout the early and mid-Victorian eras. However, the burdens of public office increasingly irked the Colonel as his career unfolded and he sometimes became prone to angry outbursts. To quote Volume One of the Australian Dictionary of Biography (edited by Douglas Pike), Melbourne University Press, 1966, p. 439:
"As collector of Customs at a salary of 1000 pounds Gibbes found his department inadequate to cope with the growing demand of shipping and trade and he constantly appealed for more and better paid staff. He carried out his duties with more zeal than discretion and, when his suspicions were aroused [about possible smuggling activity], he seized whole cargoes which often led to tedious litigation. His accounts were always confused because of inefficient clerks and often showed him liable for surcharges which were removed only after long and acrimonious correspondence with the Board of Customs in London. All these irritations frayed his temper and hen gained a reputation for irascibility."
, before proceeding to buy it after Campbell's death. He completed the house-building project about a year later. Wotonga was a graceful single-storey house with wide verandahs and elegant French doors. Gibbes designed the house, which he called "Wotonga" (or "Woottonga"), himself. The stone for the house's walls was quarried locally and the hardwood and cedar joinery came from George Coleson's timber-yard in George Street, Sydney. Gibbes engaged James Hume, a well-known builder who dabbled in ecclesiastical architecture, to supervise the construction of the building and its stables. Gibbes, however, hired his own masons, bricklayers, carpenters, plumbers and ironmongers to work on the project, paying each of them separately as work progressed.
Colonel Gibbes used the Custom Department's cutter to commute to and from the building site. Once completed, Gibbes' L-shaped residence featured a plain, yet stylish, double façade to maximise the building's magnificent, sweeping views across Sydney Harbour. These views enabled Gibbes to monitor shipping traffic in and out of Darling Harbour and, more importantly, Circular Quay, where the Sydney Customs House was situated.
In 1849, Robert Campbell died and the executors of the estate sold the property, comprising the house and 5 acres (20,234.3 m²) land, to Colonel Gibbes for about 1,400 pounds. On 27 December 1851, Gibbes (who was contemplating a departure from the Customs Service at the age of 64), sold the property to James Lindsay Travers, a merchant of Macquarie Place, Sydney, for 1,533 pounds.
Colonel Gibbes subsequently changed his mind about leaving his position as head of the NSW Customs Department; instead, he leased Greycliffe House at Shark Beach, Vaucluse, from the Wentworth
family and remained in Sydney for the better part of eight years. Greycliffe is now listed by the government as one of the Heritage homes of Sydney
.
Today, Wotonga forms the core of Admiralty House and the building's 180-degree, east-west panoramic sight-lines are even more spectacular than they were in Gibbes' day, owing to the subsequent high-rise growth of Sydney's CBD.
A portrait of Colonel Gibbes, painted in 1808 when he was a redcoat captain service on the personal staff of the Earl of Craven
, now hangs in Admiralty House
.
, arriving in Sydney the following year. He served as Collector of Customs for New South Walesd for a record term of 25 years, from 1834 until 1859. He was forced to retire from the Customs Service when his libertine of a second son, William John Gibbes, became embroiled in a smuggling scandal. (For information about the scandal, see The Australian Customs History Journal, Number 4, published in Canberra, 1992.)
Earlier, in 1844, Colonel Gibbes had persuaded the then Governor of NSW, Sir George Gipps, to begin construction of the Customs House, Sydney
on Circular Quay in response to Sydney's growing volume of maritime trade. The building project also doubled as an unemployment relief measure for stonemasons and laborers during an economic depression which was afflicting the colony at the time. The original sandstone edifice of the Customs House, Sydney
on Circular Quay remains as the core of a subsequently enlarged edifice on the site.
As we have seen, Gibbes lived by the water at Kirribilli Point, on Sydney's northern shore. The Customs Service in the 1840s had an important link with Kirribilli, because the locale afforded panoramic views of Circular Quay and shipping movements on Sydney Harbour's main channel. It was therefore no coincidence that both Colonel Gibbes and his departmental deputy and personal friend, Thomas Jeffrey, elected to live in Kirribilli. The Customs Department's flagstaff, for instance, was located on Thomas Jeffrey's house, serving as a key maritime marker for mercantile vessels.
Colonel Gibbes also had an interesting connection in his later years to Henry Parkes
, known as the "father" of Australia's Federation as a unified nation in 1901 and five times Premiere of New South Wales. About a year after Parkes arrival in Sydney, he was hired by the New South Wales Customs
Department as a Tide Waiter, and given the task by Colonel Gibbes of inspecting merchant vessels in the port of Sydney in order to guard against the importation of contraband. He had been recommended for this responsible post by Sir John Jamison's son-in-law, William John Gibbes, who was manager of Sir John's Regentville estate, and the third-born offspring of Colonel Gibbes. Parkes left the employ of the Customs Department during the 1840s and went into the newspaper industry and, later, the political arena; but he remained on friendly terms with the Gibbes family for the rest of his life.
homestead, now the official Canberra
residence of the Governor-General of Australia
, in late 1859. Yarralumla was owned from 1859 to 1881 by the Colonel's youngest child, Augustus Onslow Manby Gibbes.
Incidentally, the Colonel's second daughter, Mary, had married the prominent New South Wales parliamentarian, Sir Terence Aubrey Murray (1810–1873) who had purchased Yarralumla in 1837. In July 1859, he would sell the property to his brother-in-law Augustus Onslow Manby "Gussie" Gibbes (who had been managing Yarralumla on Murray's behalf for the past four years).
Colonel Gibbes and his wife Elizabeth (known affectionately as Eliza or Betsy) lived to advanced ages by 19th-century standards. Their final years were clouded by various age-related health problems, and they died at Yarralumla homestead in 1873 and 1874 respectively. They were buried initially in a family vault at Yarralumla but, in 1880, their son Augustus moved their remains to the graveyard at the Canberra church of St John the Baptist, where they were re-interred under an inscribed marble headstone which still stands. Two stained-glass windows, dedicated to their memories and bearing the Gibbes coat of arms, were also erected in the nave of the church.
. They were:
, Yorkshire
. He entered the British Public Service at the age of 18, being appointed to the personal staff of the Duke of Wellington
in London
. He rose subsequently through the bureaucratic ranks at Horse Guards
(the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief of the British Army) and the War Office in Whitehall
. In 1869, he retired on an annual half-pay pension from his £1300 per annum position of Assistant Military Secretary. He had wed Mary Ann Fuller (1811–1896) at Gorleston
, Suffolk
, in 1831. They spent their married life living in London (in the suburbs of Chelsea
and Belgravia
) and at a holiday house in Rye
on the Isle of Wight
. There were no children of the marriage.
, Hampshire
. As a girl, according to her own account, she worked in an unofficial capacity for Queen Adelaide
. In Sydney in 1837, she married Robert Dulhunty
((1802–1853), an English-born grazier and Police Magistrate who owned Claremont, near Penrith, NSW. During the 1840s, Dulhunty and his family pioneered the Dubbo region of central-western NSW. Dulhunty died at Old Dubbo Station at the age of 51, leaving Eliza to bring up their large brood of children and run their portfolio of rural properties, many of which were lost to the banks due to the adverse effects of drought and economic recessions. Eliza died in hospital in the NSW town of Bathurst
and is buried in the local cemetery.
Harriet's father was Sir John Jamison (1776 – 29 June 1844), an important Australia
n physician
, pastoralist, banker, politician
, constitutional reformer and public figure. Sir John fathered a number of illegitimate children by several mistresses.
