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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. |
