George Arnold Wood (7 June 1865 – 14 October 1928) was an English Australian historian notable for writing an early work on Australian history entitled ''

The Discovery of Australia ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

''. Wood was born at

Salford Salford () is a city and the largest settlement in the City of Salford metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. In 2011, Salford had a population of 103,886. It is also the second and only other city in the metropolitan county afte ...

, England; he was educated at Owens College, Manchester, where he graduated B.A., and afterwards at

Balliol College Balliol College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. One of Oxford's oldest colleges, it was founded around 1263 by John I de Balliol, a landowner from Barnard Castle in County Durham, who provided the f ...

, Oxford, where in 1886 he won the Brackenbury history scholarship and in 1889 the Stanhope history essay prize. In 1891 he became Challis professor of history at the

University of Sydney The University of Sydney (USYD), also known as Sydney University, or informally Sydney Uni, is a public research university located in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and is one of the country's si ...

and held this chair for the remainder of his life. Before coming to Australia his chief study had been in English and European history, but he soon developed an interest in the early days of Australia and did valuable research on this period. During the

Boer War The Second Boer War ( af, Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, the Anglo–Boer War, or the South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer Republics (the Sou ...

he incurred some unpopularity by advocating peace measures, but he was not a pacifist if he thought a cause a just one—only his age prevented him from enlisting during the First World War. In 1922 he published ''The Discovery of Australia''. It was at once accepted as the standard work on the subject. His ''The Voyage of the "Endeavour"'', written for school children is also very good of its kind. He had hoped to write a history of Australia up to the deposition of Bligh, but it was never completed. Some of his preparatory work will be found in the admirable papers he contributed to the ''Journal and Proceedings of the Royal Historical Society, Sydney''. He died at Sydney on 14 October 1928. He married Eleanor Madeline Whitfeld, who survived him with three sons and a daughter. One of his sons, Frederick Wood, became professor of history at

Victoria University College Victoria University of Wellington ( mi, Te Herenga Waka) is a university in Wellington, New Zealand. It was established in 1897 by Act of Parliament, and was a constituent college of the University of New Zealand. The university is well know ...

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...

, New Zealand.

Notes

References

*R. M. Crawford 'A Bit of A Rebel.' The Life and Work of George Arnold Wood. Sydney University Press. 1975. John A. Moses, Prussian-German Militarism 1914-18 in Australian Perspective: The Thought of George Arnold Wood. Bern Peter Lang, 1991. {{DEFAULTSORT:Wood 1865 births 1928 deaths Australian historians English emigrants to Australia University of Sydney faculty