Her mother (one of Sir John's mistresses), Catherine Cain(e), the convict 'housekeeper' assigned to him at his Sydney residence. Catherine gave birth to a daughter by Sir John, Harriet Eliza Jamison, in 1819.
Harriet grew up to be a cultivated and pious young woman. In 1837, she married into the colonial establishment when she wed William John Gibbes. The wedding took place at St James' Anglican Church, Sydney, in the presence of the governor. Harriet died in Sydney in 1896. By this stage, she had seen her three children, all sons, carve out successful careers for themselves in the political, legal and sporting/civil-service sectors of Sydney society.
William John Gibbes, incidentally, lived with his wife at Regentville House, near Penrith
, New South Wales, following his marriage. Later, in the second half of the 1840s, he lived in Beulah House at Kirribilli, before moving to Camden Villa in the then Sydney garden-suburb of Newtown
in the early 1850s. Beulah was later lived in by the Riley and Lasseter families. Regrettably, this elegant sandstone residence was eventually demolished and its grounds subdivided into numerous residential blocks which were auctioned off by developers in 1905.
William became a notorious libertine who sired a number of illegitimate children. He spent the 1850s in a state of bankruptcy
with debts exceeding ₤20,000. William was convicted (in the NSW Supreme Court) of a smuggling charge in 1859 and sentenced to two years imprisonment at Parramatta Gaol in Sydney. Subsequently, he lived in Melbourne
and East Sydney. He died at the latter location of a blood disorder, aged 52. William was estranged from his wife at the time of his passing, and the two lived separately. He lies buried in the Old Balmain Cemetery (now Pioneers' Park, in the Sydney suburb of Leichhardt
.
, Yorkshire
. She later married the prominent Irish-born parliamentarian, Sir Terence Aubrey Murray (1810–1873). Murray was the proprietor of Winderradeen sheep station near Lake George
, NSW. He also purchased 'Yarralumla sheep station, in what is now Canberra
, in 1837. Yarralumla subsequently became Government House, Canberra
. Mary's health was frail, and she died at Winderradeen at the start of 1858, following the birth of her third surviving child. She is buried in the grounds of the homestead.
In 1859, Murray sold Yarralumla to his brother-in-law, Augustus Onslow Manby Gibbes. Later that same year, Augustus' parents came to live with him at Yarralumla homestead. Eventually, in 1881, Augustus sold Yarralumla for 40,000 pounds to Frederick Campbell, a descendant of Robert Campbell.
politician, horticulturist and farmer who owned land at Wellington
and in the Hutt Valley. Ludlam was a member of three of New Zealand's four earliest parliaments, he was also a philanthropist and a founder of Wellington's Botanic Garden
.
Ludlam was a periodic visitor to NSW. The main reason for these trans-Tasman Sea
visits of Ludlam's was to do business in Sydney, which served as New South Wales' principal trading port, population centre and seat of government; but he also found time to socialise. On 1 October 1850, he married into Sydney's colonial establishment with his wedding to Fanny Gibbes. His wedding took place took place at St Thomas' Anglican Church (in what is today the North Sydney
local government area).
Fanny was living with her parents at Wotonga House—nowadays part of Admiralty House
complex on Sydney's Kirribilli Point—at the time of her marriage to Ludlam. She and her husband spent their honeymoon relaxing at the New South Wales country property of Yarralumla
(now the site of Australia's Government House in Canberra
), which at that stage belonged to Fanny's brother-in-law, (Sir) Terence Aubrey Murray. During the 1870s, Fanny and her husband holidayed in London, taking a house at Maida Vale
. Fanny fell fatally ill there with an intestinal blockage and was buried in London. Her husband returned to New Zealand, dying in Wellington later that same year (1877) of kidney disease. They had no children.
. He worked for his father as a NSW Customs Department officer in Sydney and at the whaling port of Eden
on the NSW South Coast. During the 1840s, he eloped with a wealthy Jewish teenager, Frances Simmons (1833–1910), scandalising colonial Sydney in the process. They would have two children, both of whom died in infancy. Edmund belatedly wed Miss Simmons at Campbelltown
, NSW, in 1849. He contracted pulmonary tuberculosis and sailed for England with his bride in 1850 to begin a fresh life. He died on the voyage and was buried at sea. Edmund's widow later married a London lawyer named Roger Gadsden and returned to Sydney to live.
and is buried locally in the Berney family mausoleum.
, Norfolk. His godfathers were George William Manby
and Captain John Onslow, RN. He became a large-scale sheep farmer and horse breeder in rural New South Wales, owning the Yarralumla estate from 1859 to 1881. He then travelled overseas for a decade before settling down on a farming property named Braemar, near the town of Goulburn, New South Wales, in the early 1890s, with his wife and their four surviving children, all sons. His wife, Annie Bartram (1865–1914) came from the City of Bath in England The two had met in the mid-1880s, entering into a relationship and touring around the United Kingdom. Augustus, however, did not officially marry her until 1896 (at Penrith, NSW). The following year, he died at Braemar House after suffering a stroke and was buried with his parents in Canberra. For a detailed account of Augustus' life and the Gibbes family's era at Yarralumla, see the Canberra Historical Journal, New Series, Number 48, September 2001, pp. 11–31. For more genealogical data about his siblings, see The Ancestral Searcher, Volume 27, Number 4, December 2004, pp. 324–325.
were close associates of the Gibbes' during their time in Norfolk. Indeed, the two families would later inter-marry. Another friend of the Gibbes' in Great Yarmouth was George William Manby
, who became one of the godfathers of Augustus Onslow Manby Gibbes (1828–1897). Manby was a well-known inventor and a member of England's Royal Society
.
DSO
, DFC
& Bar
, OAM
(6 May 1916 – 11 April 2007) who was a leading Australian fighter ace
of World War II
.
He was officially credited with shooting down 10¼ enemy aircraft, although his score is often reported as 12 destroyed.
in the Australian National Capital of Canberra
. Interred with him are the remains of his wife, Elizabeth, who died in 1874, his son Augustus Gibbes, his grandson Henry Gibbes, and his great-grandson Wing-Commander
Robert "Bobby" Gibbes.
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
in 1834, becoming a Crown-appointed member of the New South Wales Legislative Council
New South Wales Legislative Council
The New South Wales Legislative Council, or upper house, is one of the two chambers of the parliament of New South Wales in Australia. The other is the Legislative Assembly. Both sit at Parliament House in the state capital, Sydney. The Assembly is referred to as the lower house and the Council as...
and the Collector of Customs
Customs
Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting and safeguarding customs duties and for controlling the flow of goods including animals, transports, personal effects and hazardous items in and out of a country...
for the Colony of New South Wales for a record term of 25 years.
In his capacity as head of the New South Wales Department of Customs, Colonel Gibbes was the colonial government's principal accumulator of domestic-sourced revenue − prior to the huge economic stimulus provided by the Australian gold rushes of the 1850s − through the collection of import duties and other taxes liable on ship-borne cargoes. Thus, he played a significant role in the transformation of the City of Sydney
City of Sydney
The City of Sydney is the Local Government Area covering the Sydney central business district and surrounding inner city suburbs of the greater metropolitan area of Sydney, Australia...
(now Australia's biggest State capital) from a convict-based settlement into a prosperous, free enterprise-based port replete with essential government infrastructure.
Gibbes was born and schooled in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. He saw active service as a military officer during Great Britain's wars against Napoleon which occupied most of the early years of the 19th century.
