Macquarie & Me  © Alan Maclean 2012
 
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Macquarie was shocked at what found when he arrived in New Wales of the South. The country was “threatened with famine; distracted by faction; the public buildings in a state of dilapidation; the few roads and bridges almost impassable; the population in general depressed by poverty”.
Macquarie came to understand that the new colony comprised settled communities as well as penal institutions. His vision helped transform former convicts into useful citizens — farmers, tradesmen, soldiers and, in a small but notable number of cases, successful professional and business men and women.
Visionary, Lachlan Macquarie, began using “Australia” in all his official dispatches, and in 1817 the Colonial Office agreed that it be formally adopted.
 
Macquarie’s early years
Lachlan Macquarie was born at his father’s small farm on Ulva.  Macquarie’s mother, Margaret, was the only sister of Murdoch Maclaine, 19th Chief of the Clan Maclean of Lochbuie. When Lachlan was only 14 his father died and he was taken by his maternal ­uncle, Murdoch Maclaine, to live at Castle Maoidh.
Uncle Murdoch paid for Lachlan to be educated at the Royal High School of Edinburgh and purchased a commission for him in the 2nd Bn, 84th Regiment of Foot. He served at the closing stages of the American War of Independence and also in India where he was appointed a captain-lieutenant at just 26.
Recognising that Lachlan’s real strengths were beyond the battlefield... in administration, organisation logistics, and innovation in times of stress... the Duke of York promoted Macquarie to Governor-in-Chief of New South Wales.
 
Macquarie/Maclaine Family Connect
   As a gesture to repay his uncle for his generosity over the years, Lachlan Macquarie paralleled history by using his considerable influence to obtain a Ensign’s commission in the 73rd Regt for his young cousin, John Maclaine.
In 1809, Macquarie, his wife, Elizabeth, John Maclaine, plus other officers of the 73rd Regt sailed halfway around the world to the colony in Terra Australis. 
 
Vested Interests—The Ugly Side Of Politics
By 1815, Macquarie’s forward-thinking attitude toward emancipists was alienating wealthy landowners, causing him ongoing problems in the class faction-ridden colony. A “smear” campaign was mounted against Macquarie.
Macquarie was summoned back to England when the extremely biased reports to the House of Commons, favouring the “exclusives” cause, were published. 
Macquarie’s rebuttal statement was deliberately withheld from parliament by the power-brokers and their minions. Bitterly disappointed, sick, and in debt, he died in London on July 1, 1824 aged just 62. 
Had it not been for Murdoch Maclaine’s intervention -- financial generosity -- and on-going patronage during his early career, -- Lachlan may well have remained a poor, uneducated, subsistence, tenant-farmer, living in a tiny croft with rain seeping through the thatch, perhaps eking out his resources with a little sheep droving and Australia may not have become the country it is today.