Goold, Stephen Styles

Goold, Stephen Styles

Stephen Styles Goold was born in 1817 in Wiltshire, England, son of Moses Goold and his wife, née Styles.

Goold arrived in Sydney in 1841. On 7 March 1843, he married an Irish housemaid, Margery Belfour or Balfour, at St James church, Sydney. He achieved a modest success as a painter, glazier and building contractor, and by the late 1860s he owned several houses in Waterloo, Sydney, including his own residence at 29 Botany Road.

Religious pioneer

Although of Jewish ancestry, he was an active member of the Primitive Methodist Church and was a prominent lay preacher and a trustee of the Kent Street chapel.

He was a founder of the Loyal Orange Institution in 1845 and Grand Master of the Institution from 1870 to 1875. After the attempted assassination of the Duke of Edinburgh at Clontarf on 12 March 1868, Goold joined the Protestant Political Association, formed later that month. Part of the anti-Fenian movement invigorated by the crime, it sought the 'self defence and maintenance of Protestant principles' by supporting the election of Protestant candidates to parliament and the city council. Goold became a paid organiser for the association in 1869. In 1870 he was elected grand master of the Loyal Orange Institution, and with publicity by Reverend John McGibbon, editor of the journal Protestant Standard, and his own organising abilities, Goold built up the institution from fewer than 3,000 members in 30 lodges in early 1870 to over 16,000 members and 120 lodges by the end of 1875, when he resigned because of ill health.

Politics

Goold was commissioned as a Justice of the Peace in 1871. He served as the alderman for Phillip Ward from 1 December 1870 until his death, and became the mayor of Sydney in 1874. Goold was elected as a member of the Legislative Assembly for Mudgee from 23 December 1874 until 28 August 1876.

Goold died of hypostatic disease and debility on 28 August 1876, aged 59. He was survived by his wife, a son and three daughters. He was buried in Camperdown cemetery in a graveside ceremony attended by over 1,000 people, and the pall-bearers included the Premier, the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly, and the Mayor of Sydney.

References

City of Sydney Archives, photo THC 88/086

Shirley Fitzgerald, Sydney 1842–1992, Hale & Iremonger, Sydney, 1992

Mark Lyons, 'Goold, Stephen Styles (1817–1876)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, volume 4, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne, 1972, p 267, online at http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/goold-stephen-styles-3634/text5651

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