Then, in 1814, while on convalescence leave from the armed forces, Gibbes married Elizabeth Davis, the daughter of a clergyman, at the 17th-century Church of St Andrew, Holborn
St Andrew, Holborn
St Andrew, Holborn is a Church of England church on the northwestern edge of the City of London, on Holborn within the Ward of Farringdon Without.-Roman and medieval:Roman pottery was found on the site during 2001/02 excavations in the crypt...
, in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. Their marriage would give rise to a total of eight children, namely: George (who married Mary Ann Fuller), Eliza (subsequently Mrs Robert Dulhunty
Robert Dulhunty
Robert Venour Dulhunty is chiefly remembered as being the first permanent white settler of what has since become the City of Dubbo, in the rural heartland of the Australian state of New South Wales...
), William (who married Harriet Eliza Jamison), Mary (subsequently Mrs Terence Aubrey Murray), Frances (subsequently Mrs Alfred Ludlam
Alfred Ludlam
Alfred Ludlam was a leading New Zealand politician, horticulturist and farmer who owned land at Wellington and in the Hutt Valley...
), Edmund (who married Frances Simmons), Matilda (subsequently Mrs Augustus Berney), and Augustus (who married Annie Bartram).
Following his arrival in Sydney on 19 April 1834, he occupied a seat in the New South Wales Legislative Council
New South Wales Legislative Council
The New South Wales Legislative Council, or upper house, is one of the two chambers of the parliament of New South Wales in Australia. The other is the Legislative Assembly. Both sit at Parliament House in the state capital, Sydney. The Assembly is referred to as the lower house and the Council as...
from 1834 until his retirement from politics in 1855. Moreover, he was the Collector of Customs for New South Wales
New South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
for an unsurpassed period spanning one quarter of a century, being the incumbent from 1834 to 1859. Indeed, it was Colonel Gibbes' who persuaded the Governor of NSW, Sir George Gipps, to begin construction of the Customs House, Sydney
Customs House, Sydney
The Customs House is an historic Sydney landmark located in the city's Circular Quay area. Constructed initially in 1844-1845, the building served as the headquarters of the Customs Service until 1990. Ownership was then transferred from the Commonwealth Government of Australia to the City of...
on Circular Quay in 1844 in response to port's growing volume of maritime trade. This major building project also doubled as an unemployment relief measure for stonemasons and laborers during an economic depression which was afflicting the colony at the time. (The Customs House at Circular Quay replaced inadequate departmental accommodation for Gibbes and his team of officers in The Rocks
The Rocks, New South Wales
The Rocks is an urban locality, tourist precinct and historic area of Sydney's city centre, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located on the southern shore of Sydney Harbour, immediately north-west of the Sydney central business district...
area of Sydney.)
Colonel Gibbes resided in a series of historically and architecturally important private dwellings during his time in New South Wales, including the since demolished Palladian-style Point Piper House (also known as Henrietta Villa or The Naval Villa), Wotonga House (now part of the vice-regal establishment known as Admiralty House
Admiralty House, Sydney
Admiralty House is the official Sydney residence of the Governor-General of Australia. It is located in the suburb of Kirribilli, on the northern foreshore of Sydney Harbour . This large, Italianate, sandstone mansion occupies the tip of Kirribilli Point...
on Kirribilli Point), Greycliffe House (which overlooks Shark Beach in the Sydney suburb of Vaucluse
Vaucluse
The Vaucluse is a department in the southeast of France, named after the famous spring, the Fontaine-de-Vaucluse.- History :Vaucluse was created on 12 August 1793 out of parts of the departments of Bouches-du-Rhône, Drôme, and Basses-Alpes...
, and, finally, Yarralumla Homestead (now the site of Australia's Government House, Canberra
Government House, Canberra
Government House, Canberra, commonly known as Yarralumla, is the official residence of the Governor-General of Australia. It is located in the suburb of Yarralumla, in the City of Canberra, in the Australian Capital Territory....
).
A concise account of Colonel Gibbes' career as a soldier and public servant can be found in The Australian Dictionary of Biography (on-line edition) and also the official Website of the Parliament of New South Wales
Parliament of New South Wales
The Parliament of New South Wales, located in Parliament House on Macquarie Street, Sydney, is the main legislative body in the Australian state of New South Wales . It is a bicameral parliament elected by the people of the state in general elections. The parliament shares law making powers with...
, under "Former members". An obituary containing an account of his life was also published in several New South Wales metropolitan and regional newspapers following his death in 1873, including the Sydney Morning Herald of 28 December of that year.
Parents and education
The direct ancestors of London-born Colonel Gibbes were members of the landed gentryLanded gentry
Landed gentry is a traditional British social class, consisting of land owners who could live entirely off rental income. Often they worked only in an administrative capacity looking after the management of their own lands....
in the English West Country
West Country
The West Country is an informal term for the area of south western England roughly corresponding to the modern South West England government region. It is often defined to encompass the historic counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset and the City of Bristol, while the counties of...
counties of Devon
Devon
Devon is a large county in southwestern England. The county is sometimes referred to as Devonshire, although the term is rarely used inside the county itself as the county has never been officially "shired", it often indicates a traditional or historical context.The county shares borders with...
and Somerset
Somerset
The ceremonial and non-metropolitan county of Somerset in South West England borders Bristol and Gloucestershire to the north, Wiltshire to the east, Dorset to the south-east, and Devon to the south-west. It is partly bounded to the north and west by the Bristol Channel and the estuary of the...
with a lineage that can be traced back to the 14th century. (See William Betham
William Betham (antiquary)
William Betham was an English clergyman and antiquary, known for his work on the baronetage.-Life:He was born at Little Strickland, near Morland, Westmoreland, on 17 May 1749. He was educated at the public school of Bampton, was ordained in 1773, apparently without graduating at a university, and...
's Baronetage, Volume III, published in London in 1803 for further genealogical information.) Later, during the reigns of Queen Elizabeth 1 and King James I
James I of England
James VI and I was King of Scots as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the English and Scottish crowns on 24 March 1603...
, they lived in the port city of Bristol where they prospered as Merchant Venturers. Then, in the 1630s, during the reign of King Charles I
Charles I of England
Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...
, one of his direct forebears, Philip Gibbes, settled on the West Indian island of Barbados
Barbados
Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles. It is in length and as much as in width, amounting to . It is situated in the western area of the North Atlantic and 100 kilometres east of the Windward Islands and the Caribbean Sea; therein, it is about east of the islands of Saint...
, founding a dynasty of sugar planters and slave owners.
Colonel Gibbes was said to be the illegitimate child of His Royal Highness Frederick, Duke of York, (King George III's second son) and a Gibbes mother. Officially, however, his father was John Gibbes, a Barbadian planter who dwelt part-time in London and was a relative of the prominent baronet
Baronet
A baronet or the rare female equivalent, a baronetess , is the holder of a hereditary baronetcy awarded by the British Crown...
, lawyer and plantation owner, Sir Philip Gibbes. (See the Wikipedia entry for the Osborne-Gibbes Baronets
Osborne-Gibbes Baronets
The Gibbes, later Osborne-Gibbes Baronetcy, of Springhead in Barbados, was a title in the Baronetage of Great Britain. It was created on 30 May 1774 for Philip Gibbes, a wealthy Barbadian plantation owner, lawyer, and author of books dealing with the management of slaves and sugar estates...
for further information about the family.)
The Duke and Duchess of York, incidentally, had no children; but the Duke was rumoured to have sired several illegitimate offspring by different mothers over the years. They included:
- Captain Charles Hesse (circa 1786-1832), a British military officer;
- Colonel J.G.N. Gibbes (1787–1873), as we have noted;
- Captain John MolloyJohn MolloyCaptain John Molloy was an early settler in Western Australia. He was one of the original settlers of Augusta.-Early life:...
