William Kerr, City of Melbourne, Town Clerk, Argus newspaper, James Anderson, c1855
Summary
The city has a large collection of portraits, both formal works and contemporary and informal portraits of the many individuals – famous and not – who shape, and have shaped, the culture and narrative of Melbourne. This painting of Town Clerk William Kerr is indicative of the collection’s formal portraiture, weighted towards European men of a certain age who were charged with founding and running the capital municipality of Victoria – and pre-separation Port Phillip. This oil on canvas was painted by portraitist James Anderson around 1855, and it entered the collection through private donation in 2010.
A journalist who hailed from Scotland, William Kerr (1812–59) arrived in Sydney in 1837, moving to Melbourne two years later, first working as editor of the fledgling newspapers the ‘Port Phillip Herald’ and ‘Port Phillip Patriot and Advertiser’ and then founding the ‘Argus’. Something of a hothead (wonderfully described as ‘a man of many violent enthusiasms’), Kerr railed against the powerful interests of the colony’s squattocracy and against convict transportation and labour use; he was also a strong advocate for separation from New South Wales. Kerr’s interest in local politics saw him elected as one of 12 councillors in Melbourne’s first municipal election, in 1842. One of the four aldermen, he became the second town clerk in 1851. Two notable projects with which he is associated in this role are the building of the Yan Yean reservoir, to secure the city’s water supply, and the establishment of the Victorian secret ballot. Kerr’s tenure as town clerk was relatively short; he resigned in 1856 for irregularities in the accounts.
