Documents

Lot 1940    SESSION 8 (2.30PM TUESDAY 31ST AUGUST)    Documents

Estimate $150
Bid at live.noble.com.au
SOLD $4,000

HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR AUSTRALIA, Visitors Book, cover in padded blue leather with gold blocked details and Australian arms at top, inside are signatures of visitors to the embassy between April and September 1947 including a letter pasted on the cover page from Government House, Cape Town dated 24th April 1947 and addressed to Sir George Knowles, C.B.E., High Commissioner for Australia, Cape Town, that reads, 'My Dear Sir George, The King and Queen and the Princesses have been able to sign your Visitors' Book, and I now return it. Many thanks for your good wishes. With kind regards', and on the first signature page are the signatures of King George VI, Queen Elizabeth and the Princesses, Elizabeth (now the Queen) and Margaret. Very fine.

King George VI and his family's signatures all on one page. The signatures were made around about the 21st birthday of his daughter Elizabeth (21 Apr 1947), now Queen Elizabeth II.

George Shaw Knowles was born at Toowong, Brisbane, Queensland on 14 March 1880. He completed his schooling in Queensland and then joined the Queensland Public Service. After a few years he decided to attend university and applied for a position with the Commonwealth Audit Office in Melbourne, Victoria. He married Eleanor L. Bennett on 10 November 1908 in Brisbane and by then George had obtained a Law Degree. He moved forward to work in the Attorney-General's Department. He occupied many important government positions and was on various government committees and when he transferred to Canberra he built an impressive house as a family home and named it Ellanshaw. In February 1932 he was appointed Solicitor-General. He had been awarded an OBE in 1920, a CBE in 1927 and in 1939 was created a Knight Bachelor. In 1946 Sir George Knowles was appointed Australia's first High Commissioner to South Africa, dying there at Pretoria on 22 November 1947.

The above is a brief summation. Accompanying the lot is a comprehensive history of Sir George Shaw Knowles CBE and his family.

See also lots 1964 and 1965.