Walter Hughes Duncan (29 April 1848 – 12 May 1906) was a

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

n pastoralist and politician. He was a member of the

South Australian House of 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 1896 to 1906, representing the electorates of Onkaparinga (1896-1902) and

Murray Murray may refer to: Businesses * Murray (bicycle company), an American manufacturer of low-cost bicycles * Murrays, an Australian bus company * Murray International Trust, a Scottish investment trust * D. & W. Murray Limited, an Australian who ...

(1902-1906).

History

Duncan was born the second son of (sea) Captain John Duncan (died 24 April 1880) in

Anstruther Anstruther ( sco, Ainster or Enster ; gd, Ànsruthair) is a small coastal resort town in Fife, Scotland, situated on the north-shore of the Firth of Forth and south-southeast of St Andrews. The town comprises two settlements, Anstruther ...

Fifeshire Fife (, ; gd, Fìobha, ; sco, Fife) is a council area, historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries with Perth and Kinross (i.e ...

, Scotland, and came out to South Australia with his parents in 1854; his father was a partner with his brother-in-law Sir Walter W. Hughes, who was running sheep and cattle at Hoyle's Plains and on

Yorke Peninsula The Yorke Peninsula is a peninsula located northwest and west of Adelaide in South Australia, between Spencer Gulf on the west and Gulf St Vincent on the east. The peninsula is separated from Kangaroo Island to the south by Investigator Strai ...

in the vicinity of

Wallaroo Wallaroo is a common name for several species of moderately large macropods, intermediate in size between the kangaroos and the wallabies. The word "wallaroo" is from the Dharug ''walaru'', and not a portmanteau of the words "kangaroo" and "wal ...

and Moonta. He was educated at

Stanley Grammar School Stanley Grammar School was a private day and boarding school in Watervale, a small town in South Australia's Clare Valley. Its history, which dates from 1858 to 1904, is inextricably linked with that of its founder and headmaster, Joseph S. Co ...

, at Watervale, at

St. Peter's College, Adelaide , other_name = The Collegiate School of St Peter , seal_image = St Peter's College, Adelaide Logo.svg , seal_size = 150 , image = SPSC chapel and memorial hall.jpg , image_size ...

, and studied for two years at

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

. He was a successful pastoralist, owning "Mernowie" of near Marrabel and shareholder in the Wallaroo and Moonta mines.

Politics

He was a councillor with Waterloo District Council for three years, then stood, unsuccessfully, for the

Assembly Assembly may refer to: Organisations and meetings * Deliberative assembly, a gathering of members who use parliamentary procedure for making decisions * General assembly, an official meeting of the members of an organization or of their representa ...

seat of Burra in 1891, and again in 1893. In 1896 he stood for Onkaparinga and was successful, and was returned in 1899, both times with

Robert Caldwell Robert Caldwell (7 May 1814 – 28 August 1891) was a missionary for London Missionary Society. He arrived in India at age 24, studied the local language to spread the word of Bible in a vernacular language, studies that led him to author a tex ...

as a colleague. In 1902 he won the seat of

. He was an attentive listener, and only ever spoke in Parliament on matters with which he was completely conversant. He was "one of Nature's gentlemen". He died suddenly at sea on the ''S.S. Ormuz'' on his return journey from London, somewhere between

Port Said Port Said ( ar, بورسعيد, Būrsaʿīd, ; grc, Πηλούσιον, Pēlousion) is a city that lies in northeast Egypt extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, north of the Suez Canal. With an approximate population of 6 ...

and

Colombo Colombo ( ; si, කොළඹ, translit=Koḷam̆ba, ; ta, கொழும்பு, translit=Koḻumpu, ) is the executive and judicial capital and largest city of Sri Lanka by population. According to the Brookings Institution, Colombo me ...

, and was buried at sea.

Family

He was a nephew of Sir

Walter Watson Hughes Sir Walter Watson Hughes (22 August 1803 – 1 January 1887),Dirk Van Dissel,Hughes, Sir Walter Watson (1803 - 1887), ''Australian Dictionary of Biography'', Volume 4, MUP, 1972, pp 440-441. Retrieved 11 August 2009 who before his knighthood wa ...

and a brother of the politician Sir John James Duncan. He had a half-brother William Duncan and half-sisters Janet Elizabeth Duncan and Helen Chambers Duncan. He married Alice Rebecca Good ( – ca.30 October 1927) on 21 September 1876; they had residences "Duncraig" at

Stirling Stirling (; sco, Stirlin; gd, Sruighlea ) is a city in central Scotland, northeast of Glasgow and north-west of Edinburgh. The market town, surrounded by rich farmland, grew up connecting the royal citadel, the medieval old town with its me ...

and "St. Monans" at Palmer Place (Brougham Place?),

North Adelaide North Adelaide is a predominantly residential precinct and suburb of the City of Adelaide in South Australia, situated north of the River Torrens and within the Adelaide Park Lands. History Surveyor-General Colonel William Light of the colo ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Duncan, Walter Hughes Members of the South Australian House of Assembly Australian pastoralists 1848 births 1906 deaths Scottish emigrants to colonial Australia 19th-century Australian politicians 19th-century Australian businesspeople