Emanuel Solomon (1800 – 3 October 1873) was a businessman and politician in the early days of the
Colony of South Australia
In modern parlance, a colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule. Though dominated by the foreign colonizers, colonies remain separate from the administration of the original country of the colonizers, the '' metropolitan state'' ...
, representing the seat of
West Adelaide in the
South Australian Legislative Assembly
The House of Assembly, or lower house, is one of the two chambers of the Parliament of South Australia. The other is the Legislative Council. It sits in Parliament House in the state capital, Adelaide.
Overview
The House of Assembly was creat ...
from 1862 to 1865. He is the brother of
Vaiben Solomon
Vaiben Solomon (1798 – 21 June 1860) was a London Jew who, with his brother Emanuel Solomon, was transported for larceny to New South Wales in 1818. He had further brushes with the law but seized business opportunities and became quite prosper ...
and is apart of the larger
Solomon family.
History
Emanuel was born in London, a son of
Samuel Moss Solomon (c. 1769 – 13 May 1842) and his first wife Elizabeth née Moses (c. 1772–c. 1814). He and his brother
Vaiben Solomon
Vaiben Solomon (1798 – 21 June 1860) was a London Jew who, with his brother Emanuel Solomon, was transported for larceny to New South Wales in 1818. He had further brushes with the law but seized business opportunities and became quite prosper ...
(1802 – 21 June 1860) were transported to Sydney and served time for larceny, arriving on 1 May 1818 aboard the ''
Lady Castlereagh''.
He arrived in South Australia in 1837 and was one of the founders of the Adelaide Hebrew Congregation.
[
He founded the ]Queen's Theatre, Adelaide
The Queen's Theatre is a building of historic importance in Playhouse Lane, Adelaide, South Australia. It is the oldest intact theatre in mainland Australia, having originally been built in 1840, the only earlier one in Australia being the still- ...
with brother Vaiben and occasional involvement of nephew Judah Moss Solomon (1818–1880), father of Vaiben Louis Solomon
Vaiben Louis Solomon (13 May 1853 – 20 October 1908) was the 21st Premier of South Australia and a member of the first Australian Commonwealth parliament. He was generally known by his full name (perhaps to distinguish him from his uncle, ...
.
In 1848 he and Matthew Smith purchased of land on Spencer Gulf
The Spencer Gulf is the westernmost and larger of two large inlets (the other being Gulf St Vincent) on the southern coast of Australia, in the state of South Australia, facing the Great Australian Bight. It spans from the Cape Catastrophe and ...
and subdivided it as a township to be known as Port Pirie. Little development occurred on site and by the late 1860s there were only three woolsheds on the riverfront. It was later re-surveyed and became Port Pirie
Port Pirie is a small city on the east coast of the Spencer Gulf in South Australia, north of the state capital, Adelaide. The city has an expansive history which dates back to 1845. Port Pirie was the first proclaimed regional city in South ...
's suburb Solomontown, commonly referred to as "Solly". Solomon had reserved a parcel of land for a synagogue, but was never taken up by the few Jews in Port Pirie. A clause in his will left it to whatever denomination should erect a building there, which offer was taken up by the Bible Christians
The Bible Christian Church was a Methodist denomination founded by William O’Bryan, a Wesleyan Methodist local preacher, on 18 October 1815 in North Cornwall. The first society, consisting of just 22 members, met at Lake Farm in Shebbear, ...
, who transported a surplus building to the site.
Solomon is commemorated for the generosity he provided to Mary MacKillop
Mary Helen MacKillop RSJ (15 January 1842 – 8 August 1909) was an Australian religious sister who has been declared a saint by the Catholic Church, as St Mary of the Cross. Of Scottish descent, she was born in Melbourne but is best known fo ...
.
In November 1871 he gave the Sisters of St. Joseph
The Sisters of St. Joseph, also known as the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph, abbreviated CSJ or SSJ, is a Roman Catholic religious congregation of women founded in Le Puy-en-Velay, France, in 1650. This congregation, named for S ...
