Description

Extended Data

Birth Place

England, UK

Biography

painter and sketcher, was born in England and came to Sydney in 1828, accompanying her father, Judge Sir James Dowling, later Chief Justice of New South Wales. Eliza grew up at Broughton House, the Dowlings’ family home on the border of Woolloomooloo and Surry Hills. She was taught to draw and paint in watercolour by Conrad Martens , then the most fashionable artist in Sydney. After a society wedding in St James’s Church on 30 March 1842, Eliza spent her honeymoon bringing sheep to the Darling Downs (Queensland) from her husband’s property, Cashiobury, in New South Wales. She and her husband Arthur, the young Oxford-educated squatter son of an English clergyman, spent the first year of their marriage in a slab hut on his recently established property, Eton Vale, near Toowoomba, often in danger of attack from Aborigines. In a speech her husband made to the Royal Commonwealth Society, Eliza was called 'the first white woman to settle on the Darling Downs’. With her energetic participation Eton Vale became one of Queensland’s largest and most successful wool properties of the 1850s. In December 1851 Martens visited and made three signed and dated pencil sketches which served as the basis for several watercolours subsequently purchased by the Hodgsons. Eliza Hodgson was one of the earliest artists to sketch the town of Brisbane and the pastoral properties of the Darling Downs. Her delicate pencil sketches with their meticulous attention to detail and accurate observation of foliage and cloud effects show the influence of Martens. Her drawings and paintings were never exhibited or sold for she painted solely as a relaxation and escape from her arduous life as wife of an ambitious pastoralist and politician and mother of eleven children. Three children died in childhood, one allegedly killed by Aborigines. Her husband frequently visited Brisbane as member of the Legislative Assembly for Warrego and she then ran the property single-handed. Arthur Hodgson became colonial secretary and acting premier of Queensland for a brief period in 1869. He was Queensland commissioner for various international exhibitions held in Europe and Britain, and the Hodgsons made eleven voyages overseas during their Queensland years. In December 1869 Eliza Hodgson returned to England to arrange the purchase of their final home, Clopton House, near Stratford-upon-Avon. She took many of her sketchbooks and views with her. These remain in family possession in England; a large watercolour panorama, Brisbane from Toorak, Hamilton, July 1869 , is in the Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW. In 1886 Sir Arthur became high sheriff for Warwickshire and Knight Commander of St Michael and St George. After a long and happy life, Lady Hodgson died at Stratford-upon-Avon in 1901. Her husband died six months later. Their son Edward remained in Queensland to run Eton Vale, sold after his death. Writers: de Vries-Evans, Susanna Date written: 1992 Last updated: 2011

Born

b. 1820

Summary

Painter and sketcher, was born in England and came to Sydney in 1828. In 1842 she moved to Queensland with her husband where she became one of the earliest artists to sketch the town of Brisbane and the pastoral properties of the Darling Downs.

Gender

Female

Died

1901

Age at death

81