THE GRAND LODGE OF ANTIENT, FREE AND ACCEPTED MASONS 017 TASMANIA THE FIRST ONE HUNDRED YEARS 1890 - 1990 FOREWORD The initial research leading up to this publication was carried out by Wor. Bro. Hugh Middleton. We thank him for painstakingly examining the reports and minutes that reflect the activities of the Grand Lodgeof Tasmania over the last 100 years. This volume does not purport to be a historyof freemasonry in Tasmania, This would entail a close look at the records of individual lodges. But we have here a historical record of freemasonry in Tasmania as seen by the Grarid Masters and the Boards of General Purposes. You will find excerpts from what must have been stirring speeches at the time of their delivery. They still make good reading. You will wonder at the fortitude of our brethren who travelled the length and breadth of Tasmania in the early days. Indeed they travelled by sea to get to the West Coast. If this book is nothing more it is an acknowledgement that the freemasons of 1990 give thanks to their predecessorswho worked so hard to establish the craft in Tasmania. M.L. YAXLEY Chairman, Editorial Committee EDITORIALCOMMITTEE The original research for this volume was conducted by Wor. Bro. Hugh Middleton'.Upon his resignation in 1983 an editori�I committee was formedand the work was continued by. V. Wor. Bro. M. Davis Wor. Bro. N. Dunbar V. Wor. Bro. M.L. Yaxley (Chairman) INDEX Page No. Foreword Index of Grand Masters 1. The Beginningsof Freemasonryin Van Diernen'sLand 1 2. Formation of the Grand Lodge of Tasmania 10 3. Our FirstTwo Grand Masters 21 4. Our Longest Serving Grand Master Begins his Reign 29 5. The20th CentuiyBegins 43 6. War and Peace 70 7. A Period of Growth 78 8. Under Vice-Regal Patronage 99 9. MasonryFlourishes Statewide 107 10. The Years of World War 11 123 11. The Post War Years 1946-1948 150 12. Grand Masters Wall and Lowe -1948 -1950 174 13. A Period of Consolidation 186 14. A Periodof Learning 202 15. TheSeventies 228 16. Completing a Century 253 17. Masonic Benevolence 274 18. Masonic Hornes 279 19. Australasian Masonic Conferences 285 20. Fraternal Relations withother Jurisdictions 295 INDEX OF GRAND MASTERS M.W.Bro.The Rev.RD. Poulett-Harris 1890-1892 M.W.Bro.Dr. E.O. Giblin 1893-1895 M.W.Bro.C.E. Davies 1896-1913 M.W.Bro.H.E.Sir W.G.Eltison-Macartney 1914-1916 M.W.Bro.C.8. Davies 1917-1921 M.W.Bro.H.L D'Emden 1921-1925 M.W.Bro. Claude E.W James 1926-1928 M.W.Bro. Frank P. Bowden 1929-1931 M.W.Bro. LawrieJ, Abra 1932-1934 M.W.Bro. H.B. Sir Ernest Clark 1935-1936 M.W.Bro.Stanley Dryden 1937-1939 M.W.Bro. William E. Downie 1940-1941 M.W.Bro.H.U. Wilkinson 1942-1944 M.W.Bro. H.V. Biggins 1945-1947 M.W.Bro. GeraldE. Wall 1948-1950 M.W.Bro. A.C. Lowe 1951-1952 M.W.Bro. R.P.Furmage 1953-1956 M.W.Bro. FJ. Carter 1956-1958 M.W.Bro. H.V. Jones 1959-1961 M.W.Bro. Rt. Rev.Bishop W.RBarrett 1962-1964 M.W.Bro. T.E. Doe 1965-1967 M.W.Bro. Dr. W.H. Hill 1968-1970 M.W.Bro. E. Chester Gifford 1971-1973 M.W.Bro.L.P. Abra 1974-1976 M.W.Bro. Charles H. Harnett 1977-1979 · M.W.Bro. D.H. Johnstone 1980-1982 M.W.Bro.TheVen.Archdeacon M.R.Stanton 1983-1985 M.W.Bro. H.L. Williams 1986-1989 M.W.Bro. C.B. Ward 1990- 1. The Beginningsof Freemasonryin Van Diemen's Land Freemasonry was introduced ·into the colony of Van Diemen's Land by members of masonic lodges attached to regiments that formed the British garrisons1 1803 to 18701 and in particular those from 1814 to 1839, for it was within this period that the first civil lodges were constituted. Theearly Regimentswhich held moveable, or "ambulatory",warrants were:- 1814-1818 The 46th Regiment,2nd Battalion, Duke of Cornwall'sLight Infantry 1817-1824The 48th Regimentwith attached warrantNo. 218 from the GrandLodge of Ireland. 1823-1825 The 3rdRegiment with attached Engiish warrantNo.170 1825-1830The 40th Regiment with attached "Thornton1s Lodge" No. 284 Ireland, and appendant RoyalArch Chapter 284I.C. 1830-1834The 63rd Regiment,with dormant warrant No. 512 I.C. 1833-1839 The 21st Regiment Royal Scots Fusiliers with attached warrant 33 I.C., appendant Royal Arch Chapter, and dormantWarrant 936 I.C. Later regiments included those with warrants 112 E.C., 677 E.C. and 313 I.C.; these numbersappear with lists of visitors to the established "civil" lodges, together with those from other constitutions who were either free settlers or mariners. The warrantof the lodge attached to the 46th Regiment was left in Sydney, N.S.W., where it worked in 1816 as The Lodge of Social and MilitaryVirtues No. 227 Irish Constitution. Local records