Thomas McCombie 1819-1869 An Early Melbourne Writer.

Thomas McCombie was a Scotsman who came to Australia in the very early days of the Colonies and made a substantial contribution to Australian Literature. He was born in Tillyfour in Aberdeenshire in Scotland in 1819 and so he was only 22 years old when he arrived in Australia. He actually arrived in the new settlement of Port Phillip in early 1841 and like many young men on arrival he went out into the country to try his hand as a grazier. At this time Melbourne and Port Phillip was part of new South Wales and his earliest experiences were in country New South Wales. This is probably the reason why his novel Arabin is set in country New South Wales although it was probably set in what later became the State of Victoria. The life of a Grazier dial not suit the young man from Scotland and he returned to Melbourne to make his home in that brash infant town.

What was he to do with himself in the growing settlement on the Yarra River? In 1844 he settled that question and became the editor of the young newspaper The Port Phillip Gazette and in addition also became a part owner. This newspaper had been started in 1838 and was the second newspaper in Melbourne. The first had been started by John Pascoe Fawkner as a hand written newspaper called The Advertiser. The Port Phillip Gazette was not an official newspaper as its title might suggest but had been commenced by an 18 year old immigrant by the name of George Arden a colourful character who was a good writer and a brilliant speaker on literary topics. He had that unfortunate failing of many of our early writers, a craving for strong drink. Due to various financial problems he lost the paper in 1842 and his partner, Thomas Strode a printer also left the newspaper soon after. Strode inserted an advertisement in the September 1846 issue of the newspaper to say he had sold his interest and no longer had a connection with the newspaper.

Thomas McCombie took over as editor and part owner in early 1844 from William Kerr who became better known for his later work on The Argus. In that same year, on 16 October 1844, McCombie married Elizabeth Willis and settled down to family life in Melbourne. He had commenced writing about the settlement of Port Phillip and the Australian colonies before this and published articles some of them in Tait's Edinburgh Magazine. He possibly had connections with the periodical or its editor before he left Britain. It was while he was editor of The Port Phillip Gazette that he commenced to write a novel. In 1845 he published his best known work the novel Arabin of the Adventures of a Colonist in New South Wales published in London by Simmonds & Ward. The book includes an essay on the Aborigines as an appendix. Arabin is an interesting account of the adventures of a medical graduate from Edinburgh University. His experiences as a country doctor with a criminal lunatic to cope with make a great story and it is far from dull or pedestrian. Also he was in the novel addressing an Australian audience instead of a British one which adds to its value as part of this early literature. The reason for this Australian focus may in part be attributed to the fact that he was a Scottish rather than English immigrant. Although it is stated that the action of the novel takes place in New South Wales the country setting is now part of Victoria. McCombie may have travelled to Sydney or to the northern part of the colony in his early days in the colonies. There were a number of editions of Arabin which was variously titled. For example one printing was titled Adventures of a Colonist or Godfrey Arabin, the Settler and it was published in London by John & Daniel Darling of Bishopgate Street in 1845 The usual title was Arabin, or The Adventures of a Colonist in New South Wales. With an essay on the Aborigines of Australia, it was published in London by Simmonds & Ward also in 1845. McCombie advertised Arabin continuously in The Port Phillip Gazette in 1846 and added his name prominently under the title as the author.

In 1845 McCombie had published his Australian Sketches. This was a series of essays on topics mainly related to the colony specifically the Port Phillip district. Some of these articles were published originally in Tait's Edinburgh Magazine and other British periodicals. A second edition of the Australian Sketches was published in Melbourne by 'The Gazette' Office also in 1847.

The Australian Sketches were a collection of essays or articles on various subjects related to the colonies. They were a mixture of factual descriptions of aspects of the colonies and character sketches of various 'types' to be encountered. For example in the article headed 'My Neighbourhood' he gives colourful pictures of the grocer (an ex-convict who tried to hide the fact), the local auctioneer, the baker and finally the most important man in the neighbourhood, the hotel landlord. They are well written and amusing.

Another sketch was about Jackey Jackey the Bushranger. There was another Jacky Jacky, known as the Indian Chief (an aboriginal). His description of the outback settler as hairy, dirty and lazy is an amusing description of some of this special type of character. As this outback settler comes to town once a year to sell his wool he could not have been all that lazy. But the sketch makes good reading. Perhaps the best story is 'The Merchant's Bride' and it displays McCombie's skill in telling a good story especially in his use of conversation which catches some of the colonial tuna of phrase.

There are other articles on 'Mountain Worship', 'The Overlanders', 'Stations,' 'Colonial servants', 'Transportation', and 'Crime and Emigration'. He concludes with descriptive chapters on Melbourne and Australia. These latter articles are not exciting but contain much information of the time. The first of his series of Australian Sketches is probably one of importance when considering Australian literature in this very early period. McCombie remained until 1851 as editor of The Port Phillip Gazette and Settler's Journal to give the newspaper its full official designation.

