John Hindmarsh: Powder Monkey, Governor, Forgotten Man of South Australia

He survived Britain's great naval wars. Governing South Australia proved harder.John Hindmarsh entered the Royal Navy as a boy and grew to adulthood in an unforgiving world of gunpowder, hierarchy and war. The son of a naval gunner from Chatham, he served during Britain's long struggle against Revolutionary and Napoleonic France and emerged with courage, ambition and an intense belief in the authority of rank.Then peace left him waiting.After years of half-pay and frustrated advancement, Hindmarsh finally received the appointment that seemed to justify a lifetime of service. In 1836 he sailed aboard HMS Buffalo to become the first Governor of the new Province of South Australia.His governorship would last barely eighteen months.South Australia had been created with competing centres of authority. Governor Hindmarsh represented the Crown. Resident Commissioner James Hurtle Fisher represented the Colonisation Commission and its land system. Surveyor-General William Light possessed the practical responsibility for transforming Country into the roads, town acres and boundaries of a new colonial capital.Personality turned structural tension into open conflict.At the same time, the proclamation Hindmarsh read at Holdfast Bay on 28 December 1836 promised protection to Aboriginal inhabitants while British authority, survey and settlement were being imposed across Kaurna Country.John Hindmarsh: Powder Monkey, Governor, Forgotten Man of South Australia follows Hindmarsh from the gun decks of Nelson's Navy to the beaches of South Australia, through political failure, recall and eventual rehabilitation as Governor of Heligoland.It is the story of a brave, difficult and frequently forgotten man whose name remained on the map long after the arguments surrounding his career had faded.Part of the Shadows on the Map series.