Geological sketch map of New South Wales / compiled from the original map of the late Revd. W.B. Clarke, M.A, F.R.S., F.G.S., &c. by C.S. Wilkinson, L.S., F.G.S., Government Geologist

Charles Smith Wilkinson (1843 - 1891)

Wilkinson was a geologist born at Northamptonshire, England. His family migrated to Melbourne, arriving in the Marlborough in November 1852. Charles attended Rev. T. P. Fenner's Collegiate School, Prahran, and in December 1859 began work with the Victorian Geological Survey under Alfred Selwyn, becoming in 1861 field assistant to Richard Daintree. In 1863 he accompanied Reginald Murray to the Otway Ranges and became field geologist in 1866. Wilkinson moved to Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, to take up pastoral pursuits, but occasionally did some private surveying. In October 1870 in evidence before the gold fields royal commission he warned against dividing the interests and claims of geology and mining, and argued for a department of mines. After passing his surveyor's licence on 16 August 1871 he worked in the Surveyor-General's Department, then as a geological surveyor from 16 July 1874 in the Department of Lands until he became geological surveyor in charge in the Department of Mines in 1875. In 1874 Wilkinson began the systematic geological survey of New South Wales. In 1876 he reported on the specimens collected by (Sir) William Macleay's expedition to New Guinea, and later announced the discovery of Miocene fossils and described the gold specimens found by Andrew Goldie and William George Lawes in New Guinea. From October 1882 to March 1883 he acted as chief mining surveyor. He persuaded the government to support the search for subterranean water in the western districts, giving detailed hydrological evidence in August 1884 before the royal commission on the conservation of water. He travelled widely throughout New South Wales as a member of the Prospecting Board from 1888, gaining an intimate knowledge of its mineralogical and palaeontological wealth. In 1882 Wilkinson was joined by (Sir) Tannatt William Edgeworth David, to whom he delegated much responsibility. He brought together the extensive collection for the Mining and Geological Museum, Sydney, and served on every major New South Wales exhibition commission from 1875; in 1890 he visited London as the colony's representative at the International Exhibition of Mining and Metallurgy. Despite long absences from Sydney Wilkinson was active in the colony's corporate scientific life: a member of the local Royal Society from 1874, he was its president in 1887-88; a member of the Linnean Society of New South Wales from 1880 and president in 1883-84, he contributed five papers on anthropology, geology and the general progress of colonial science. He was elected a fellow of the Geological Society, London, in 1876, the Linnean Society of London in 1881 and the Victoria Institute, London, in 1885 and was a member of the New South Wales branch of the Geographical Society of Australasia. He made over ninety contributions to science in lectures, articles, maps and official reports. A member of the Engineering Association of New South Wales, Wilkinson also served on the Board of Technical Education and as a trustee of the Australian Museum.

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William Branwhite Clarke (1798 - 1878)

William Branwhite Clarke (1798-1878) Clarke was a geologist and Anglican clergyman. He became a fellow of the Geological Society of London in 1826 and by 1832 had made several excursions to the Continent. His papers on meteoric phenomena and geology and notes on zoology in the Magazine of Natural History in the 1830s attest the scope of his work and he contributed several papers to the Proceedings of the Geological Society. He cultivated the leaders of geological science and began the correspondence with Sedgwick and Sir Roderick Murchison that later stimulated and encouraged his lonely researches in New South Wales. Without ecclesiastical or aristocratic connexions to aid him, Clarke's chances of church preferment were small, and in December 1838, near penury and suffering from rheumatic fever, he accepted the nomination of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel to a chaplaincy in New South Wales. He arrived at Sydney with his family in May 1839 and was assigned to St Peter's, Campbelltown. But within a week Bishop Broughton changed his appointment to the headmastership of The King's School, Parramatta, with charge of the near-by parishes of Castle Hill and Dural. In December 1840 he resigned as headmaster because of his health, but continued to minister at Dural and Castle Hill until November 1844. Clarke left his mark in New South Wales as a geologist rather than as a churchman. In his spare time he moved out from Sydney and Parramatta in a widening arc and collected rocks and fossils, sending many to Sedgwick and publishing his observations in British scientific journals and the Tasmanian Journal of Natural Science. Clarke early predicted the colony's mineral wealth. In 1841, chipping the quartziferous slates near Hartley in the Blue Mountains, he discovered particles of gold and later added evidence from Bathurst to the Liverpool Range that the country would be found 'abundantly rich in gold'. In April 1844 he told Governor Sir George Gipps of his finds and later claimed that the governor directed him to 'Put it away, Mr. Clarke, or we shall all have our throats cut'. He pressed for an official survey of New South Wales and in 1847 became active in drawing public attention to the geological phenomenon of gold. When Edward Hargraves discovered a goldfield at Ophir in 1851 Clarke acted as the government's scientific adviser and served as a geological surveyor from September 1851 to July 1853, carrying church ministrations to the diggings and to other outlying parts. Travelling on foot and horseback with two servants, he made a reconnaissance from Marulan southwards across the Alps to Omeo; east to Twofold Bay and north from the Hunter River to Brisbane and the Darling Downs. In his twenty-eight reports he outlined the physical and stratigraphical structure of the country he had seen and its metalliferous resources. Scientific recognition followed Clarke's work on gold. In 1856 at the Tasmanian government's invitation he reported on the Fingal goldfield and on the auriferous character of the basin at South Esk, but in 1858 he refused appointment as geological surveyor of Tasmania. Clarke claimed to be the scientific discoverer of Australian gold, a title contested by John Lhotsky, Strzelecki, Hargraves and by Sir Roderick Murchison who published in 1844 a comparison between the Australian 'Cordillera' and the goldbearing Ural chain. In 1861, however, the government of New South Wales honoured Clarke's claim and awarded him a grant of £3000. His part in the discovery and investigation of Australia's gold resources was also recognized by the Royal Society of London who elected him a fellow in June 1876. Clarke's most important contribution to Australian geology was his work on the age of the coal deposits of New South Wales  

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