Williamstown Notables - Captain Charles Ferguson

Kezia Hayter became engaged to Captain Charles Ferguson in Hobart in 1841. She remained in Hobart while Captain Ferguson and the Rajah departed on 22th of August, 1841, travelling to India. Miss Hayter resigned from prison reform work and for most of 1842 she was governess to the children of William Archer of Brickendon, Longford.  Charles finally returned to Hobart in 1843 and the pair were married on 1st July, 1843 in Saint Andrews Presbyterian Church, Hobart by Minister James Bell.

The ship left Hobart two months later with the newlyweds on board, sailing first to Sydney, Geelong and then onto London. The couple remained on board, along with their first child George who was born in Hobart in 1846, until 1848 when Kezia Ferguson and son George decided to visit her husband’s family in Scotland. She and George rejoined the ship in 1850, arriving in Port Phillip on 4 May, 1850. When the Rajah next left port in July, 1850, it was under the command of Captain William McQueen, Captain Ferguson having decided to resign his command for a permanent job on dry land.

The couple moved to Victoria where Captain Charles Ferguson became the state of Victoria’s first Chief Harbour Master in February, 1852.  In the same year he began to perform the duties of both a Police Magistrate and a Water Police Magistrate for Williamstown and became a big landholder in the colony. He was also chairman of the Steam Navigation Board, President of the Pilot’s Board, Secretary of the provisional Committee to establish a Floating Seaman’s Chapel, the forerunner to the Mission to Seamen.