(1788/89-1867), a landowner and pioneer of Augusta in Western Australia; and - the Vandiest siblings, Frederick George (1800–1848) and Louisa Ann (1802–1890).
Young Gibbes was raised in London by John, his nominal father. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School
Merchant Taylors' School, Northwood
Merchant Taylors' School is a British independent day school for boys, originally located in the City of London. Since 1933 it has been located at Sandy Lodge in the Three Rivers district of Hertfordshire ....
and privately with a cleric in North Wales
North Wales
North Wales is the northernmost unofficial region of Wales. It is bordered to the south by the counties of Ceredigion and Powys in Mid Wales and to the east by the counties of Shropshire in the West Midlands and Cheshire in North West England...
prior to entering the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
as an ensign (junior commissioned officer) in 1804. Ten years later, he wed Elizabeth Davis at Holborn in central London. Although a committed Anglican, Elizabeth had already borne Gibbes two children out of wedlock at the time of their marriage. Six more children would be born to the now sanctified union.
Military service in brief
The future Colonel Gibbes filled a vacancy with the 40th Infantry Regiment upon joining the army as an ensign in 1804; but he would go on to serve as a commissioned officer with a variety of other regiments, ascending through five military ranks (namely, lieutenant, captain, major, lieutenant-colonel and colonel) in the process. Early on, he participated in some fierce fighting during the wars against Napoleon and the French Emperor's allies. He saw action firstly in South America, where he participated in the siege and capture of the fortified city of MontevideoMontevideo
Montevideo is the largest city, the capital, and the chief port of Uruguay. The settlement was established in 1726 by Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst a Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region, and as a counter to the Portuguese colony at Colonia del Sacramento...
and the follow-up assault on Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
, which degenerated into a savage sequence of street-fight battles between the British redcoats and the ultimately victorious Spanish defenders of the city.
In 1809, Captain Gibbes was called in from staff officer duties in Southern England and given orders to take part in a massive amphibious operation that was about to be mounted across the English Chanel, from Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
, with the aim of directing a smashing blow against Napoleon's forces stationed in the Low Countries of Europe. This operation, known as the Walcheren
Walcheren
thumb|right|250px|Campveer Tower in Veere, built in 1500Walcheren is a former island in the province of Zeeland in the Netherlands at the mouth of the Scheldt estuary. It lies between the Oosterschelde in the north and the Westerschelde in the south and is roughly the shape of a rhombus...
campaign, turned into a military disaster for the British, however, when their military machine got bogged down in the marshy, muddy, miasmic countryside that guarded the approaches to Antwerp, which was their ultimate battlefield objective. This delay gave their French foe ample time to regroup and reinforce their lines with fresh troops. Moreover, an alarming number of British soldiers had begun to collapse and die in their camps from a virulent form of malarial fever that they had contracted after one of the mission's fthe successes—the ferocious bombardment and capture of the strategic town of Flushing
Flushing, Netherlands
Vlissingen is a municipality and a city in the southwestern Netherlands on the former island of Walcheren. With its strategic location between the Scheldt river and the North Sea, Vlissingen has been an important harbour for centuries. It was granted city rights in 1315. In the 17th century...
.
Gibbes was one of the disease's victims. Near death, he was evacuated back to England to recuperate from his illness for a protracted period on half-pay and share in Britain's collective loss of face when the failed Walcheren campaign was wound down and terminated by the government. Once Gibbes had recovered his health sufficiently, he was reinstated to the army's active-service list. Henceforth, he would serve his country as a staff officer at various military stations in southern and northern England (chiefly in the counties of Berkshire
Berkshire
Berkshire is a historic county in the South of England. It is also often referred to as the Royal County of Berkshire because of the presence of the royal residence of Windsor Castle in the county; this usage, which dates to the 19th century at least, was recognised by the Queen in 1957, and...
and Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
), and reaching the rank of brigade major in the process.
Following the cessation of hostilities with France in 1815, following Waterloo
Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815 near Waterloo in present-day Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
, Gibbes went back on the army's half-pay list. During this difficult period, he appears to have contracted a bigamist marriage in Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
with the daughter of a wealthy Canadian industrialist named Matthew Bell, according to information supplied by the College of Arms
College of Arms
The College of Arms, or Heralds’ College, is an office regulating heraldry and granting new armorial bearings for England, Wales and Northern Ireland...
in London. Gibbes managed to return unscathed to England (and his legal wife Elizabeth) after this strange episode.
Customs service
Then, in 1819, Gibbes' fortunes changed for the better when the British Government agreed to appoint him Collector of Customs for the wealthy Caribbean sugar port of Falmouth, Jamaica. He would serve in this posting from 1819 to 1827, drawing a large annual salary of approximately ₤1500. While stationed on Jamaica, Gibbes and his growing family lived in a plantation house located inland from the actual town of Falmouth. Census returns show him as owning livestock as well as several black slaves. Gibbes enjoyed life in the West Indies but ill-health, probably a recurrence of malaria brought on by Jamaica's tropical climate, forced him to leave the island in 1827 with his family.They voyaged back to London and moved into a secluded house, Fulham Lodge, in the west of the metropolis, which formerly belonged to a mistress of the Duke of York
Duke of York
The Duke of York is a title of nobility in the British peerage. Since the 15th century, it has, when granted, usually been given to the second son of the British monarch. The title has been created a remarkable eleven times, eight as "Duke of York" and three as the double-barreled "Duke of York and...
. Gibbes, meanwhile, had applied successfully to the British Board of Customs for a transfer to the collectorship at the North Sea
North Sea
In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean. In the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively...
trading and fishing port of Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
, in the English County of Norfolk
Norfolk
Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...
. He would occupy this new post until 1833, working with military-style diligence to improve physical conditions and work practices at what he discovered, on arrival, to be a somewhat rundown red-brick customs house, situated on Great Yarmouth's main quay. He strengthened, too, the law-enforcement partnership which existed with the naval coast guard, in order to counteract smuggling along 'his' section of the Norfolk-Suffolk coast. Privately, he also set about building a small network of potentially productive friendships and acquaintanceships with certain well-connected members of East Anglia's naval-officer class and the region's leading merchants and established families. In 1831, he and Mrs Gibbes had the satisfaction of seeing their eldest child, George, advantageously wed a local East Anglian girl (see below), while some years later, their youngest daughter, Matilda, would marry into the Norfolk landed gentry (below).
Nonetheless, Gibbes never felt completely happy during his tenure in Norfolk. So, he decided to leave England permanently, and emigrate to the Port of Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
, in the Colony of New South Wales, on the east coast of mainland Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. His motives for emigration were multiple. First, the Australian billet paid significantly more money than he was currently receiving in Great Yarmouth. Secondly, he had grown tired of the area's cold winters, buffeting North Sea gales and rusticated habits. Thirdly, he felt frustrated by the lack of promotional opportunities to be had for a middle-aged man within the Customs service in England.
