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sketcher, natural historian, collector, soldier and lieutenant-governor, was born in Scotland on 17 August 1755. As a boy Paterson became an enthusiastic botanist, an interest retained all his life. In 1777 he made four journeys into the interior of South Africa and later published his account of these expeditions, Narrative of Four Journeys into the Country of the Hottentots and Caffaria . The book, dedicated to Joseph Banks, contained seventeen plates after his drawings (nineteen in the second edition), all except two being botanical. Also interested in zoology, he is said to have been the first person to take a live giraffe to London.

In 1782 Paterson was corresponding about botanical specimens with Banks while serving as an ensign with the 98th Regiment in India. Promoted lieutenant in 1783, he returned to England when the regiment was disbanded in 1785. He married Elizabeth Driver there in about 1787. In June 1789 he was gazetted captain in the New South Wales Corps, very probably through the influence of Banks, and arrived at Port Jackson in the Gorgon in October 1791. He was immediately put in charge of the military detachment on Norfolk Island, where he served from November 1791 to March 1793, during which time he continued to correspond with Banks and send him botanical specimens. He also sent Banks numerous drawings, the majority acknowledged as the work of his convict servant, John Doody , although 'I have taken great pains in drawing some of them’, he wrote. Unfortunately, the book he intended to publish on the natural history of Norfolk Island, discussed with Banks in 1794, never eventuated.

Back at Sydney in 1793 Paterson led an unsuccessful attempt to cross the Blue Mountains. He acted as administrator of the colony from Major Grose’s departure in December 1794 to Governor Hunter 's arrival in September 1795. After sick leave in England, when he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society, he was sent back to Sydney in 1799 to investigate Hunter’s administration (of which he became increasingly critical). In 1800 he was appointed lieutenant-governor under Governor King . At first he kept up his interest in exploration and natural history, leading expeditions to the Hawkesbury River in 1799 and 1800, and to the Hunter River in 1801. But his health failed after he was injured in a duel with John Macarthur in September 1801 and administrative duties seem to have required all his energy from then on. In 1804 he was ordered to found a settlement at Port Dalrymple (Launceston), Van Diemen’s Land, where he remained until the end of 1808, having procrastinated for almost a year over returning to Sydney after Governor William Bligh was overthrown. When he finally assumed office as acting governor in January 1809 he proved ineffectual. Once Governor Macquarie had arrived, Paterson left New South Wales in May 1810. He died at sea off Cape Horn on 21 June.

Only Paterson’s botanical collections are preserved in the Natural History Museum, South Kensington (London). Over 300 original drawings of Aborigines, scenery, animals and plants attributed to him were for sale at London in 1929. Some were probably those now in the Dixson Library’s Paterson-Doody Collection, the rest have disappeared. He is therefore mainly known artistically for his friendships with John Lewin , G.P. Harris and G.W. Evans . The Rienits suggest that a miscellaneous collection of paintings and sketches containing works by these three artists as well as some unsigned, less competent drawings (Mitchell Library) could have belonged to Paterson.

Writers:

Staff Writer

Date written:

1992

Last updated:

2011