WAL WALKER

Through my family I am connected to the arrival of the first British to settle in Sydney. On one side are four convicts from the First Fleet and one from the Second Fleet, who came accompanying a surgeon, D’Arcy Wentworth, the first fare-paying passenger to the Colony.

On the other side of my family, William Walker arrived in 1813 from Calcutta to sort out the affairs of Robert Campbell, whose trading enterprise was under duress, after Campbell had been sent to London by Governor Macquarie in support of Bligh.

These and many of their descendants took an interest in the welfare of the Indigenous Australians. Some advocated for them as Members of Parliament in New South Wales and Queensland, in the first Commonwealth Parliament and later as the first Minister for Aboriginal Affairs.

It is not unreasonable for the reader to understand that I have a passionate interest in Australian history and the welfare of the Australian Aborigines. My history, Jane & D’Arcy: Jane Austen & D’Arcy Wentworth, tells a story long suppressed by Jane Austen’s family, who persuaded her not to travel to Australia with D’Arcy. It is in two volumes, Folly is not always Folly and Such talent & such Success. The Squatters’ Grab looks at the failures of government and administration in London and in the Colony, that allowed the violent dispossession of the Indigenous people. It unearths, many for the first time, the people and incidents responsible for this disaster.

Early Merchants, Bankers & Squatters records the growth of trade from the Colony, its emergence from the constraints of the East India Company. It moves from 1813 to the end of the First World War, following two Scottish Walker families, including nine Archer brothers from Norway, their sons and grandsons. They began as merchants, trading in whale oil and wool, then bankers, pastoralists and politicians in a new and turbulent economy. In 2027, Arcana Gallery Press will publish my next history/biography: Bill Wentworth, His Life and Times. What I would say about myself is that I have been a researcher, trained as an economist, who has become an historian through exposure, travels throughout Australia, Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Africa; in retirement, having the time and knowledge to investigate and make new knowledge available to readers. I hope you enjoy the stories.