Robert Thomas (newspaper proprietor)

Robert Thomas (November 1781 – 1 July 1860) was a Welsh newspaper proprietor, printer and early settler of South Australia who was born on a farm 'Rhantregynwen', at Llanymynech, Powys, Wales.^[1]

In 1836, Thomas migrated to the new colony with his wife Mary and family on the Africaine, arriving at Holdfast Bay on 8 November. He printed Governor Hindmarsh's proclamation of the new colony (28 December 1836), and began printing copies of the South Australian Gazette and Colonial Register. By 1838, the Register was a weekly newspaper. Thomas also printed copies of the South Australian Church Hymn Book for the Rev. Charles Howard, the Royal South Australian Almanac (1838-1842) and from 1839, the Port Lincoln Herald and South Australian Commercial Advertiser.

The Register had a fierce policy of independence and this resulted in conflict with Governor George Gawler, who it often criticised for his economic policies. Gawler was particularly attacked in September 1840 over his ordering of the execution of two Ngarrindjeri men as a reprisal for the killing and dismembering of the survivors of the Maria shipwreck on the Coorong the previous July. As a result, the Government ceased to use the services of Robert Thomas & Co. from 11 November 1840 as Government printer, especially of the Government Gazette – a loss to the company of ₤1650 a year.

After an unsuccessful trip to London to protest the loss of business from the Government, he returned to Adelaide, where he continued to be involved in further printing and publishing. He died on 1 July 1860 at his home in Hindley Street.

Family

His wife Mary was a poet and diarist, who published The Diary of Mary Thomas, which is considered a valuable history of her voyage on the Africaine and the early days of the colony.

• Eldest son Robert George Thomas (1820 – 14 April 1883) with G. S. Kingston and William Light on either the Cygnet or the Rapid, and drafted the original plan of the City of Adelaide, later Government Architect.
• Their second son William Kyffin Thomas (1821–1878), became a proprietor of the South Australian Register.^[2]

References

• Robert Thomas at the Australian Dictionary of Biography
• Mennell, Philip (1892). " Thomas, Robert". The Dictionary of Australasian Biography. London: Hutchinson & Co. Wikisource