In 1833, the Board of Customs in London accepted Gibbes' application to be appointed the next Collector of Customs for New South Wales under an exchange arrangement with his counterpart in the port of Sydney. Soon after his arrival in Sydney on 19 April 1834, he was sworn in by Governor Richard Bourke
Richard Bourke
General Sir Richard Bourke, KCB was Governor of the Colony of New South Wales, Australia between 1831 and 1837.-Early life and career:...
as a Crown appointee to the colony's governing Legislative Council. During his time as a Legislative Councillor, he would serve on a number of maritime-related government boards and parliamentary committees. Perhaps his most important contribution in this regard was to recommend the introduction of gaslight into Sydney, as chairman of the committee charged with examining this proposal. The subsequent establishment of the Australian Gas Light Company
Australian Gas Light Company
The Australian Gas Light Company was an Australian gas and electricity retailer. It was formed in Sydney in 1837, and supplied town gas for the first public lighting of a street lamp in Sydney in 1841 AGL was the second company to list on the Australian Stock Exchange. The company gradually...
at Darling Harbour during the 1840s would transform the lifestyle of Sydney's 19th-century residents in terms of street-lighting and domestic illumination, and, later, gas cooking. For details of Colonel Gibbes political career, access Gibbes' entry on the New South Wales Legislative Council Website.
Arrival in Australia
When Gibbes arrived in the colony aboard the Resource in 1834, he held the military rank of major. Later, in 1837, he would be promoted to lieutenant-colonel and then to full colonel shortly before his retirement from the army in 1851. Initially, he lived with his family in Henrietta Villa, also known as the Naval Villa, on Sydney's scenic Point Piper, under a leasehold arrangement. In 1843-44, the Gibbes family moved to "Wotonga", a stone house on Kirribilli Point, that had been designed and erected by Gibbes. Wotonga now forms part of Admiralty HouseAdmiralty House, Sydney
Admiralty House is the official Sydney residence of the Governor-General of Australia. It is located in the suburb of Kirribilli, on the northern foreshore of Sydney Harbour . This large, Italianate, sandstone mansion occupies the tip of Kirribilli Point...
. (Point Piper House was torn down in the 1850s and the site redeveloped.)
Physically, Colonel Gibbes was a compact, spare person with grey eyes and receding light brown hair. He looked taller than he was because he walked with an erect military carriage. Contemporary accounts portray him as an urbane, cultivated gentleman and record how his wife, children and in-laws figured as prominent members of Sydney society throughout the early and mid-Victorian eras. However, the burdens of public office increasingly irked the Colonel as his career unfolded and he sometimes became prone to angry outbursts. To quote Volume One of the Australian Dictionary of Biography (edited by Douglas Pike), Melbourne University Press, 1966, p. 439:
"As collector of Customs at a salary of 1000 pounds Gibbes found his department inadequate to cope with the growing demand of shipping and trade and he constantly appealed for more and better paid staff. He carried out his duties with more zeal than discretion and, when his suspicions were aroused [about possible smuggling activity], he seized whole cargoes which often led to tedious litigation. His accounts were always confused because of inefficient clerks and often showed him liable for surcharges which were removed only after long and acrimonious correspondence with the Board of Customs in London. All these irritations frayed his temper and hen gained a reputation for irascibility."
Admiralty House
Colonel Gibbes began work on Wotonga House in 1842 on the five-acre Kirribilli Point site, which he had leased from the wealthy merchant Robert CampbellRobert Campbell (1769–1846)
Robert Campbell was a pioneering and leading merchant in Sydney, a land-owner, a pastoralist, a philanthropist, and a politician being a member of the first New South Wales Legislative Council...
, before proceeding to buy it after Campbell's death. He completed the house-building project about a year later. Wotonga was a graceful single-storey house with wide verandahs and elegant French doors. Gibbes designed the house, which he called "Wotonga" (or "Woottonga"), himself. The stone for the house's walls was quarried locally and the hardwood and cedar joinery came from George Coleson's timber-yard in George Street, Sydney. Gibbes engaged James Hume, a well-known builder who dabbled in ecclesiastical architecture, to supervise the construction of the building and its stables. Gibbes, however, hired his own masons, bricklayers, carpenters, plumbers and ironmongers to work on the project, paying each of them separately as work progressed.
Colonel Gibbes used the Custom Department's cutter to commute to and from the building site. Once completed, Gibbes' L-shaped residence featured a plain, yet stylish, double façade to maximise the building's magnificent, sweeping views across Sydney Harbour. These views enabled Gibbes to monitor shipping traffic in and out of Darling Harbour and, more importantly, Circular Quay, where the Sydney Customs House was situated.
In 1849, Robert Campbell died and the executors of the estate sold the property, comprising the house and 5 acres (20,234.3 m²) land, to Colonel Gibbes for about 1,400 pounds. On 27 December 1851, Gibbes (who was contemplating a departure from the Customs Service at the age of 64), sold the property to James Lindsay Travers, a merchant of Macquarie Place, Sydney, for 1,533 pounds.
Colonel Gibbes subsequently changed his mind about leaving his position as head of the NSW Customs Department; instead, he leased Greycliffe House at Shark Beach, Vaucluse, from the Wentworth
Wentworth
-People:* Baron Wentworth , the Wentworth peerage, several men and women.* D'Arcy Wentworth , surgeon in the early days of Sydney, Australia, and father of William Charles Wentworth I....
family and remained in Sydney for the better part of eight years. Greycliffe is now listed by the government as one of the Heritage homes of Sydney
Heritage homes of Sydney
The following houses in Sydney, Australia are listed on the Register of the National Estate and/or the State Heritage Register of New South Wales:-1790s:* Elizabeth Farm* Experiment Farm Cottage* Old Government House-1830s:* Camden Park* Elizabeth Bay House...
.
Today, Wotonga forms the core of Admiralty House and the building's 180-degree, east-west panoramic sight-lines are even more spectacular than they were in Gibbes' day, owing to the subsequent high-rise growth of Sydney's CBD.
A portrait of Colonel Gibbes, painted in 1808 when he was a redcoat captain service on the personal staff of the Earl of Craven
Earl of Craven
Earl of Craven, in the County of York, is a title that has been created twice, once in the Peerage of England and once in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. The first creation came in the Peerage of England in 1664 in favour of the soldier William Craven, the eldest son of Sir William Craven, Lord...
, now hangs in Admiralty House
Admiralty House, Sydney
Admiralty House is the official Sydney residence of the Governor-General of Australia. It is located in the suburb of Kirribilli, on the northern foreshore of Sydney Harbour . This large, Italianate, sandstone mansion occupies the tip of Kirribilli Point...
.
New South Wales Customs Service
As we have seen, Colonel Gibbes took up a commission in 1819 as the Collector of Customs for Falmouth, Jamaica, but remained on the army's half-pay list, which meant that he could be recalled to active service in times of war. Then, from 1827 to 1833, he held the equivalent position of Collector in the major East Anglian port of Great Yarmouth. In 1833, Colonel Gibbes was appointed the Collector of Customs for New South WalesNew South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
, arriving in Sydney the following year. He served as Collector of Customs for New South Walesd for a record term of 25 years, from 1834 until 1859. He was forced to retire from the Customs Service when his libertine of a second son, William John Gibbes, became embroiled in a smuggling scandal. (For information about the scandal, see The Australian Customs History Journal, Number 4, published in Canberra, 1992.)
Earlier, in 1844, Colonel Gibbes had persuaded the then Governor of NSW, Sir George Gipps, to begin construction of the Customs House, Sydney
Customs House, Sydney
The Customs House is an historic Sydney landmark located in the city's Circular Quay area. Constructed initially in 1844-1845, the building served as the headquarters of the Customs Service until 1990. Ownership was then transferred from the Commonwealth Government of Australia to the City of...
on Circular Quay in response to Sydney's growing volume of maritime trade. The building project also doubled as an unemployment relief measure for stonemasons and laborers during an economic depression which was afflicting the colony at the time. The original sandstone edifice of the Customs House, Sydney
Customs House, Sydney
The Customs House is an historic Sydney landmark located in the city's Circular Quay area. Constructed initially in 1844-1845, the building served as the headquarters of the Customs Service until 1990. Ownership was then transferred from the Commonwealth Government of Australia to the City of...
on Circular Quay remains as the core of a subsequently enlarged edifice on the site.
