Charles Arthur Wheeler (1880-1977), Alexander Gore Arkwright Hore-Ruthven (detail), 1939, Historic Memorials Collection, Parliament House Art Collection. View full image
1st Earl Of Gowrie
Governor-General, 23 January 1936 to 30 January 1945
As a distinguished soldier, Alexander Hore-Ruthven (later 1st Earl of Gowrie) (1872-1955) was well-credentialled to serve as a wartime Governor-General. Regarded as a ‘splendid counsellor to Cabinet Ministers during World War II’,1 he helped provide the nation with stability and certainty. He remains Australia’s longest-serving Governor-General.2
Hore-Ruthven was born at Windsor and educated at Winchester and Eton. At 20 he joined the 3rd Battalion Highland Light Infantry and was awarded the VC during the Sudan campaign. It was the first received by a militia officer, earning him ‘repute in Britain as an imperial hero’.3 From 1905 to 1908 he served as military secretary to successive Lords Lieutenant of Ireland. In 1908 he married Zara Eileen Pollok – despite her parents lamenting his ‘indifferent prospects’ – and they had two children.4 Hore-Ruthven travelled to Australia as Governor-General Dudley’s military secretary, before returning to England to serve on Lord Kitchener’s staff.5
In World War I Hore-Ruthven was severely wounded at Gallipoli, and later served in France. After leaving the military in 1928, he served six years as Governor of SA. He was briefly Governor of NSW before being selected as Australia’s 10th Governor-General. Created Baron Gowrie and appointed GCMG, he took office in January 1936.
Gowrie’s term spanned five Prime Ministers: Joseph Lyons, Earl Page, Robert Menzies, Arthur Fadden and John Curtin. With his term extended due to the exigencies of the war,6 the government relied upon his experience and knowledge. As Herbert ‘Doc’ Evatt7 later recalled:
... not only did he perform his official functions but, because of his great military experience, he was a source of great strength and a splendid counsel to the Ministers of that time of whom I had the honour to be one.8
For her part, Lady Gowrie became an active supporter of the Red Cross, child welfare and early-childhood education projects, giving her name to a national service network.9 In 1942 their only surviving son was killed serving in Tripoli,10 and Gowrie’s own health began to deteriorate. They left Australia two years later, with Victoria’s Governor Sir Winston Dugan acting as administrator. Upon his departure Gowrie continued to encourage Australia’s war effort, declaring that:
you have weathered the first blast of the storm, but there are still gigantic tasks to be undertaken and accomplished. In the Pacific you have bitter debts to pay and much lost ground to regain, and you cannot afford to relax your efforts for one single moment until complete victory is assured.11
In 1945, he was made Earl of Gowrie and died a decade later in Gloucestershire. Eileen died in 1965.
Charles Arthur Wheeler OBE DCM
New Zealand-born artist and art teacher Charles Wheeler (1880-1977) moved to Melbourne with his family in about 1891. At age 15 he was apprenticed as a lithographic artist and later studied at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School under Frederick McCubbin and Lindsay Bernard Hall. In 1912 he travelled to Europe, where he exhibited at the Salon de la Société des Artistes Français in Paris. Enlisting in the Royal Fusiliers in World War I, he was awarded the DCM (1916) for his actions at Vimy Ridge. Discharged in 1919, Wheeler resumed his painting practice in London, exhibiting at the Royal Academy of Arts. The following year he returned to Melbourne and continued to exhibit and to teach at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School. Well known for his portraits and nudes, he won the Archibald Prize in 1933 for his portrait of writer Ambrose Pratt. In 1951 he was awarded an OBE for his contribution to art. He continued painting mostly impressionistic landscapes until he died. In 1979, the Victoria College of the Arts held a retrospective of his work. He is represented in national and state collections across Australia.
12
Alexander Gore Arkwright Hore-Ruthven
by Charles Arthur Wheeler
1939
Oil on canvas
135.8 x 90 cm
Historic Memorials Collection, Parliament House Art Collection
References
1.
B Carroll,
Australia’s Governors-General: From Hopetoun to Jeffery, Rosenberg Publishing Pty Ltd, Kenthurst, NSW, 2004, p. 106.
2. Information in this biography has also been taken from the following: C Cunneen and D Morris, ‘Gowrie, first Earl of (1872–1955)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1983; C Cunneen, ‘Ruthven, Alexander Gore Arkwright Hore-, first earl of Gowrie (1872–1955)’,
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press. Websites accessed 11 May 2021.
3. Ibid.
4. Carroll, op. cit.
5. K Neilson, ‘Kitchener, Horatio Herbert, Earl Kitchener of Khartoum (1850–1916)’,
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
6.
Cunneen, ‘Gowrie, first Earl of (1872–1955)’, op. cit.
7. GC Bolton, ‘Evatt, Herbert Vere (Bert) (1894–1965)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, accessed 3 November 2021.
8. H Evatt, ‘Death of Lord Gowrie’, House of Representatives,
Debates, 3 May 1955, p. 327.
9. ‘Our History’, Gowrie NSW, accessed 13 September 2021.
10. Audax, ‘Happy Warrior and Poet’,
The Age, 23 October 1943, p. 6, accessed 3 September 2021.
11. ‘Lord Gowrie Says Farewell’,
The Sydney Morning Herald, 11 September 1944, p. 4, accessed 3 September 2021.
12.‘Wheeler, Charles Arthur’, A McCulloch, S McCulloch and E McCulloch Childs, eds,
The New McCulloch’s Encyclopedia of Australian Art, Aus Art Editions in association with The Miegunyah Press, 2006, p. 1017; ‘Charles Wheeler: 1881–1977’, National Portrait Gallery; MWH Pennings, ‘Wheeler, Charles Arthur (1880–1977)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1990. Websites accessed 27 April 2021.