Edwin Mitchell Smith

Edwin Mitchell Smith (18 March 1847 – 21 April 1929) was Surveyor General of South Australia from 1911 to 1917.

History Smith was born at Ipswich, Suffolk, England, eldest son of Edwin Smith (died March 1907) and his wife Hannah Smith, née Mitchell, and left England with his parents and sister aboard the ship Bolivar for South Australia, arriving in late January 1850. They lived at Medindie, where his father, who served for several years as chairman of Walkerville Council, developed a reputation as rose-grower. and joined the Survey Department as a field assistant or chainman on 1 June 1862, and in his first years was attached to a team doing survey work in the Mount Gambier area, followed by the Anlaby estate, Hill River and Bungaree regions. He acted as Surveyor-General for a total of around three years before being appointed to the office on 1 July 1911. He retired voluntarily on 31 March 1917.

Recognition He was awarded the Imperial Service Order in 1916.

Family Smith married Frances Lettice Porter (c. 1845 – 6 September 1920) of Parkside on 1 June 1870. Their children included:

Archibald John "Archie" Smith (1872–1945), of Melbourne (Frances) Evelyn Smith (1874 – 24 April 1953), of Medindie Norman Morley Alexander Smith (6 January 1877 – 24 December 1944) married Lillian Goode (11 July 1879 – ), daughter of Thomas Goode (pastoralist), on 16 June 1904; lived in Hawthorn, South Australia Estelle Laura Smith (1880– ) married Willy Theodore Alexander Drechsel in Dresden, Germany on 24 March 1903; moved to New York 1924. Their son Edwin Jared Drechsel was a noted magazine editor. They had a home on The Avenue, Medindie, South Australia, later on Arthur Street in the same suburb.

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