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The partnership opened an office at Hay and later in Sydney. Wilkinson was the senior partner and afterwards was the managing director of the business.<ref name=obitRG/>

The partnership opened an office at Hay and later in Sydney. Wilkinson was the senior partner and afterwards was the managing director of the business.<ref name=obitRG/>

Wilkinson, Hann, Minchin and Co. In September 1878 Phineas Hann retired from the partnership and the business was afterwards carried on by Wilkinson, Minchin and Lavender (under that name), stock and station agents at Sydney, Wagga Wagga and Hay.<ref>[https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/141039611 Partnership Notice], ”The Riverine Grazier” (Hay), 14 September 1878, page 2.</ref>

The business underwent changes regarding personnel. At one stage it was known as Wilkinson, Hann, Minchin and Lavender. Afterwards Chapman and W. H. Graves were connected with it.<ref name=obitJSL2>[https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/144707534 Death of Mr. J. S. Lavender], ”The Hay Standard”, 22 November 1899, page 2.</ref>

The business underwent changes regarding personnel. At one stage it was known as Wilkinson, Hann, Minchin and Lavender. Afterwards Chapman and W. H. Graves were connected with it.<ref name=obitJSL2>[https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/144707534 Death of Mr. J. S. Lavender], ”The Hay Standard”, 22 November 1899, page 2.</ref>

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Australian politician

Robert Bliss Wilkinson
In office 2 December 1880 – 25 June 1894
Born	22 July 1837
Died	26 April 1928(1928-04-26) (aged 90)
Spouse(s)	(1) Alice Georgiana Foss Jarrett (2) Annie Louise Leitch (née Lavender)
Parents	David Wilkinson (father) Elizabeth (née Bliss) (mother)

Robert Bliss Wilkinson (22 July 1837 – 26 April 1928) was an English-born Australian politician.

Robert Bliss Wilkinson was born on 22 July 1837 at Northampton, England, the second son of David Wilkinson and Elizabeth (née Bliss). Robert’s father was an engineer by profession.^[1][2]

Young Robert was educated at Hanwell College in west London, under the care of Rev. Dr. Emerton, a school specialising in educating boys who intended to enter military careers.^[2][3]

As a 15 year-old Wilkinson arrived in Victoria in November 1852 with his family, at “the height of gold fever”. He “experienced a share of the many hardships and privations attendant on the then unsettled state of colonial life”.^[4][5]

In 1853 Wilkinson entered into service with the Bank of Victoria and was employed “for some years” in branch offices on the Castlemaine and Maryborough diggings. He was later employed in the Union Bank in Melbourne.^[4]

In 1863 Wilkinson and Lavender purchased ‘Marrah’ and ‘Temora’ stations in the Wagga Wagga district of New South Wales.^[6]

From 1865 Wilkinson ran a station near Wagga Wagga in partnership with his brother-in-law J. S. Lavender; they sold out after a few years and became stock agents in 1870, with offices in Sydney, Hay, Wagga Wagga and Bourke.

In 1868 the partners established a stock and station agency at Wagga. They later established branch offices in Sydney and Hay, and later at Bourke.^[6]

Wilkinson met his long-term partner James Smith Lavender and the two men engaged in pastoral pursuits with interests in several stations in the eastern Riverina region of New South Wales. In the late 1860s they sold ‘Marrar’ station and in 1868 the partners established themselves as stock and station agents at Wagga Wagga.^[1][A]

The partnership opened an office at Hay and later in Sydney. Wilkinson was the senior partner and afterwards was the managing director of the business.^[1]

Wilkinson, Hann, Minchin and Co. In September 1878 Phineas Hann retired from the partnership and the business was afterwards carried on by Wilkinson, Minchin and Lavender (under that name), stock and station agents at Sydney, Wagga Wagga and Hay.^[7]

The business underwent changes regarding personnel. At one stage it was known as Wilkinson, Hann, Minchin and Lavender. Afterwards Chapman and W. H. Graves were connected with it.^[8]

Wilkinson’s nephew Frank Lavender later took on the position of managing director.^[1]

For many years (until 1878) Wilkinson’s headquarters were at Hay.^[1]

In 1878 (or 1875) J. S. Lavender took charge of the Hay office, but Wilkinson was “a frequent visitor, and always kept in personal touch with the Hay district graziers”.^[1][8]

In 1880 the Balranald electorate was changed from a single member to a two-member electorate. The sitting member, Colin W. Simson, decided not to seek re-election. Wilkinson and John Cramsie campaigned together “as graziers’ candidates for the two seats”.^[1]

Wilkinson, Graves, Minchin and Lavender. In 1880 he was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly for Balranald. A Free Trader, he held his seat until his retirement in 1894.

In February 1881 Stapleton Minchin left the partnership, the firm then becoming known as Wilkinson, Graves and Lavender, carrying on business in co-partnership as stock and station agents and sheep and cattle salesmen.^[9]

Robert Wilkinson and Alice Georgiana Foss Jarrett were married on 15 November 1882 in the Christ Church in South Yarra, Victoria. Alice died of typhoid, aged 23, on 9 April 1884 in New South Wales.^[10]

Wilkinson was a prominent voice in parliament in connection with the Land Act of 1884. Prior to those reforms a landholder had wide choice as to which part of his run could be selected, a situation leading to corrupt practices such as ‘dummying’ and causing “endless friction with the selectors”. The 1884 Act divided the pastoral runs into leasehold and resumed areas and confined selection to the resumed sections of a holding. Although it did not entirely eliminate ‘dummying’, the Land Act “was a great boon to the pastoral industry… [and] put the smaller man on a better footing and led to more cordial relations between the two classes of holders”.^[1]

Robert Wilkinson married Annie Louise Leitch (née Lavender) on 26 February 1890 (his second marriage). The couple had three children, two daughters and a son (John C.).^[10]

In 1894 when Wilkinson decided to retire from politics, he was given a public dinner at Hay and received “a substantial presentation”. At the dinner it was revealed that Wilkinson was “taking his political farewell” because of an affliction of the eyes and a desire to focus more on his business interests.^[1]

Wilkinson’s partner and brother-in-law, James S. Lavender, died in Sydney on 17 November 1899.^[6][8]

In 1901 he became managing director of Wilkinson & Lavender, retiring in 1927.

When Frank Lavender died, Wilkinson again resumed as managing director, a position he still held at the time of his death in 1928.^[1]

Robert Bliss Wilkinson died on 26 April 1928 at his home, ‘Wilga’, in The Boulevarde, Strathfield, aged 90.^[11] He was buried in the churchyard of St. Thomas’ Anglican church in Enfield.^[1]

A.^ James Smith Lavender was born in 1828 in Bedfordshire, England, the son of a farmer. He emigrated to Victoria in 1852, attracted by reports about the Australian goldfields. Lavender took up a pastoral run at ‘Oakwood Park’ near Dandenong, “where for some years” he raised cattle and horses.^[6] Married Jennie Hann in 1875.

Sources

• Everard Digby (editor) (1889), Australian Men of Mark: Illustrated with Authentic Portraits, Vol. 1, Sydney: Charles F. Maxwell.