As we have seen, Gibbes lived by the water at Kirribilli Point, on Sydney's northern shore. The Customs Service in the 1840s had an important link with Kirribilli, because the locale afforded panoramic views of Circular Quay and shipping movements on Sydney Harbour's main channel. It was therefore no coincidence that both Colonel Gibbes and his departmental deputy and personal friend, Thomas Jeffrey, elected to live in Kirribilli. The Customs Department's flagstaff, for instance, was located on Thomas Jeffrey's house, serving as a key maritime marker for mercantile vessels.
Colonel Gibbes also had an interesting connection in his later years to Henry Parkes
Henry Parkes
Sir Henry Parkes, GCMG was an Australian statesman, the "Father of Federation." As the earliest advocate of a Federal Council of the colonies of Australia, a precursor to the Federation of Australia, he was the most prominent of the Australian Founding Fathers.Parkes was described during his...
, known as the "father" of Australia's Federation as a unified nation in 1901 and five times Premiere of New South Wales. About a year after Parkes arrival in Sydney, he was hired by the New South Wales Customs
Customs
Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting and safeguarding customs duties and for controlling the flow of goods including animals, transports, personal effects and hazardous items in and out of a country...
Department as a Tide Waiter, and given the task by Colonel Gibbes of inspecting merchant vessels in the port of Sydney in order to guard against the importation of contraband. He had been recommended for this responsible post by Sir John Jamison's son-in-law, William John Gibbes, who was manager of Sir John's Regentville estate, and the third-born offspring of Colonel Gibbes. Parkes left the employ of the Customs Department during the 1840s and went into the newspaper industry and, later, the political arena; but he remained on friendly terms with the Gibbes family for the rest of his life.
Retirement and death
On retirement, Colonel Gibbes and Mrs Gibbes moved to YarralumlaGovernment House, Canberra
Government House, Canberra, commonly known as Yarralumla, is the official residence of the Governor-General of Australia. It is located in the suburb of Yarralumla, in the City of Canberra, in the Australian Capital Territory....
homestead, now the official Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
residence of the Governor-General of Australia
Governor-General of Australia
The Governor-General of the Commonwealth of Australia is the representative in Australia at federal/national level of the Australian monarch . He or she exercises the supreme executive power of the Commonwealth...
, in late 1859. Yarralumla was owned from 1859 to 1881 by the Colonel's youngest child, Augustus Onslow Manby Gibbes.
Incidentally, the Colonel's second daughter, Mary, had married the prominent New South Wales parliamentarian, Sir Terence Aubrey Murray (1810–1873) who had purchased Yarralumla in 1837. In July 1859, he would sell the property to his brother-in-law Augustus Onslow Manby "Gussie" Gibbes (who had been managing Yarralumla on Murray's behalf for the past four years).
Colonel Gibbes and his wife Elizabeth (known affectionately as Eliza or Betsy) lived to advanced ages by 19th-century standards. Their final years were clouded by various age-related health problems, and they died at Yarralumla homestead in 1873 and 1874 respectively. They were buried initially in a family vault at Yarralumla but, in 1880, their son Augustus moved their remains to the graveyard at the Canberra church of St John the Baptist, where they were re-interred under an inscribed marble headstone which still stands. Two stained-glass windows, dedicated to their memories and bearing the Gibbes coat of arms, were also erected in the nave of the church.
Offspring
The Colonel and Mrs Gibbes had eight children, born in the 1809-1828 period. All of them migrated to Sydney with their parents except for the eldest, George Hervey Gibbes (1809–1883), who remained in London and became a senior bureaucrat with the British War OfficeWar Office
The War Office was a department of the British Government, responsible for the administration of the British Army between the 17th century and 1964, when its functions were transferred to the Ministry of Defence...
. They were:
George Hervey Gibbes (1809-1883)
Unlike his seven siblings, George remained in England. He was born at Kirk EllaKirk Ella
Kirk Ella is a village in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England and is located around west of the city of Kingston upon Hull. Together with West Ella it forms the civil parish of Kirk Ella and West Ella....
, Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
. He entered the British Public Service at the age of 18, being appointed to the personal staff of the Duke of Wellington
Duke of Wellington
The Dukedom of Wellington, derived from Wellington in Somerset, is a hereditary title in the senior rank of the Peerage of the United Kingdom. The first holder of the title was Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington , the noted Irish-born career British Army officer and statesman, and...
in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. He rose subsequently through the bureaucratic ranks at Horse Guards
Horse Guards (building)
Horse Guards is a large grade I listed building in the Palladian style between Whitehall and Horse Guards Parade in London, England. It was built between 1751 and 1753 by John Vardy to a design by William Kent. The building was constructed on the site of the Guard House of the old Whitehall Palace,...
(the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief of the British Army) and the War Office in Whitehall
Whitehall
Whitehall is a road in Westminster, in London, England. It is the main artery running north from Parliament Square, towards Charing Cross at the southern end of Trafalgar Square...
. In 1869, he retired on an annual half-pay pension from his £1300 per annum position of Assistant Military Secretary. He had wed Mary Ann Fuller (1811–1896) at Gorleston
Gorleston
Gorleston-On-Sea, also known colloquially as Gorleston, is a settlement in Norfolk in the United Kingdom, forming part of the larger town of Great Yarmouth. Situated at the mouth of the River Yare it was a port town at the time of the Domesday Book. The port then became a centre of fishing for...
, Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
, in 1831. They spent their married life living in London (in the suburbs of Chelsea
Chelsea, London
Chelsea is an area of West London, England, bounded to the south by the River Thames, where its frontage runs from Chelsea Bridge along the Chelsea Embankment, Cheyne Walk, Lots Road and Chelsea Harbour. Its eastern boundary was once defined by the River Westbourne, which is now in a pipe above...
and Belgravia
Belgravia
Belgravia is a district of central London in the City of Westminster and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Noted for its immensely expensive residential properties, it is one of the wealthiest districts in the world...
) and at a holiday house in Rye
Rye
Rye is a grass grown extensively as a grain and as a forage crop. It is a member of the wheat tribe and is closely related to barley and wheat. Rye grain is used for flour, rye bread, rye beer, some whiskeys, some vodkas, and animal fodder...
on the Isle of Wight
Isle of Wight
The Isle of Wight is a county and the largest island of England, located in the English Channel, on average about 2–4 miles off the south coast of the county of Hampshire, separated from the mainland by a strait called the Solent...
. There were no children of the marriage.
Eliza Julia Gibbes (1811-1892)
The eldest daughter of the family as born in the naval and military port of GosportGosport
Gosport is a town, district and borough situated on the south coast of England, within the county of Hampshire. It has approximately 80,000 permanent residents with a further 5,000-10,000 during the summer months...
, Hampshire
Hampshire
Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...
. As a girl, according to her own account, she worked in an unofficial capacity for Queen Adelaide
Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen
Princess Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen was the queen consort of the United Kingdom and of Hanover as spouse of William IV of the United Kingdom. Adelaide, the capital city of South Australia, is named after her.-Early life:Adelaide was born on 13 August 1792 at Meiningen, Thuringia, Germany...
. In Sydney in 1837, she married Robert Dulhunty
Robert Dulhunty
Robert Venour Dulhunty is chiefly remembered as being the first permanent white settler of what has since become the City of Dubbo, in the rural heartland of the Australian state of New South Wales...
