Donald Macdonell (1862 – 26 October 1911) was a politician, trade unionist and shearer in New South Wales, Australia. Born at Stuart Mill near

St Arnaud, Victoria St Arnaud is a town in the Wimmera region of Victoria, Australia, 244 kilometres north west of the capital Melbourne. It is in the Shire of Northern Grampians local government area. At the , St Arnaud had a population of 2,318. It is named af ...

, to Christina McMaster and Alexander Macdonell, a Scottish-born farmer and shearer. He helped on his father's farm as a child and moved to New South Wales in 1886, being an early member of the

Australian Shearers' Union The Australian Shearers' Union (also known as the Australasian Shearers Union, sometimes referred to as the Creswick Shearers' Union) was a significant but short-lived early trade union in Victoria and southern New South Wales. It was formed on 12 ...

. He played a leading party in the 1891 strike, during which time he had traveled to Queensland. He became secretary of the Shearers' Union's Bourke branch and a member of the Labor Party in 1894, and helped to draft the rules for the new

Australian Workers' Union The Australian Workers' Union (AWU) is one of Australia's largest and oldest trade unions. It traces its origins to unions founded in the pastoral and mining industries in the 1880s and currently has approximately 80,000 members. It has exerci ...

when the shearers' and labourers' unions amalgamated in the same year. He continued as secretary of the AWU's Bourke branch thereafter. He was general secretary of the AWU from 1900 to 1911. In 1901 he was elected to the

New South Wales Legislative Assembly The New South Wales Legislative Assembly is the lower of the two houses of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The upper house is the New South Wales Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament Ho ...

as the Labor member for

Cobar Cobar is a town in central western New South Wales, Australia whose economy is based mainly upon base metals and gold mining. The town is by road northwest of the state capital, Sydney. It is at the crossroads of the Kidman Way and Barrier Hig ...

, serving until 1911. He was Minister for Agriculture and Chief Secretary in the

McGowen ministry The McGowen ministry was the 34th ministry of the New South Wales Government, and was led by the 18th Premier, James McGowen. This ministry marks the first Labor ministry in the state of New South Wales. McGowen was elected to the New South ...

from 1910 to 1911. He was absent from parliament from 1 March 1911 due to illness but was expected to recover when a political crisis caused by the resignation of 2 Labor members resulted in parliament being prorogued and he was automatically expelled for non-attendance during an entire session. He was re-elected unopposed in the Cobar by-election on 7 October, but died three weeks later. Macdonell died in

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

on and is buried at Stuart Mill. He was a friend of

Henry Lawson Henry Archibald Hertzberg Lawson (17 June 1867 – 2 September 1922) was an Australian writer and bush poet. Along with his contemporary Banjo Paterson, Lawson is among the best-known Australian poets and fiction writers of the colonial perio ...

who in 1899 described Macdonell as "the tallest, straightest, and perhaps the best of the Bourke-side bush-leaders".

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Macdonell, Donald 1862 births 1911 deaths Members of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly People from Victoria (Australia) Australian trade unionists Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of New South Wales Australian people of Scottish descent