report that there were several masons present at the laying of the foundation stone of the Officers' Mess at the Anglesea Barracks, Hobart Town, on 17th July, 1814. This first reported presence of Freemasons is considered to refer to members of 227 I.C. Later records show that the regimental lodges were not pennitted to assemble in Barracks, but met in private homes or in a room set aside fortheir use in a hotel, and leased for that purpose. Documents reveal that the regimental lodges spread the light of freemasonry in Van Diemen's Land by initiating local citizens into their lodges. A Royal Arch Certificate dated 18th May1 1828, in Hobart Town, V.D.L. testifiesthat Bro. J. Lester received his R.A. Degreeon that day in Thornton's Chapter No. 284. Bro. Lester was at that time proprietor of "TheWhite HorseInn" on the cornerof Elizabethand Liverpool Streets. This Thornton'sLodge and Chapter 284,attached to the 40th Regiment, first met in a waterfron_t hotel, "The Hope", and later at the "Macquarie Hotel". 2 Some members of the regimental lodges who completed their term of engagement prior to the departure of their regiment elected to settle here, and the amalgam of theseelements was a journalist, Robert Lathrop Murray,who firstarrived in Australia i� 1816, and came to Van Diemen's Land in 1821, and later owned considerable property. He was bornin England in 1780, educated at Westminster School and at Cambridge, and entered the army at an early age, servedwith the RoyalManx Fencibles during the Irish rebellion, was equerry to the Duke of Kent and served throughout the Peninsular Wars under the Duke of Wellington. He built Wentworth House at Bellerive on the easternshore of the Derwent River as his country seat. He possessed high degrees in masonry and was personally known to members of the Grand Lodge of Ireland. It was upon his recommendation and application through the Regimental Lodge 284 that dispensation to open a civillodge under the title of 'The Tasmanian Lodge' to meet in Hobart Town was issued. The date of the original dispensation is not known. The first master was Bro. John Eddington and the Warrant 313 dated 6th August, 1829 Dublin, was received early in 1831, but this wasafter the 40th Regiment had left forIndia. When the warrant arrived from Ireland in 1831, it was No. 313 on the roll of the Grand Lodge. Their Master in 1832 was Bro. TJ. Lempriere, and the lodge met in the same room as used by the 40th Regiment Military Lodge No. 2841.C. Gould's Historyof Freemasonry. Vol. 111, page 392, refers to an Irish warrant issued to Tasmania in 1823, but local record of this has not been found. On 10th April, 1832, a petition from Bros. RL Murray, S. Wittaker and J. Lester, and others then residing in Hobart Town, to furm a lodge under the title of The Lodge of Brotherly Union, was received and granted by the Master and Wardens of TheTasmanian Lodge313 I.C. The new lodge later received Warrant numbered 326 I.C. The 63rd Regiment arrived in 1830, its lodge . Warrant 512 was dormant, although the surgeon, William Bohan, held the rank of P. Provincial Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Ireland. When the Warrant for 326 arrived, he "constituted" the Masters and Wardens of 313 and 326 as "his" Provincial Grand Lodge. He left the colony with the 63rd Regiment when it sailed forIndia on 1st January, 1834. In December 1833, the 21st Regiment, Royal Scots Fusiliers arrived. This Regiment of 602 men had attached Warrant No. 33 I.C. first issued in 1734. Accordingto Gould, this was one of the first five travelling warrants granted to Regiments by the Grand Lodge of Ireland, a practice later followed by the Grand Lodges of England, France, Holland, Germany and for a short period, Russia. The 21st Regiment also had Warrant No. 936 I.C., presumed dormant, as the only evidence of its existence is the inscribed silver jewel left in Hobart. This Warrant was is.sued to the Regimentin 1803. 3 Digressing from local history, the Master of Lodge 33 I.C., W. Bro. A Mackay, was elected in January 1832, and conducted meetings of his lodge in Weedon and Chatham before his Regiment sailed for Tasmania (Van Diemen's Land). The first minutes endorsed by him in Van Diemen's Land, on the 10th May, 1836, include "due to the detached state of the Regiment the members were consequently reduced to four in number, and the lodge chest could not be opened since leaving Chatham." The disposition of the Regiment to widely separated areas of the Island left 254 men stationed in HobartTown, including Captain A.