((1802–1853), an English-born grazier and Police Magistrate who owned Claremont, near Penrith, NSW. During the 1840s, Dulhunty and his family pioneered the Dubbo region of central-western NSW. Dulhunty died at Old Dubbo Station at the age of 51, leaving Eliza to bring up their large brood of children and run their portfolio of rural properties, many of which were lost to the banks due to the adverse effects of drought and economic recessions. Eliza died in hospital in the NSW town of Bathurst
Bathurst, New South Wales
-CBD and suburbs:Bathurst's CBD is located on William, George, Howick, Russell, and Durham Streets. The CBD is approximately 25 hectares and surrounds two city blocks. Within this block layout is banking, government services, shopping centres, retail shops, a park* and monuments...
and is buried in the local cemetery.
William John Gibbes (1815-1868)
Colonel Gibbes second son was William John Gibbes (1815–1868), who had been born in the English garrison City of York. In 1837, William John married Harriet Eliza Jamison in the Anglican Church of St James, Sydney.Harriet's father was Sir John Jamison (1776 – 29 June 1844), an important Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n physician
Physician
A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...
, pastoralist, banker, politician
Politician
A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...
, constitutional reformer and public figure. Sir John fathered a number of illegitimate children by several mistresses.
Her mother (one of Sir John's mistresses), Catherine Cain(e), the convict 'housekeeper' assigned to him at his Sydney residence. Catherine gave birth to a daughter by Sir John, Harriet Eliza Jamison, in 1819.
Harriet grew up to be a cultivated and pious young woman. In 1837, she married into the colonial establishment when she wed William John Gibbes. The wedding took place at St James' Anglican Church, Sydney, in the presence of the governor. Harriet died in Sydney in 1896. By this stage, she had seen her three children, all sons, carve out successful careers for themselves in the political, legal and sporting/civil-service sectors of Sydney society.
William John Gibbes, incidentally, lived with his wife at Regentville House, near Penrith
Penrith, New South Wales
Penrith is a suburb in western Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Penrith is located west of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local government area of the City of Penrith...
, New South Wales, following his marriage. Later, in the second half of the 1840s, he lived in Beulah House at Kirribilli, before moving to Camden Villa in the then Sydney garden-suburb of Newtown
Newtown, New South Wales
Newtown, a suburb of Sydney's inner west is located approximately four kilometres south-west of the Sydney central business district, straddling the local government areas of the City of Sydney and Marrickville Council in the state of New South Wales, Australia....
in the early 1850s. Beulah was later lived in by the Riley and Lasseter families. Regrettably, this elegant sandstone residence was eventually demolished and its grounds subdivided into numerous residential blocks which were auctioned off by developers in 1905.
William became a notorious libertine who sired a number of illegitimate children. He spent the 1850s in a state of bankruptcy
Bankruptcy
Bankruptcy is a legal status of an insolvent person or an organisation, that is, one that cannot repay the debts owed to creditors. In most jurisdictions bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor....
with debts exceeding ₤20,000. William was convicted (in the NSW Supreme Court) of a smuggling charge in 1859 and sentenced to two years imprisonment at Parramatta Gaol in Sydney. Subsequently, he lived in Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
and East Sydney. He died at the latter location of a blood disorder, aged 52. William was estranged from his wife at the time of his passing, and the two lived separately. He lies buried in the Old Balmain Cemetery (now Pioneers' Park, in the Sydney suburb of Leichhardt
Leichhardt, New South Wales
Leichhardt is a suburb in the inner-west of Sydney in New South Wales, Australia. Leichhardt is located 5 kilometres west of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local government area of the Municipality of Leichhardt...
.
Mary "Minnie" Gibbes (1817–1858)
Mary, known affectionately as Minnie, was born in the garrison town of PontefractPontefract
Pontefract is an historic market town in West Yorkshire, England. Traditionally in the West Riding, near the A1 , the M62 motorway and Castleford. It is one of the five towns in the metropolitan borough of the City of Wakefield and has a population of 28,250...
, Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
. She later married the prominent Irish-born parliamentarian, Sir Terence Aubrey Murray (1810–1873). Murray was the proprietor of Winderradeen sheep station near Lake George
Lake George (New South Wales)
Lake George is a lake in south-eastern New South Wales, Australia about 30 minutes drive north-east of Canberra along the Federal Highway en route to Sydney.-Geography / Geology:...
, NSW. He also purchased 'Yarralumla sheep station, in what is now Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
, in 1837. Yarralumla subsequently became Government House, Canberra
Government House, Canberra
Government House, Canberra, commonly known as Yarralumla, is the official residence of the Governor-General of Australia. It is located in the suburb of Yarralumla, in the City of Canberra, in the Australian Capital Territory....
. Mary's health was frail, and she died at Winderradeen at the start of 1858, following the birth of her third surviving child. She is buried in the grounds of the homestead.
In 1859, Murray sold Yarralumla to his brother-in-law, Augustus Onslow Manby Gibbes. Later that same year, Augustus' parents came to live with him at Yarralumla homestead. Eventually, in 1881, Augustus sold Yarralumla for 40,000 pounds to Frederick Campbell, a descendant of Robert Campbell.
Frances "Fanny" Minto Gibbes (1822/23–1877)
Frances "Fanny" Minto Gibbes (1822/23–1877) was born in Trelawney Parish on the north coast of the West Indian island of Jamaica during her father's term there as Collector of Customs for the port of Falmouth. In Sydney, in 1850, she married Alfred Ludlam (1810–1877). Irish-born Ludlam was a leading New ZealandNew Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
politician, horticulturist and farmer who owned land at Wellington
Wellington
Wellington is the capital city and third most populous urban area of New Zealand, although it is likely to have surpassed Christchurch due to the exodus following the Canterbury Earthquake. It is at the southwestern tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Rimutaka Range...
and in the Hutt Valley. Ludlam was a member of three of New Zealand's four earliest parliaments, he was also a philanthropist and a founder of Wellington's Botanic Garden
Wellington Botanic Garden
The Wellington Botanic Garden, Wellington, New Zealand, covers 25 hectares of land on the side of the hill between Thorndon and Kelburn, near central Wellington....
.
Ludlam was a periodic visitor to NSW. The main reason for these trans-Tasman Sea
Tasman Sea
The Tasman Sea is the large body of water between Australia and New Zealand, approximately across. It extends 2,800 km from north to south. It is a south-western segment of the South Pacific Ocean. The sea was named after the Dutch explorer Abel Janszoon Tasman, the first recorded European...
visits of Ludlam's was to do business in Sydney, which served as New South Wales' principal trading port, population centre and seat of government; but he also found time to socialise. On 1 October 1850, he married into Sydney's colonial establishment with his wedding to Fanny Gibbes. His wedding took place took place at St Thomas' Anglican Church (in what is today the North Sydney
North Sydney, New South Wales
North Sydney is a suburb and commercial district on the Lower North Shore of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. North Sydney is located 3 kilometres north of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local government area of North Sydney...
local government area).
Fanny was living with her parents at Wotonga House—nowadays part of Admiralty House
Admiralty House, Sydney
Admiralty House is the official Sydney residence of the Governor-General of Australia. It is located in the suburb of Kirribilli, on the northern foreshore of Sydney Harbour . This large, Italianate, sandstone mansion occupies the tip of Kirribilli Point...
complex on Sydney's Kirribilli Point—at the time of her marriage to Ludlam. She and her husband spent their honeymoon relaxing at the New South Wales country property of Yarralumla
Yarralumla, Australian Capital Territory
Yarralumla is a large inner south suburb of Canberra, the capital city of Australia. Located approximately south-west of the city, Yarralumla extends along the south-west bank of Lake Burley Griffin...
