Robert Alfred Tarlton
Robert Alfred Tarlton (21 April 1828 – 29 November 1918) was a businessman and politician in the early days of the colony South Australia.
Contents
History
Tarlton was born in Birmingham, England and trained for the Ministry. He married Caroline Walters in 1854 and emigrated to South Australia in 1858. In 1860 he had a draper's shop on Rundle Street and by 1861 was a director of G. & R. Wills & Co. Ltd., a position he held until 1869.[1] He was in 1865 a founder of the Bank of Adelaide, along with Henry Ayers, Fred. C. Bayer, John Dunn, Thomas Magarey, William Morgan, William Peacock, Robert Barr Smith, Thomas Greaves Waterhouse and others. He was chairman of directors, Commercial Bank of South Australia in 1886 when manager Alexander Crooks and accountant Alexander McKenzie Wilson were charged with embezzlement.[2] The bank's liquidators subsequently sued him and fellow Directors James Crabb Verco, Alfred Tennant, Charles Rischbieth and Maurice Salom for £320,000 damages, claiming negligence.
He was elected to the South Australian Legislative Council in 1873 and retired in 1888
They moved to Launceston, Tasmania, where he was appointed J.P. in 1890, then in 1893 moved to "Willowdene", Frankfort, Orange Free State, where he died; she died at her daughter's residence in Johannesburg.
Tarlton Street, Somerton may have been named for him.
Family
His wife Caroline Walters Tarlton (née Walters) died 20 March 1865 at Somerton (then spelled Summerton). He married again, to Sophia Walters Turner, who may have been her niece, (died 21 March 1913) on 11 April 1866 and lived at Somerton. He had one son and four daughters by his first wife and six sons and three daughters by the second.
- Eldest daughter Florence (ca.1855 – 7 November 1889) married Rev. Osric Copland on 18 September 1879
- Eldest son (Robert) Tatham Tarlton (ca.1859 – 17 December 1894) lived at Johannesburg, died of tuberculosis
- Second daughter Caroline Mary married W. Herbert Phillipps on 18 December 1877
- Third daughter Louie married James Eddington Jefferis, M.B., C.M., M.R.C.S., on 27 March 1888
- Fourth daughter Lizzie married Henry S. Rickards on 13 September 1888
