There is some uncertainty about the number of children that George Hogarth had; Christie, The Ancestry of Catherine Thomson Hogarth, lists five daughters and five sons. The second of the sons, d. 1841, does not enter into consideration here. Record of other sons: Robert Hogarth, first son, b, 1816, stilI living in the 1870s (see Adrian, Georgina Hogarth and the Dickens Circle p. 208); William Thomson Hogarth ("William Thomas" in D.N.B.), third son, b. 1823, no death date recorded; James BalIantyne Hogarth, fourth son, d. 1876 (D.N.B.); Edward Hogarth, fifth son, d. 1879 at age forty-five (Life and Reminiscences of E. L. Blanchard, ed, Scott and Howard, II, 485, where name is given as "Edward Norris Hogarth").
The two items listed as by Hogarth Jnr. give the following information about the contributor: Had emigrated to Australia before the gold-rush days; at “the beginning of the Winter of 1850 ... was working quietly in Sydney, by no means dissatisfied with [his] position", when rumours of the Bathurst gold discovery reached the city; resigned his position, advertised in the Sydney Morning Herald for "a gentleman, willing to join him in and to share the expenses of "going to Turon diggings; chose as partner one of the men who answered the advertisement; proceeded with him to the diggings; worked there about four months ("The Cradle and the Grave"); obviously found the venture unsuccessful; was in Melbourne in November 1852, having been there apparently for some time ("Look Before You Leap").
The Office Book assigns "Look Before You Leap" to Horne and Hogarth. Home had arrived in Melbourne in September 1852; about a fortnight after his arrival he obtained a position as commander of a Bendigo-Melbourne gold-escort; he resigned after a short time and thereafter stayed some weeks in Melbourne. It must have been shortly after his arrival from England that he collaborated with Hogarth on the article. He was, during about his first ten months in Australia, also sending his own articles to H.W. For "Look Before You Leap" the Office Book records split payment to Horne and Hogarth. For "The Cradle and the Grave" it records payment made "To Hogarth senr".
The Mitchell library, Sydney, reports that Hogarth’s advertisement for a partner seems not to appear in the Sydney Morning Herald, that no Hogarth is listed in the 1850 Sydney directories, but that a William Hogarth is listed in Sands, Kenney & Co’s Melbourne Directory, 1861. See "Plorn's Australian Uncles", Dickensian, Autumn 1972: two of George Hogarth's sons—WilIiam and James—went to Australia.
Author: Anne Lohrli; © University of Toronto Press, 1971.
