17 Facts About Saul Samuel

Saul Samuel was born in London, England on 2 November 1820, the posthumous son of Sampson Saul Samuel and his wife Lydia, nee Lyons.

Saul Samuel married Henrietta Matilda Goldsmith-Levien on 16 December 1857 and had two daughters and two sons.

Saul Samuel married Sarah Louisa Isaacs on 31 October 1877 and had one son.

In 1854, Saul Samuel became an elective Member of the first Legislative Council of New South Wales, representing the Counties of Roxburgh and Wellington between 1854 and 1856.

Re-elected to the Assembly in June 1859 and then again in November 1859, Saul Samuel served as member for Orange until 1860.

Saul Samuel became member for Wellington in 1862, serving until 1869, and then again as member for Orange, serving between 1869 until 1872, before briefly serving as member for East Sydney during 1872.

In 1872, Saul Samuel was appointed a Life Member of Legislative Council, where he sat until he retirement from parliamentary life in 1880.

Saul Samuel served as Colonial Treasurer three times during his parliamentary career including in the Forster ministry between 1859 and 1860, the fourth Cowper ministry between 1865 and 1866, and the second Robertson ministry between 1868 and 1870.

Saul Samuel resigned as Treasurer in the Cowper ministry after his budget proposals for trade licences and increased duties on tea and sugar had been defeated.

In 1870, at the Intercolonial Conference in Melbourne, Saul Samuel proposed intercolonial free trade to settle the border customs dispute.

Between 1872 and 1880, Saul Samuel served as Postmaster-General on three occasions under Premier, Henry Parkes, including the first, second, and third ministries.

Between 1880 and 1897, Saul Samuel was the sixth Agent-General for New South Wales in London and was a director of Mercantile Bank of Sydney.

Saul Samuel fostered assisted immigration, negotiated with the Peninsular and Oriental and the Orient shipping companies for weekly mail services to the colony and in 1885 about the New South Wales Contingent to the Sudan.

Saul Samuel was a commissioner for New South Wales at the 1883 Amsterdam Exhibition and represented the colony at the 1887 Colonial Conference in London.

Saul Samuel was active in Jewish affairs, including the Board of Management of York Street Synagogue.

Saul Samuel was invested as a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1874, and was elevated as a Knight Commander in 1882.

Saul Samuel was made a Privy Councillor in 1884, was invested of a Companion of the Order of the Bath in 1886 in recognition of his services in connection with the Colonial and Indian Exhibition, and was created baronet in 1886.