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DUNCAN, Sir JOHN JAMES
(1845-1913), pastoralist and member of parliament, was born on 12 February
1845 at Anstruther, Fife, Scotland, second son of John Duncan, sea captain,
and his first wife Joan, sister of Walter Watson Hughes. Captain Duncan had
first arrived in Adelaide in 1841 and engaged in sheepfarming with his
brother-in-law at the Hummocks, but he went back to Scotland and made
several voyages to India; in 1854 he returned to South Australia with his
family and again joined Hughes on pastoral leases near Wallaroo. There his
wife died, he became a justice of the peace and, when copper was found near
Wallaroo in 1859, helped to develop the mines. He was a staunch Presbyterian
and his obituarist claimed that 'no man ever complied so fully with the
Scripture injunction of not letting his left hand know what the right hand
did'. He died at Glen Osmond on 24 April 1880, leaving two sons by his first
wife and two sons and two daughters by his second.
John James was educated at Watervale Grammar School, Bentley, near Gawler
and the Collegiate School of St Peter; in holidays he brought the first four
miners from Burra to Moonta and often carted water to his uncle's mines. He
worked for three years with Elder, Smith & Co. and then took charge of the
financial department of the Wallaroo and Moonta Mining and Smelting Co. He
went to Britain in 1878, served as South Australian commissioner at the
Paris Exhibition and travelled widely on the Continent. On his return he
managed his uncle's pastoral properties, took up leases as far north as Lake
Eyre and in 1887 inherited the stations of Hughes Park near Watervale and
Gum Creek near Burra. On 5 November 1873 he had married Jane Morison,
daughter of Arthur Harvey of Durban, South Africa; she died a year later
without issue. In London on 27 August 1879 he married Jean Gordon, daughter
of James Grant and Mary, née Todd.
In 1871 Duncan was elected to the South Australian House of Assembly for
Port Adelaide which then included Wallaroo where the overwhelming mining
vote made him one of the first members of parliament to be returned by a
labour organization. In 1875-78 he represented Wallaroo after it became a
separate electorate. He was elected for Wooroora in 1884 but resigned in
1890 to take a prominent part in the National League, a Conservative
association which later became allied with Liberal and Democratic unions
against the Labor movement. In 1891 he was returned for the North-Eastern
District to the Legislative Council. He held the seat until 1896 and then
visited Britain until 1899. He represented the Midland District in the
council in 1900-13. In his last years he was leader of the Opposition to
Verran's Labor government. Peculiarly loyal to South Australia, he rejected
all pleas to nominate him for election to the Federal Senate, although he
had forsaken much of the independence that earlier led him to refuse
ministerial office three times. At first an impetuous and vehement speaker,
he was said to 'wing a sparrow by his gunshot and disjoint his own shoulder
with the recoil'; later he developed 'some oratorical magnetism', and
despite 'an irruption of ahs' his speeches were vigorous and authoritative.
Right or wrong he was always sincere and a popular choice for the joint
committees which hammered out disagreements between the two Houses. Even in
his last years when he cheerfully called himself a 'stonewaller', he was
never cynical or bitter and prided himself on differing from his opponents
'with honour and without estrangement'.
Duncan was widely respected for his sagacity and immense influence in
pastoral affairs, and the administration of big finance and local finance.
He held many directorships including the South Australian Savings Bank and
was president of the Northern Agricultural Society and in 1905-07 of the
Pastoralists' Association, often representing South Australia on its federal
council. He was a captain in the Watervale Volunteers and served for years
on the Upper Wakefield District Council. In 1911-13 he was one of the first
members elected by parliament to the Council of the University of Adelaide.
He was knighted for his public services on 12 June 1913. In addition to his
fine homestead at Hughes Park he had a large town house, Strathspey, at
Mitcham. After an operation for gall-stones he died at a private hospital in
North Adelaide on 8 October 1913. He was buried in the family ground at St
Mark's Church of England, Penwortham, the mourners travelling by train to
Saddleworth and thence to the cemetery by char-à-bancs. He was survived by
his wife, four sons and two daughters. From his estate of £320,000 generous
bequests were made to his numerous relations, £1500 to charitable
organizations and £5000 to the Presbyterian Church of which he had been a
devoted member at Flinders Street. Most of the remaining property was sold
and placed in trust for his family and descendants. In memory of W. W.
Hughes, he left £100 to maintain his uncle's grave at Chertsey, Surrey, and
£50 'to keep clean and repair' his uncle's statue at the entrance of the
University of Adelaide; his son John Grant was enjoined to use the surname
Duncan-Hughes. |
