William Edward PARRY

PARRY, (WILLIAM) EDWARD (b. Bath, Somerset, England, 19 Dec 1790; d. Ems, Germany, 8 July 1855). Commissioner of the Australian Agricultural Company.

Son of a doctor, Caleb Hilary Parry and Sarah (née Rigby), Parry joined the Royal Navy in 1803. From 1817 he spent ten years exploring in the Canadian Arctic for which m 1829 he was knighted. Although unsuccessful in finding a North-West passage, he held the record for fifty years for northernmost penetration of the Arctic.

In 1829, three years after his marriage to Isabella, daughter of Sir John Stanley Bt, he was appointed commissioner of the Australian Agricultural Company's holding of 1 000 000 acres at Port Stephens in NSW. From his headquarters at Tahlee on the northern shores of the Port, he brought order into the affairs of the Company which had struggled since its establishment there in 1826. When he left in 1834, the Company was on a sound footing with initiatives in place to move its operations from the unsuitable country around Port Stephens to the Liverpool Plains. On return to England he served in various posts until retirement, being appointed Rear-Admiral in 1852, three years before his death.

At Port Stephens Parry took responsibility for the spiritual state of the communities established by the Company at Carrington, Booral and Stroud, referring to himself in a letter to his father-in-law as 'the parson of the parish'. He preached every Sunday, baptised children, visited the sick, conducted funerals and conversed with his people, all with the aim of preparing them for life beyond the grave. He provided schools, a church and a library, and other amenities for those under his jurisdiction.

ADB 2; C E Bennett, Early Days of Port Stephens (Newcastle, nd); E Parry, Memoirs of Rear-Admiral Sir W. Edward Parry (London, 1857)

RAYMOND JAMES LAIRD