Parkes, SIR HENRY, K.C.M.G.

Parkes, SIR HENRY, K.C.M.G., an Australian statesman, was born the son of a yeoman at Stoneleigh, Warwickshire, in 1815, emigrated to New South Wales in 1839, and at Sydney became eminent as a journalist, editing The Empire from 1849 to 1856. A member of the colonial parliament in 1854, he held various government offices and became prime-minister in 1872, was repeatedly head of the ministry, and was identified with free trade. He was at the Colonial Conference in London in 1887, and president of the Australian Federation Council. He died 27th April 1896. See his autobiographical Fifty Years of the making of Australian History (1892), and Life by Lyne (1897).