Frederick Wolseley

Frederick York Wolseley (16 March 1837 – 8 January 1899) was an Irish-born New South Wales inventor and woolgrower who invented and developed the first commercially successful sheep shearing machinery after extensive experimentation. It revolutionised the wool industry.

The Murray Shire Council has erected a monument to him where he lived at the time, referring to his invention: "It has become part of the rich history of the wool industry and is now perpetuated in poem and song."

Born in Kingstown (now Dún Laoghaire) in County Dublin Ireland, Frederick was the third son of the seven surviving children of Major Garnet Joseph Wolseley (1780–1840) of The King's Own Scottish Borderers (25th Foot) and of the family of Mount Wolseley, co. Carlow, and Frances Anne (1801–1883) daughter of William Smith of Dublin. His eldest brother became Field Marshal Wolseley and a hero of the Victorian era, another brother became General Sir George Wolseley. Their father died in 1840 leaving their mother little more than his army pension and the brothers were educated at the local day school instead of being sent to England. The seven children remained close-knit throughout their lives.

He married his nurse, Ellen Elizabeth Clarke (1850–1922), in Melbourne in 1892. She looked after him through his long final illness. They had no children.

Frederick Wolseley, unassisted, went to Melbourne from Ireland, arriving in July 1854, aged 17, to be a jackaroo on his future brother-in-law's sheep station. His sister Fanny's husband, Gavin Ralston Caldwell, they married in Dublin in 1857, held Thule, on the Murray River, and later added nearby Cobran near Deniliquin; both stations were in New South Wales.

Caldwell died in 1868. About that time, Wolseley set to work developing his ideas for a sheep shearing machine. By 1872, he had created a working model. He returned from a visit to England and Ireland in 1874 and continued development in Melbourne with Richard Park & Co, an engineering business where a few years later Herbert Austin, a new immigrant from England, was to serve an apprenticeship. Austin's uncle was works manager.

...
Wikipedia