sketcher and naval officer, was born at Canfield Hall, Essex, on 4 August 1814, eldest surviving son of Sir William Saltonstall Wiseman, Bt., a captain in the Royal Navy who came to Sydney in HMS Elizabeth in 1829, and his first wife Catherine, daughter of Sir James Mackintosh. William junior entered the Royal Naval College in 1827 and was on board Rattlesnake and Sparrowhawk in South American waters in 1831-33, remaining with Sparrowhawk until February 1837. He then served in various ships in British, Mediterranean, North American and West Indian waters, being promoted commander in 1846. On 1 July 1848 he succeeded his father as eighth baronet.
In 1863-67 Sir William was commander of HMS Cura ç oa , the flagship of the Australia Station. He arrived at Sydney on 22 September 1863 after visiting the Swan River Colony Western Australia, but stayed only a day, loading stores, troops and ordnance for the Waikato River, New Zealand, where he landed 365 men from the Cura ç oa , Harrier and Eclipse to man the flotilla of small colonial vessels established there. After a battle against a Maori force on the east coast, he left for Sydney in June 1864, keeping his headquarters in New Zealand until relieved in September 1866.
Wiseman defended British interests in the New Hebrides and Fiji in 1865 with a great deal of force and appears to have collected a vast number of 'souvenirs’ while doing so. In November 1865 he exhibited over 1200 'curiosities’ from the South Sea Islands at the Diocesan Book Repository in Phillip Street, Sydney. Included were eighty-seven photographs of natives, missionaries and buildings in the Pacific and Norfolk islands, as well as one of the Cura ç oa in Fitzroy Dock on Cockatoo Island, Sydney Harbour (NLA). They were probably all taken by Mr Kerr and/or Lieutenant Michael Guy .
Wiseman himself recorded the places he visited in ink and grey monotone wash drawings. His Sketches in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and New Hebrides (ML) contains fourteen unsigned and undated views, mostly of Western Australian, South Australian and New South Wales subjects. The drawings, extremely competent compositions according to picturesque principles, include the ink and wash Bunbury Western Australia and Tom Thumb’s Lagoon Illawarra District (NSW) and an atmospheric ink sketch, Mode of Disposal of the Dead in Australia . All have been given titles, some apparently in Wiseman’s own hand; others, according to the Mitchell Library, were possibly added by Mrs J.H. Connell of Melbourne who once owned them.
After returning to England from Australia, Wiseman retired on a 'good service’ pension and was promoted rear-admiral in 1869. He died on 14 July 1874, survived by his wife Charlotte Jane, only daughter of Admiral Charles William Paterson, whom he had married in 1838. They had two children, Eliza Frances Charlotte and William, who succeeded his father as ninth baronet.
- Writers:
- Staff Writer
- Date written:
- 1992
- Last updated:
- 2011
