Charles Gavan Duffy

Charles Gavan Duffy, 1846

Sir Charles Gavan Duffy as speaker, 1880

Sir Charles Gavan Duffy (born April 12, 1816 in Monaghan , † February 9, 1903 in Nice ) was an Irish nationalist and Australian colonial politician. He was the 8th Prime Minister of Victoria .

Charles Duffy was born the son of a Catholic shopkeeper, but lost his parents as a child. An uncle of his, a Catholic priest, took care of him. He was able to complete his training at St Malachy's College in Belfast and was admitted to the bar in 1845.

He had married in 1842, but his wife died three years later. A second marriage in 1846 resulted in six children.

Early on, he joined Irish nationalist circles who advocated independence for Ireland. He also became an important figure in Irish literary circles and also emerged as the editor of Irish literature. He founded the Irish newspaper The Nation with others and was a member of the Young Ireland Association . He campaigned for land reform in Ireland and was elected to represent New Ross in the British House of Commons in 1852 .

Desperate about the poor prospects for Irish independence, he gave up his parliamentary mandate in 1856 and emigrated with his family to Australia, where he settled in the newly formed colony of Victoria. At first he was feared and hated there with his literary and political ambitions in the English Protestant establishment. But that same year he was elected to the Legislative Assembly of the Western District of Victoria. In 1857 another Irish Catholic, John O'Shanassy, ​​became Prime Minister of Victoria and Duffy became its deputy. In 1871 he became the eighth Prime Minister himself, but only held this office for one year. From 1877 to 1880 he was Speaker of the Parliament of Victoria. He then withdrew to the south of France, where he died in 1903 at the age of 86.

In 1873 Duffy had been promoted to Knight Bachelor , in 1877 he was accepted as Knight Commander in the British Order of Saints Michael and George . In 1881 he married a third time and had four more children. Even in exile, he was actively interested in his country of origin and his chosen country. Two of his sons held high political offices in Australia and one, George Gavan Duffy , was a Sinn Féin politician and President of the High Court of Ireland in Ireland .

Books

• Geoff Browne: A Biographical Register of the Victorian Parliament, 1900-84 . Government Printer, Melbourne 1985.
• Charles Gavan Duffy: Four Years of Irish History 1845-1849 . Robertson, Melbourne, 1883. (autobiography and recollections).
• Don Garden: Victoria: A History . Thomas Nelson, Melbourne 1984.
• Justin McCarthy: History of Our Own Times . Vols 1-4, 1895.
• Davis McCaughey et al .: Victoria's Colonial Governors 1839-1900 , Melbourne University Press, Carlton 1993.
• Antony O'Brien: Shenanigans on the Ovens Goldfields: The 1859 Election . Artillery Publishing, Hartwell 2005 (p. Xi & Ch.2).
• Kathleen Thompson, Geoffrey Serle: A Biographical Register of the Victorian Parliament, 1856-1900 . Australian National University Press, Canberra 1972.
• Raymond Wright: A People's Counsel. A History of the Parliament of Victoria, 1856-1990 . Oxford University Press, Melbourne 1992.

Web links

• Poetry of Ireland, with references to Duffy
• Early Life in Monaghan by Charles Gavan Duffy