Harry Lawson

Sir Harry Sutherland Wightman Lawson KCMG (5 March 1875 – 12 June 1952), was an Australian politician who served as Premier of Victoria from 1918 to 1924. He later entered federal politics, serving as a Senator for Victoria from 1929 to 1935, and was briefly a minister in the Lyons government. He was a member of the Nationalist Party until 1931, when it was subsumed into the United Australia Party.

Early life Lawson was born in Dunolly, the son of a Presbyterian clergyman of Scottish descent. He was educated at a local school and then, briefly, at Scotch College in Melbourne. He was a noted Australian rules footballer, playing for Castlemaine. He studied law with a Melbourne law firm and was called to the bar. He began a practice in Castlemaine, and was elected to the town council, serving as mayor in 1905. In 1901, he married Olive Horwood, with whom he had eight children.

State politics In a by-election in December 1899, Lawson was elected to the Victorian Legislative Assembly for Castlemaine as a Liberal, and represented the district, in its different incarnations, for 28 years.

Death and legacy

Lawson died in East Melbourne, survived by seven of his eight children. His wife died in 1949 and his youngest son, who had joined the Royal Australian Air Force, was killed in 1941. His daughter, Helen Mary Keays, was appointed an OBE in 1972 for Women's Services. His last surviving child, Ina Constance Watson, died in Melbourne on 9 November 2012.