(now the site of Australia's Government House in Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
), which at that stage belonged to Fanny's brother-in-law, (Sir) Terence Aubrey Murray. During the 1870s, Fanny and her husband holidayed in London, taking a house at Maida Vale
Maida Vale
Maida Vale is a residential district in West London between St John's Wood and Kilburn. It is part of the City of Westminster. The area is mostly residential, and mainly affluent, consisting of many large late Victorian and Edwardian blocks of mansion flats...
. Fanny fell fatally ill there with an intestinal blockage and was buried in London. Her husband returned to New Zealand, dying in Wellington later that same year (1877) of kidney disease. They had no children.
Edmund Minto Gibbes (1824-1850)
Like his sister Fanny, Edmund was born on Jamaica. After his arrival in Sydney, he was educated with his brother Augustus at Sydney CollegeSydney Grammar School
Sydney Grammar School is an independent, non-denominational, selective, day school for boys, located in Darlinghurst, Edgecliff and St Ives, all suburbs of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia....
. He worked for his father as a NSW Customs Department officer in Sydney and at the whaling port of Eden
Eden, New South Wales
Eden is a coastal town in the South Coast region of New South Wales, Australia. The town, south of the state capital Sydney near the border with Victoria, is located between Nullica Bay to the south and Calle Calle Bay, the northern reach of Twofold Bay, and built on undulating land adjacent to a...
on the NSW South Coast. During the 1840s, he eloped with a wealthy Jewish teenager, Frances Simmons (1833–1910), scandalising colonial Sydney in the process. They would have two children, both of whom died in infancy. Edmund belatedly wed Miss Simmons at Campbelltown
Campbelltown, New South Wales
Campbelltown is a suburb in south-western Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Campbelltown is located 51 kilometres south-west of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local government area of the City of Campbelltown.- History :Campbelltown...
, NSW, in 1849. He contracted pulmonary tuberculosis and sailed for England with his bride in 1850 to begin a fresh life. He died on the voyage and was buried at sea. Edmund's widow later married a London lawyer named Roger Gadsden and returned to Sydney to live.
Matilda Lavinia Gibbes (1826-1916)
Matilda was the third and last child to be born on Jamaica during her father's collectorship at the port of Falmouth. She spent her infancy in Norfolk and came to Sydney at the age of seven. In 1858, she married Augustus Berney (1831–1910). Her husband was an officer in the Sydney Customs Department and the heir to landed estates in Norfolk, including Morton Hall and Bracon Ash. They had four children, one of whom died in infancy, and lived in the Sydney suburb of Darlinghurst. In 1896, Matilda's husband inherited his family properties in Norfolk and the family returned there to live. Matilda died at Bracon Ash house, aged 90, during the height of World War IWorld War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
and is buried locally in the Berney family mausoleum.
Augustus Onslow Manby Gibbes (1828–1897)
Augustus, nicknamed "Gussie", was the youngest child. He was born in Great YarmouthGreat Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth, often known to locals as Yarmouth, is a coastal town in Norfolk, England. It is at the mouth of the River Yare, east of Norwich.It has been a seaside resort since 1760, and is the gateway from the Norfolk Broads to the sea...
, Norfolk. His godfathers were George William Manby
George William Manby
Captain George William Manby FRS , was an English author and inventor. He designed an apparatus for saving life from shipwrecks and also the first modern form of fire extinguisher.-Life:Manby went to school at Downham Market...
and Captain John Onslow, RN. He became a large-scale sheep farmer and horse breeder in rural New South Wales, owning the Yarralumla estate from 1859 to 1881. He then travelled overseas for a decade before settling down on a farming property named Braemar, near the town of Goulburn, New South Wales, in the early 1890s, with his wife and their four surviving children, all sons. His wife, Annie Bartram (1865–1914) came from the City of Bath in England The two had met in the mid-1880s, entering into a relationship and touring around the United Kingdom. Augustus, however, did not officially marry her until 1896 (at Penrith, NSW). The following year, he died at Braemar House after suffering a stroke and was buried with his parents in Canberra. For a detailed account of Augustus' life and the Gibbes family's era at Yarralumla, see the Canberra Historical Journal, New Series, Number 48, September 2001, pp. 11–31. For more genealogical data about his siblings, see The Ancestral Searcher, Volume 27, Number 4, December 2004, pp. 324–325.
Norfolk friends
Members of the Berney family of landed gentryLanded gentry
Landed gentry is a traditional British social class, consisting of land owners who could live entirely off rental income. Often they worked only in an administrative capacity looking after the management of their own lands....
were close associates of the Gibbes' during their time in Norfolk. Indeed, the two families would later inter-marry. Another friend of the Gibbes' in Great Yarmouth was George William Manby
George William Manby
Captain George William Manby FRS , was an English author and inventor. He designed an apparatus for saving life from shipwrecks and also the first modern form of fire extinguisher.-Life:Manby went to school at Downham Market...
, who became one of the godfathers of Augustus Onslow Manby Gibbes (1828–1897). Manby was a well-known inventor and a member of England's Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
.
Great grandson — Bobby Gibbes
One of the numerous great-grandsons of Colonel Gibbes was Bobby GibbesBobby Gibbes
Robert Henry Maxwell Gibbes DSO, DFC & Bar, OAM was a leading Australian fighter ace of World War II. He was officially credited with shooting down 10¼ enemy aircraft, although his score is often reported as 12 destroyed...
DSO
Distinguished Service Order
The Distinguished Service Order is a military decoration of the United Kingdom, and formerly of other parts of the British Commonwealth and Empire, awarded for meritorious or distinguished service by officers of the armed forces during wartime, typically in actual combat.Instituted on 6 September...
, DFC
Distinguished Flying Cross (United Kingdom)
The Distinguished Flying Cross is a military decoration awarded to personnel of the United Kingdom's Royal Air Force and other services, and formerly to officers of other Commonwealth countries, for "an act or acts of valour, courage or devotion to duty whilst flying in active operations against...
& Bar
Medal bar
A medal bar or medal clasp is a thin metal bar attached to the ribbon of a military decoration, civil decoration, or other medal. It is most commonly used to indicate the campaign or operation the recipient received the award for, and multiple bars on the same medal are used to indicate that the...
, OAM
Order of Australia
The Order of Australia is an order of chivalry established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia, "for the purpose of according recognition to Australian citizens and other persons for achievement or for meritorious service"...
(6 May 1916 – 11 April 2007) who was a leading Australian fighter ace
Flying ace
A flying ace or fighter ace is a military aviator credited with shooting down several enemy aircraft during aerial combat. The actual number of aerial victories required to officially qualify as an "ace" has varied, but is usually considered to be five or more...
of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.
He was officially credited with shooting down 10¼ enemy aircraft, although his score is often reported as 12 destroyed.
Burial of the Colonel and Mrs Gibbes
Colonel Gibbes died at Yarralumla homestead in 1873. His remains are interred at St John the Baptist Church, ReidSt John the Baptist Church, Reid
St John the Baptist Church is the oldest church in Canberra, Australia, and also the oldest building within Canberra's city precinct. It is sited at the corner of ANZAC Parade and Constitution Avenue in the suburb of Reid.-Construction:...
in the Australian National Capital of Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
. Interred with him are the remains of his wife, Elizabeth, who died in 1874, his son Augustus Gibbes, his grandson Henry Gibbes, and his great-grandson Wing-Commander
Wing Commander (rank)
Wing commander is a commissioned rank in the Royal Air Force and the air forces of many other Commonwealth countries...
Robert "Bobby" Gibbes.