In 1850 McCombie had produced his Essays on Colonization which was published in London by Smith Elder and Co. but also by George and Robert King of Aberdeen. It started with the statement: 'Colonization. The true policy of Great Britain; or the mission of the Anglo-Saxon', thus indicating the British Imperial agenda. He continued with a chapter on 'Colonial Government' and another on 'America and Australia' with the comment 'How similar and yet how different' and goes on to make various comparisons. He then covers all the usual topics such as 'Aborigines the 'Waste lands' a common term of the time for unoccupied land Then the usual articles on 'Transportation' and 'Emigration' this is the term used because it was about emigration from Britain. Further notes followed on 'Religion and Education' and concluding with an interesting comment on 'Mr Wakefield's Theory' which of course the basis for the establishment of South Australia. Some of these topics repeat McCombie's ideas earlier expressed in his Australian Sketches. All this before Port Phillip was separated from New South Wales. He was certainly setting himself up for a political career in the colony.

In 1853 he started another of those short lived Australian periodicals called The Reformer but it was not a success because of the small specialised readership in Port Phillip at the time. McCombie had now a decided interest in politics and was elected a member of the Melbourne Town Council. It was in June 1846 that his motion in the Council was carried which was in effect a petition to the Queen asking for the removal of Charles La Trobe from his position of Superintendent of the Port Phillip district. Then somewhat later McCombie was largely responsible for the election of Earl Grey as the representative for Port Phillip in the Legislative Council of New South Wales. This election caused a great controversy and emphasised the desire of the residents of Port Phillip district for the separation from the older Colony.

With the discovery of Gold in Victoria, McCombie moved to Mount Alexander, but he did not do very much digging for gold being more interested in politics and the problems of the miners. He stood for election to the Victorian parliament and was finally elected in 1856. His work in parliament was solid and sensible but was not brilliant. When the ministry in which he served fell in 1859 he returned to Britain. Before he departed he had published another work of importance. This was The History of Victoria from its settlement to the death of Sir Charles Hotham and as author he is designated 'The Hon. Thomas McCombie'. The History was published in both Melbourne and Sydney by Sands and Kenny as well as in London by Chapman and Hall in 1858. It was quite a substantial work and was no a mere pamphlet because it ran to 336 pages.

   His beginning of his preface is worth quoting because in it he said;
   'The greater part of the books which have been issued from the press
   professing to treat on Victoria have been intended for European
   readers, and have but comparatively little interest for the
   colonists. The author hopes that this record of the past will
   possess some value in the eyes of the Victorian public, and be
   useful hereafter as a work of reference.

He goes on to explain why he ended with Sir Charles Hotham's Governorship because, as he wrote, he did not think it proper to discuss Hotham's successor while he was still in office, a point of delicacy at which modern writers would possibly wonder.

Back in Britain McCombie continued his interest in the colony and wrote papers and presented arguments in the press on the colonies but mainly on Victoria. He returned to Melbourne in 1866 expecting to make his permanent home there and he was elected to the Victorian Legislative Assembly in March 1868. His stay was short lived: he returned to Britain in 1869 because of a serious illness and died in Scotland on 2 October 1869 aged 50.

Thomas McCombie's political career was of less importance that his literary contributions. His novel Arabin (1845) is one of the earliest novels about Australia. It is an important early contribution to the literature of the emerging nation. Although his novels are regarded by Australian literary experts as 'pedestrian', that opinion was probably made by someone who had not read them. He wrote a second novel which was published in Melbourne by G. Robertson and H.T. Dwight as well as Sampson Low in London in 1867 shortly after he returned to Australia. This novel was called Frank Henly, or Honest Industry will Conquer. It is a title which would not inspire great enthusiasm in the novel reading public even if it had a nice moral to promote. The two novels are however far from pedestrian. They tell a good story, they are well written and they are completely Australian in content. Admittedly they do contain some extraneous matters mainly directed at prospective emigrants but these do not impair the story. I have already discussed the novel Arabin in an earlier edition of Margin.

These were not the only works written by McCombie about life in Australia. In 1861 in Britain he had published a second in the series of Australian Sketches. This dealt largely with the question of Gold discoveries in Victoria. It was republished in Melbourne by the bookseller H.T. Dwight in 1866. It dealt in some detail with Ballarat and Bendigo as well as Mount Alexander and The MacIvor and Ovens gold fields. McCombie was writing from first hand knowledge having lived in Mount Alexander and visited the miners in the other districts. One of his special chapters is on Melbourne before and after the 'Golden Era' which could well be reprinted. He has sections on the Squatters, Gold Diggers and the Convicts. An unusual chapter is on bush graves of Australia. He had an odd interest in cemeteries and mentions some Aboriginal burial practices. An autobiographical section of the Chapter entitled 'An Afternoon in Ballarat' speaks in graphic and emotional words of his trip by steamer to Geelong and at that time recalling his earlier trip by boat to visit an incoming steamer which was bringing a loved nephew to Melbourne. He went out by boat to welcome him only to find he had died of consumption before they reached Port Phillip. This section of the article again demonstrates McCombie's writing skill in recounting a story. His final chapter in this series of Australian Sketches is a graphic account of his return to Britain by going round Cape Horn.

McCombie's extensive writings have not been reprinted or sufficiently studied to be able to give a proper assessment of their worth. The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature gives a short but more considered view of Thomas McCombie's works when it states that they are 'unexceptional works of literature but worthwhile because of their enthusiasm for and realistic account of life in Australia'.