Osbert Edrick Wilson
Osbert Edrick Wilson (1857 – July 1901) was a clerk, poet, author, orator and a Chief President of the Australian Natives' Association. Background Wilson was born in Ballarat in 1857, the son of Jonathon Noble Wilson and Martha Stripling. The father was active in public affairs; in 1885 he was mayor of Ballarat. The son – followed his father's lead. He was an active member of the Ballarat rowing, swimming and football clubs, and he was in demand for his recitations at concerts and social evenings. In July 1885 Wilson became a probationary Lieutenant in the Victorian Militia. Then in 1886 he was commissioned as a Lieutenant in the Militia at Ballarat. In 1886, he married Lily Araminta Guthridge. She was the eighth child of Nehemiah Guthridge, an early settler in Victoria. They had two daughters. Australian Natives' Association Wilson was active in the Australian Natives Association (ANA) in Ballarat and the region. He attended of the opening of the Horsham Branch No. 24 and also the Haddon Branch No. 25 both in 1883. He was Chief President of the ANA in 1884, and president of the Ballarat Branch in 1885. Under his leadership the association launched its first great ‘public demonstration’ – mass meetings in the Ballarat and the Melbourne Town Halls in support of the Service government's campaign for British annexation of the New Hebrides. These meetings effectively launched the ANA as a public pressure group. In 1887 Wilson moved to Melbourne and became the founding president of the Hotham branch. He was a popular lecturer at ANA branches across the city, drawing large audiences to hear topics such as ‘Britain and her Colonies’ and the mildly republican ‘The Life of Oliver Cromwell’. His lectures seem to have become increasingly nativist and anti-imperialist in tone. In an editorial in the ANA journal the Australian Wilson declared that: A race is growing up to whom the Old World is but a name for a state of Conservatism and armed terrorism, to whom the old racial and national distinctions are as nought … They will fight strenuously to keep their native land's shores free from pollution, and their forces and money from being dragged into foreign quarrels which to Australia are of little moment.. Aveling describes Wilson as "an Australian nationalist with a fierce radical dislike of British cant, cast and imperialism. His desire was not to enter parliament but to influence national policy by making the association an active force in national policy. Under his leadership, the Board of Directors began taking an active part discussion of the national issue. Wilson wished to influence national events, not though his elevation to parliament, but by having the Association as an active force in national policy. By 1885 the aim of Federation was already a part of the Associations policy. The ANA Board with the support of Ballarat and 4 neighbouring ANA Branches called their first public meeting with a political objective in Ballarat's Alfred Hall "to strengthen the hand of