Alfred William Howitt

Alfred William Howitt (17 April 1830 – 7 March 1908) was an Australian anthropologist and naturalist.

Background

Howitt was born in Nottingham, England, the son of well-known authors William Howitt and Mary Botham. He came to the Victorian gold fields in 1852 with his father and brother to visit his uncle, Dr. Godfrey Howitt. He became a public servant in the colony of Victoria working as a geologist. He became a gold warden in North Gippsland and was later appointed Police magistrate & Warden Crown Lands Commissioner. He eventually held the position of Secretary of the Mines Department.

In 1861, the Royal Society of Victoria appointed Howitt leader of the Victorian Relief Expedition, with the task was of establishing the fate of Robert O'Hara Burke and William John Wills, leaders of the Burke and Wills expedition. Howitt travelled to Coopers Creek where he found John King, the sole survivor of the four men who had been the first to travel across Australia from south to north. Howitt then buried Burke and Wills at Coopers Creek before taking John King back to Melbourne. Howitt was a skilled bushman and he took only the necessary equipment and a small crew when he made the journey to Cooper's Creek which he accomplished more quickly than Burke. On a follow-up expedition to Coopers Creek in 1862, Howitt recovered the bodies of Burke and Wills for burial in Melbourne.

Howitt collected botanical specimens during his expeditions in north-eastern South Australia, south-western Queensland and western New South Wales. His collections were sent to Baron von Mueller and are now in Melbourne.

Howitt researched the culture and society of Indigenous Australians, in particular kinship and marriage. He was influenced by the theories of evolution developing at the time and anthropological theory. His major work (co-authored with Lorimer Fison) was "Kamilaroi and Kurnai" (1879) which was recognised internationally as a landmark in the development of the modern science of anthropology. This work was used by many others including the twentieth century anthopologist Norman Tindale.

In 1903 he was awarded the Clarke Medal by the Royal Society of New South Wales and in 1904 he received the first Mueller Medal from the Royal Society of Victoria. A memorial fund established after his death was used to buy rare books on topics such as antropology, geology, and botany for the library of the Royal Society. These books were inscribed "Purchased from A. W. Howitt Memorial Fund".

In 1863 he married Maria (nickname 'Liney') Boothby, daughter of the then late Judge Boothby, Chief Justice of the Colony of Victoria. They had five children. Howitt died in 1908 in Bairnsdale, Victoria.

Mount Howitt in Victoria, and Howitt Hall, one of Monash University's Halls of Residence are named after him.

Howitt's scientific life shared a special irony with that of his longtime friend Lorimer Fison. They were both set in motion by Lewis Henry Morgan, but the latter pinned more hope on Fison than on Howitt. Yet Fison gave up his scientific pursuit shortly after Morgan's death, whereas Howitt persevered for many years, and Howitt's Magnum opus, "The Native Tribes of South East Australia," which was completed and published more than twenty years later in 1904, remains today and forever one of the only scientific studies into the native institutions of Central Australian Aborigines, while these institutions were still intact.

References

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* cite book
first = Mary Howitt
last = Walker
authorlink =
year = 1971
title = Come wind, come weather; a biography of Alfred Howitt
chapter =
editor =
others =
edition =
pages =
publisher = Melbourne University Press
id = ISBN 0-522-83962-2
url =
* Howitt, Alfred William, 1870, 15 March 1870. "Experiences in Central Australia". "Gippsland Times".
* Howitt, Alfred William, 1878. "Notes on the Aborigines of Coopers Creek". In R. B. Smyth (Ed.), "The Aborigines of Victoria".
* Howitt, Alfred William, 1889. "Note as to descent in the Dieri tribe". "Journal of the Anthropological Institute". Vol. 19, p. 90.
* Howitt, Alfred William, 1890. "The Dieri and other kindred tribes of Central Australia". "Journal of the Anthropological Institute". Vol. 20, pp. 30-104.
* Howitt, Alfred William, 1898. "Reminiscences of Central Australia". "Alma Mater". Vol. 3 (No. 1).
* Howitt, Alfred William, 1904. "The native tribes of south-east Australia". London: Macmillan.
* Howitt, Alfred William, 1907. "Personal reminiscences of Central Australia and the Burke and Wills Expedition: Presidents inaugural address". "Journal of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science". 1907 (Adelaide, 1907.), 43p.
* Howitt, Alfred William, Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, & Siebert Otto, 1904. "Legends of the Dieri and kindred tribes of Central Australia". London: Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland.

External links

* [http://victoria.slv.vic.gov.au/burkeandwills/explorers/howitt.html State Library of Victoria biography]
* [http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/biogs/P000507b.htm Bright Sparcs biographical entry]
* [http://www.anbg.gov.au/biography/howitt-alfred.html Brief biograph including photo]
* [http://victoria.slv.vic.gov.au/burkeandwills/index.html Terra Incognita] Burke and Wills online exhibition at the State Library of Victoria.
* [http://www.burkeandwills.net.au/ Burke & Wills Web] A comprehensive website containing many of the historical documents relating to the Burke & Wills Expedition.
* [http://www.burkeandwills.org/ The Burke & Wills Historical Society] The Burke & Wills Historical Society.
* [http://www.aiatsis.gov.au/aboriginal_studies_press/find_a_book/anthropologyarchaeology/kamilaroi_and_kurnai "Kamilaroi and Kurnai"] book details, ISBN (10) 0 85575 222 X
* [http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A040489b.htm Howitt, Alfred William (1830 - 1908)] at "Australian Dictionary of Biography"