Robert Gouger blends political progressive activism with pious social conservativism

Robert Gouger was the most ardent and active promoter of founding the colony of South Australia.
Image courtesy State Library of South Australia

Robert Gouger, the most ardent and active promoter of founding the colony, is typical of middle class pious Protestant Dissenters who had such an impact on South Australia by applying their Christian beliefs to society.

This middle class pious Dissent brought out progressive social activism alongside conservatism on the effects of alcohol, gambling and loose sexuality. The paramount aim of both strands was stable middle-class family life. This combined progressive and conservative effect explains why South Australia could lead the world in getting women the vote and yet be the “wowser” state well into the 20th Century.

Besides his English Dissenter upbringing, Gouger’s friendship with utopian socialist Robert Owen shaped his philanthropic outlook and a taste for radical politics.
Gouger was an early supporter and publisher of Edward Gibbon Wakefield’s colonisation theory but their visions for South Australia started to diverge.

In 1831, Gouger put two proposals to the Colonial Office: his own plan for helping pauper children emigrate, and another, edited by Wakefield, stressing the advantages for early land buyers in the colony. Gouger later jointly authored a more radical plan that the Colonial Office rejected.

Gouger persisted and in 1833 Gouger formed the South Australian Association with the idea of securing a charter to found a colony belonging to the Crown but administered by trustees. The Colonial Office rejected the charter but, at his own expense and hard work, Gouger pushed on with campaigning and lobbying for the colony, until the South Australian Colonization Commission was gazetted in 1835.

Wakefield ungraciously downgraded Gouger’s work in the colony’s founding. Gouger was named as colonial secretary but personal tragedy and financial struggle awaited him.