Sir John Forrest was born in Bunbury in 1843 to Scottish parents. One of 10 children, John quickly became Australia’s first native-born peer, becoming Baron Forrest in 1918.

His career began in the Surveyor General’s office in 1863 when he was apprenticed to Bunbury’s assistant surveyor, and throughout his lifetime he achieved much fame in both Australia and London as an explorer and surveyor in Western Australia and the eastern colonies of Australia.

A Natural-Born Leader

John Forrest was offered the leadership of a search party in 1869 through unexplored territory near what’s today known as Laverton, looking for the lost Leichardt expedition party. Then, in 1870 he led an expedition which became the very first land crossing from Western Australia. The team followed and surveyed John Eyre’s route when, in 1840, he crossed the Nullarbor on foot. In 1874, another expedition led by Forrest left Geraldton – through the arid, dry centre of Western Australia arriving at the north-south telegraph line in South Australia. The following year found him in London, where he gave several talks and received wide acclaim as a leader and colonial explorer.

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First Premier of Western Australia

In 1883 Forrest was appointed Surveyor General and was also given a seat in the Legislative and Executive Councils, which, at that time, were appointed advisory bodies to the Governor. In 1890 when Western Australia was granted Constitution, John Forrest was the obvious choice to become the colony’s first Premier – a position he held for the next 10 years.

While Forrest was Premier, gold was discovered in Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie, and Forrest was determined to provide the colony with publics works previous administrations had not been able to provide. He was able to raise large amounts of money in London, thus taking public debt from £1.4 million in 1890 to £212.2 million in 1900. The population was expanding and government revenues were increasing, enabling the colony to pay the increased interest on these loans. Projects such as the laying of hundreds of miles of railway, the dredging of a new harbour at Fremantle, and the construction of the Coolgardie Water Scheme were completed.

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John Forrest Moves On

John Forrest resigned as Premier in 1901 and entered the new Commonwealth Parliament as the Member for Swan. In 1901 he became Postmaster General: between the years 1901 and 1903 he was Minister for Defence, between 1903 and 1904 he was Minister for Home Affairs, then between 1905 and 1918 he was Treasurer in five governments. As Treasurer, he was responsible for establishing financial arrangements between the States and Commonwealth, which lasted until 1927.

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John Forrest was off the coast of Sierra Leone on the troopship Marathon when he died in 1918. He was on his way to London for medical treatment. Frank Crowley, the historian, made the following statement of Sir John Forrest.

“He had been a successful political broker and gardener in a small colony, but he lacked the vision or the ideology to become a statesman in the national scene, and in his wealthy old age he appeared to be more concerned with the conservation of Empire and privilege than the betterment of Australian society.”

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