John Hutt
John Hutt (24 July 1795 – 9 April 1880) was Governor of Western Australia from 1839 to 1846.
Life
Born in London on 24 July 1795, John Hutt was the fourth of 13 children of Richard Hutt of Appley Towers, Ryde, Isle of Wight. He was educated at Christ's Hospital, and in 1815 inherited Appley Towers. He is said to have lived extravagantly, and eventually found it necessary to sell his estate and enter the Madras Civil Service. When he did so is unknown, but in about 1830 he was collector of the North Arcot district. He later became Governor of North Arcot.
Along with his brother
Politically a liberal, one of Hutt's first actions as governor was to increase the membership of the Western Australian Legislative Council by adding four unofficial nominees. He also oversaw many changes in the colony's land regulations, especially in the enforcement of the conditions governing land grants. It was said that "... the acts of the Governor at this time helped materially to save the infant settlement from utter disaster, even though eventually he may have erred on the side of over-caution."[1]
Hutt's attitude to the
In 1841, John Hutt founded the first Freemasons lodge in Western Australia, named the 'Lodge of St John' No. 485 under the English Masonic constitution, later becoming the first Lodge consecrated under the Western Australian constitution in 1901. The lodge still meets in the Perth suburb of Kingsley to this day.
After resigning as Governor of Western Australia, Hutt returned to England, where he apparently went through more money. He joined the Canterbury Association on 27 March 1848 as one of its first members, but on 29 March 1850 resigned both its chairmanship and membership.[3] Edward Gibbon Wakefield dedicated his book Art of Colonization to Hutt.[4] For a while he lived in Chelsea Hospital. He died, unmarried, in his brother's house on 9 April 1880.
See also
References
- ISBN 9780859050722.
- S2CID 143060019. Retrieved 14 February 2023.
- ^ Blain, Rev. Michael (2007). The Canterbury Association (1848-1852): A Study of Its Members' Connections (PDF). Christchurch: Project Canterbury. pp. 47–48. Retrieved 20 March 2013.
- ^ Hight, James; C. R. Straubel (1957). A History of Canterbury Volume I : to 1854. Christchurch: Whitcombe and Tombs Ltd. p. 160.
Further reading
- Battye, James Sykes(1924). Western Australia: A History from its Discovery to the Inauguration of the Commonwealth. London: Oxford University Press.
- Nicholas, Julia (1958). An evaluation of the work of John Hutt as Governor of the Colony of Western Australia from 1839–1846. Thesis. Available at the State Library of Western Australia.
- The Constitution Centre of Western Australia (2002). "John Hutt 1839-1846". Governors and Premiers of Western Australia. West Perth, Western Australia: The Constitution Centre of Western Australia. ISBN 0-7307-3821-3. Archived from the originalon 2009-09-13. Retrieved 2005-08-05.