, who had been evicted from their convent, a house rent free.
In December 1871 he hosted a reception for 500 early settlers of South Australia to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the foundation of the colony. Photographer Henry Jones took photographs of most if not all of those who were invited to attend. He presented a large composite photograph to Solomon, and in 1910 another was purchased from Jones by T. R. Bowman and donated to the Public Library
A public library is a library that is accessible by the general public and is usually funded from public sources, such as taxes. It is operated by librarians and library paraprofessionals, who are also Civil service, civil servants.
There are ...
for display in the entrance foyer.
Politics
He was elected to the seat of West Adelaide in the South Australian Legislative Assembly
The House of Assembly, or lower house, is one of the two chambers of the Parliament of South Australia. The other is the Legislative Council. It sits in Parliament House in the state capital, Adelaide.
Overview
The House of Assembly was creat ...
in November 1862, with James Crabb Verco
James Crabb Verco (1814 – 2 February 1891) was an early settler in the colony of South Australia, builder, businessman and parliamentarian. He was the father of Joseph Cooke Verco.
History
Verco left his home town Callington, Cornwall for Sou ...
as his colleague, and resigned in 1865. He was elected to the Legislative Council in 1867 and retired in September 1871.
Family
He married fellow convict Mary Ann Wilson on 6 November 1826.[ On 12 April 1844 he married Cecilia Adelaide Smith ( – 24 July 1852) who died in Sydney; that same year he married a third time, to Catherine Abrahams (c. 1819 – 2 July 1901). Their children included:
*Elizabeth Dorseta Solomon (c. 1839 – 16 February 1914) married her cousin Samuel Israel Myers on 24 November 1858. (She had been the focus of a court case against ]Townsend Duryea
Townsend Duryea (1823 – 13 December 1888) and his brother Sanford Duryea (22 February 1833 – 20 March 1903, see below) were American-born photographers who provided South Australians with invaluable images of life in the early colony. Their ...
amongst others in regards to an alleged conspiracy to elope to Melbourne with John Holthouse Pierce in 1855.)
*Rosetta Solomon ( – 24 December 1901) married Joel Moss on 5 July 1865, lived at "Westwood", Glebe Point, New South Wales
Glebe Point is a point on Sydney Harbour in the suburb of Glebe, in the Inner West of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia.
External links
GlebeNet: Information for Residents and Visitors to Glebe, Sydney
File:Glebe_Point.JPG, ...
.
*Joseph Samuel Solomon (c. 1844 – 4 September 1940) married Miriam Solomon (died 6 December 1921), eldest daughter of Abraham Jacob Solomon (c. 1825–1889), on 25 November 1868. They lived at Walkerville Terrace, Walkerville.
*Julia Solomon (c. 1844 – January or February 1881) married Victor Voules Brown on 24 January 1864. She died in Darwin.
*Catherine Leah Solomon (c. 1848 – 4 July 1897) married Louis Victorsen of Clare on 27 May 1874 at the residence of J. S Solomon, Buxton St, North Adelaide.
*Vaiben Joel Solomon (27 November 1854 – 27 January 1936) married Dora Muhr on 25 July 1877
His oldest brother Moss Solomon (c. 1796 – 3 February 1849) was father of Judah Moss Solomon and grandfather of Vaiben Louis Solomon
Vaiben Louis Solomon (13 May 1853 – 20 October 1908) was the 21st Premier of South Australia and a member of the first Australian Commonwealth parliament. He was generally known by his full name (perhaps to distinguish him from his uncle, ...
.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Solomon, Emanuel
Members of the South Australian Legislative Council
Members of the South Australian House of Assembly
Jewish Australian politicians
1800 births
1873 deaths
Burials at West Terrace Cemetery
19th-century Australian politicians
Convicts transported to Australia
Jewish Australian history