Sub-item 15 - Letter from George Washington Walker to James Backhouse Walker

George Washington Walker (1800-1859), Quaker, shopkeeper and humanitarian, was born on 19 March 1800 in London, the twenty-first child of John Walker (1726-1821) by his second wife, Elizabeth, née Ridley. Because of the death of his mother and the absence of his aged father engaged in the saddle trade in Paris, he was brought up by his grandmother in Newcastle. He was educated by a Wesleyan schoolmaster near Barnard Castle, and apprenticed in 1814 to a linen draper. Impressed by the probity and wisdom of his Quaker employers and James Backhouse of York, a leading Quaker minister, he left the Unitarian persuasion of his family in 1827 and became a member of the Society of Friends. The next year he formed the first Temperance Society in Newcastle.
For more information see http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/walker-george-washington-2764

James Backhouse Walker (1841-1899), solicitor and historian, was born on 14 October 1841 in Hobart Town, son of George Washington Walker, shopkeeper, and his wife Sarah Benson, daughter of Robert Mather. Educated at the High School, Government Domain, Hobart, and at the Friends School, York, England, he was first employed as junior clerk in the office of T. D. Chapman and later in his father's Hobart Savings Bank. But in 1872 he took articles and on 7 July 1876 was admitted as barrister, solicitor and proctor of the Supreme Court of Tasmania. Senior partner in the firm J. B. Walker and Wolfhagen he was also an active councillor of the Southern Law Society. From 1877 he was a member of the Tasmanian Club. in 1890 he was appointed member of the first council of the new university, and in 1898 became its second vice-chancellor. Fro more information see : http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/walker-james-backhouse-4786