John Cockburn (Australian politician)
| Sir John Cockburn | |
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| 18th Premier of South Australia Elections: 1890 |
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In office 27 June 1889 – 19 August 1890 |
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| Monarch | Victoria |
| Governor | Earl of Kintore |
| Preceded by | Thomas Playford II |
| Succeeded by | Thomas Playford II |
| 6th Leader of the Opposition (SA) | |
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In office 1889–1889 |
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| Preceded by | John Downer |
| Succeeded by | Thomas Playford II |
Sir John Alexander Cockburn, KCMG (23 August 1850 – 26 November 1929) was Premier of South Australia from 27 June 1889 until 18 August 1890.
Cockburn was born in Corsbie, Berwickshire, Scotland in 1850 to Thomas Cockburn, farmer, and his wife Isabella, née Wright. His father died in France in 1855, and his mother migrated to South Australia in 1867 with three of the four children. Cockburn remained in the UK and was educated at Highgate School, and King's College London, he obtained the degree of M.D. London, with first class honours and gold medal. In 1875 he married Sarah Holdway (the daughter of Forbes Scott Brown) and they had one son and one daughter.
In 1879 he emigrated to South Australia and set up practice at Jamestown in the mid North.
In 1878 Cockburn was elected as the first mayor of the Corporate Town of Jamestown. In that role he lobbied the Government of South Australia to construct a railway line to the New South Wales border to tap the newly developed silver mining fields of the Barrier Ranges. Between 1884 and 1888, during Cockburn's parliamentary career, the South Australian Railways line through Jamestown to Petersburg was extended to the border to meet the tramway built by the Silverton Tramway Company. This linked the growing mines of Broken Hill to the South Australian coast at Port Pirie, where a smelter was built in 1889, effectively capturing the economic benefits of the Broken Hill mining field for South Australia. The town surveyed at the colonial border in 1886 was named Cockburn in his honour.
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