Page:The Dictionary of Australasian Biography.djvu/371

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DICTIONARY OF AUSTRALASIAN BIOGRAPHY.
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the attitude assumed by the Chief Justice in adjudicating on certain cases of newspaper libel, the Legislative Council passed a resolution requesting the Home Government, in the interests of tranquillity, to transfer him to some other location. He was accordingly given, a year's leave of absence; and this having been again extended, Sir H. T. Wrensfordsley was sent out to the colony in 1890 as Acting Chief Justice. Mr. Onslow returned to Western Australia and resumed his occupancy of the office of Chief Justice in July 1891.

Onslow, Captain Arthur Alexander Walton, R.N., eldest son of Arthur Pooley Onslow of Send Grove, Ripley, Karrey, by his marriage with Rosa Roberta, daughter of Alexander Macleay, F.B.S., sometime Colonial Secretary and Speaker of the Legislative Council of New South Wales, was born at Trichinopoly on August 2nd, 1833, and was taken to Sydney when five years old. In 1841 he went to England, and entered the royal navy in 1847 on board the Howe, commanded by Sir Jas. Stirling, first Governor of Western Australia. After seeing much active service, especially in the suppression of the slave trade off the west coast of Africa, Captain Onslow was employed on the Herald in 1857 in surveying "Shark's Bay," and the numerous detached coral reefs on the Eastern Australian coast, outside the Great Barrier Reefs and in Torres Straits. In 1861 he returned to England, and two years later became commander, and in 1871 retired from the navy with the rank of post-captain. In August 1867 he married Elizabeth, only daughter of James Macarthur (q.v.). In 1870 he was returned to the Assembly for Camden, and in 1874 accompanied Mr. (afterwards Sir) Wm. Macleay on his expedition to New Guinea in the Chevert. Captain Onslow died on Jan. 30th, 1882.

Onslow, Right Hon. William Hillier, Earl of, G.C.M.G., late Governor and Commander-in-Chief of New Zealand, son of George Augustus Cranley (grandson of Thomas, 2nd earl, and nephew of Arthur George, 3rd earl), by Mary Harriet Ann, eldest daughter of Lieut.-General William F. B. Loftus, of Kilbride, co. Wicklow, was born on March 7th, 1853, and was educated at Eton and Exeter College, Oxford. He succeeded his great-uncle as 4th earl on Oct. 24th, 1870. He was one of the Lords-in-waiting in 1880 and again in 1886, and is Lord High Steward of Guildford. In Feb. 1887 Lord Onslow was appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary for the Colonies, and in that capacity acted as Vice-President of the Colonial Conference in that year. He was also one of the British delegates at the International Conference on the Sugar Bounties. In Feb. 1888 Lord Onslow became Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade, and in the next year was appointed to the Governorship of New Zealand, in succession to Lieut.-General Sir William Jervois. This post he resigned at the end of 1891, and quitted New Zealand in March of the next year, arriving in England in June. Lord Onslow, who was created K.C.M.G. in 1887 and G.C.M.G. in 1889, married in 1875 Hon. Florence Coulston, daughter of Alan, 3rd Lord Gardner. Lord Onslow, from the time of his arrival in the colony, manifested a strong personal interest in the land of his temporary sojourn, and gave evidence of his determination to give New Zealand associations a place in his after-life. His Excellency did what he could, by precept and example, to foster a taste for legitimate sport, he encouraged and aided the labours of Acclimatisation societies, and he used his personal influence with Ministers to get certain islands lying off the coast proclaimed as perpetual preserves for native birds, so as to save from extinction the various interesting species for which New Zealand ornithology has become so famous. He lost no opportunity of collecting rare birds for transmission to the Zoological Society of London, and commenced the formation at Government House of what may hereafter prove to be a very valuable ethnological collection. In further proof that he desired to have his future linked with New Zealand, on the birth of a son at Wellington he determined to give him a Maori name. Her Majesty the Queen, at the joint request of the Jubilee mayors of the four principal cities, had consented to be the child's godmother, and by royal command the first names were Victor Alexander, to which was added the family name of Herbert. After much deliberation, the third name, selected as a compliment to the Maori people, was that of Huia. The

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