A Brief Sketch of the Long and Varied Career of Marshall MacDermott, Esq., JP, of Adelaide, South Australia

Adelaide: William Kyffin Thomas, Printer [for The Author], 1874. First Edition. Hardcover. Very Good. Adelaide, William Kyffin Thomas, Printer [for The Author], 1874. Octavo, 53 pages. Flush-cut quarter green cloth and yellow papered limp boards, with the full title page details repeated on the front cover; covers lightly marked; head of the spine slightly chipped; an excellent copy. 'These papers are written solely for private distribution amongst relatives and special friends; and, as my family is rather numerous and dispersed, the necessity arises of having them printed'. That being said, copies of this original printing are now rare nearly a century and a half later. Marshall MacDermott (1791-1877) arrived in Adelaide in 1846 and after nearly three worthy and earnest decades here penned these memoirs, decidedly brief when it comes to Australian content. Up until page 35, he reminiscences about his 22 years in the British army. He chose Western Australia as his future residence, and arrived there in June 1830. Over the last eighteen pages he recounts his six years on the land and ten years in banking in WA, then his eleven years 'as a bank manager, three years as a merchant; four years in Parliament ... and lastly, over ten years administering the laws in Local Courts' in SA.