32 Facts About Benjamin Boyd

Benjamin Boyd was a Scottish entrepreneur who became a major shipowner, banker, grazier, politician and blackbirder in the British colony of New South Wales.

Benjamin Boyd was briefly a member of the Legislative Council.

Benjamin Boyd briefly tried his luck on the Californian goldfields before venturing to establish a Pacific union, being purportedly murdered on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands.

Benjamin Boyd was a man of "an imposing personal appearance, fluent oratory, aristocratic connections, and a fair share of commercial acuteness".

Benjamin Boyd stated that he intended to send other vessels, and asked for certain privileges in connection with the purchase of land at various ports he intended to establish.

Benjamin Boyd received a guarded reply promising assistance, but pointing out that land could not be sold to an individual to the "exclusion or disadvantage of the public".

Benjamin Boyd arrived in Hobson's Bay, Port Phillip District, on his schooner, Wanderer, on 15 June 1842, and reached Port Jackson, Sydney, on 18 July 1842.

Benjamin Boyd was preceded by three steamships, the first ocean-going steamships in Australian waters.

Henry Sewell, whom Benjamin Boyd met through the Royal Yacht Squadron, became involved in the Royal Bank of Australia.

Benjamin Boyd was able to use his experience of colonial affairs in joining the Canterbury Association which advocated for the colonisation of New Zealand, and in time was elected the colony's first premier.

Benjamin Boyd became a prominent squatter and absentee farmer, heading the Pastoral Association and operating the pro-squatter Atlas newspaper.

Benjamin Boyd operated a wool-washing facility in Neutral Bay, where he resided at his home from 1844 to 1849, Craignathan.

Benjamin Boyd was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Council for the Electoral district of Port Phillip in September 1844, a position he held for 11 months.

Benjamin Boyd bought a controlling interest in The Australian in 1847, appointing Thompson as managing editor.

In 1847, Benjamin Boyd brought the first 65 Islanders to Australia from Lifu Island in the Loyalty Islands and from Tanna and Aneityum Islands in the New Hebrides.

Regardless, some of Benjamin Boyd's employees began to take the party inland on foot.

Benjamin Boyd refused to admit that the trial shipment was a failure, sending for more Islanders.

The whole matter was raised again in the Legislative Council and Benjamin Boyd showed no remorse or sense of responsibility.

Benjamin Boyd justified himself with reference to the African slave trade and there was much discussion in the colony about the issue to introducing slaves from the Pacific Islands.

Rumours about Benjamin Boyd's recruiting methods prompted the Aborigines' Protection Society and the Anti-Slavery Association to call on the Colonial Office to hold an inquiry.

Benjamin Boyd's troubles continued with the loss of two lawsuits for the insurance money on one of his vessels which was wrecked.

In October 1840, when Benjamin Boyd wrote to the Colonial Office seeking support for the Royal Bank of Australia, he enquired about the attitude the government would hold toward a hypothetical republic in the South Seas.

Benjamin Boyd reconnoitred various South Seas islands and finally settled on two islands in the Solomons to base a South Seas republic.

On 15 October 1851, on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands, Benjamin Boyd went ashore with a crew member to shoot game.

Benjamin Boyd's head was cut off and his skull kept locally in a ceremonial house.

That they first slew several of the natives of the island, and it was on this account, while on an errand of peace, that Mr Benjamin Boyd himself was seized, his attendant slain, and himself tried by a tribunal of chiefs, and condemned to death.

The township was established by Benjamin Boyd to provide services for the extensive properties he owned locally.

Benjamin Boyd's Tower is located at the entrance to the park near Twofold Bay and was designed as a lighthouse and lookout.

Whaling was already an established industry when Benjamin Boyd arrived in the area and he brought with him his own boats and crew, and went into competition with the locals and expanded his fleet until he had nine whaling boats working for him.

The locality of Newton Boyd derives its name from a squatter run licensed under Archibald Boyd, cousin of Benjamin Boyd, who claimed the run as his own as well as others which were owned nominally by his cousins or business partner Joseph Robinson.

Benjamin Boyd's life was dramatised in the radio play The First Gentleman by Betty Roland, and in an episode of the television series Jonah.

An Australian animated children's television series first broadcast in 1999 entitled The Adventures of Sam features a character named Captain Ben Benjamin Boyd who engages in blackbirding, and is likely inspired from the historical figure.