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Source: Cricket Archive
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Robert Edwin Bush (11 October 1855 – 29 December 1939) was a first-class cricketer for Gloucestershire County Cricket Club from 1874 to 1877, and from 1890 to 1893 was a member of Western Australia's first Legislative Council under responsible government. During World War I, he converted his home into a war hospital at his own cost.
Bush was born at Redland, Bristol; his father was Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Bush, who commanded a detachment of the 96th Infantry in Western Australia in the 1840s. Bush attended Clifton College from 1865 to 1875, captaining the school's cricket team in his last two years. Between August 1874 and June 1877, he played first-class cricket for Gloucestershire County Cricket Club, alongside W. G. Grace and his brother James Bush; he was a right-handed batsman and occasional wicket-keeper.
Some time afterwards, Bush travelled to Western Australia, where he worked for eighteen months as a jackaroo on Murgoo Station. After taking a cargo of horses to Mauritius, he spent six months from October 1879 to March 1880 exploring north of the Gascoyne River. He later took up a number of sheep and cattle stations in the area including Bidgemia, Clifton Downs and Mount Clere Stations, becoming a leading Gascoyne pastoralist. He also became interested in gold prospecting, and joined the gold rush to the Yilgarn after the discovery of gold there in 1887.