Self-portrait in watercolour by George Williams Chinner, painted in 1845. Signed 'G.C. 1845' in pencil at bottom right corner. This may have been painted during the voyage of the Templar to South Australia.

G.W. Chinner was born in Oxford in 1825, son of John Chinner and Ann Williams. He was well educated in England and apprenticed in drapery and hosiery businesses before 1845. That year he was a passenger on the Templar to South Australia with his father and sister Annie.

In 1847 he started a drapery and millinery business in Adelaide and with further acquisitions did well enough to sell them and purchase land at Brighton. He became a well known draper and was the first elected mayor of Brighton. He married twice and died in 1880.

Chinner, John

Chinner, G.W.

Templar (ship)

Holt, Averil G The Vanishing sands, commemorating 150 years of Brighton - South Australia: a history of a seaside town and its people  [Brighton, S. Aust]: City of Brighton, 1991

Heritage of the city of Adelaide: an illustrated guide, editors: Susan Marsden, Paul Stark and Patricia Sumerling, Adelaide: Corporation of the City of Adelaide, 1990

Pitt, G. Index to pioneers arriving in South Australia from overseas ports, July 1836 to December 1845 Archives Department, 1935

Burrows, A. Kith and Kin: Sources for family history Libraries Board of South Australia, Adelaide: 1994

Kwan, Elizabeth. Living in South Australia: a social history, Netley, S. Aust.: South Australian Government Printer, 1987

Migration Museum. From many places: the history and cultural traditions of South Australian people, Kent Town, S. Aust.: Migration Museum (History Trust of S.A.) in association with Wakefield Press, 1995

City of Holdfast Bay see: Local History