Adam Lindsay Gordon takes a poetic leap into starting a new life in South Australia in 1853
Adam Lindsay Gordon in 1865 when he was elected to the South Australian House of Assembly.
The poet Adam Lindsay Gordon, aged 20, arrived in Adelaide in 1853 with a letter of introduction to the South Australian governor from his military father who’d sent his son out from England as a fresh start from his wild and aimless life.
Gordon immediately joined the South Australian mounted police and was the groom to senior officer Alexander Tolmer before being stationed at Mount Gambier and Penola. He left the police force in 1855 and took up horse breaking in the south-east district.
In 1857, he met Julian Tenison-Woods, the Catholic priest, geologist and educationist, who, with Mary MacKillop, founded the Congregation of Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart at Penola in 1866. Woods lent books to Gordon and talked poetry with him.
Having inherited his parents’ estate, Gordon resumed his interest in horse racing and won or was placed in several local hurdle and steeplechases. When the ship Admella ran aground on the Cape Northumberland shoals, near where Gordon was staying in 1859, many heroic feats were attempted, including an epic horse ride to Mount Gambier, to rescue its passangers. Ten years later, Gordon wrote a poem “From the Wreck”, popular imagination credited Gordon with making that ride, although newspaper articles were written to debunk the myth.
In 1862, he married Margaret Park, aged 17, and two years later bought a cottage, Dingley Dell, near Port MacDonnell. In this same year, inspired by six engravings after Noel Paton illustrating "The Dowie Dens O' Yarrow", Gordon wrote a poem “The Feud”, with 30 copies printed at Mount Gambier.
In 1864, Gordon performed the daring riding feat known as Gordon's Leap on the edge of Mount Gambier’s Blue Lake. An obelisk now marks the spot.
Responding to a deputation’s request, Gordon was elected to the South Australian House of Assembly representing the district of Victoria in 1865. In politics, Gordon was a maverick. His semi-classical speeches were colourful and entertaining but largely irrelevant, and he resigned his seat in 1866. He found a good friend in wealthy fellow parliamentarian John Riddoch of Penola, and was a frequent guest at his big home “Yallum” where he wrote "The Sick Stockrider".
Gordon contributed verse to the Australasian and Bell's Life in Victoria and bought land in Western Australia but returned from a visit there in 1867 and went to live at Mount Gambier where he wrote "Ashtaroth, a Dramatic Lyric" and "Sea Spray and Smoke Drift".
In 1868, Gordon moved to Ballarat. After growing financial troubles and serious falls in horse races, Gordon shot himself in 1870. His wife returned to South Australia, married Peter Low, and lived until 1919.
