People Australia

Arthur Edwin Dengate (1878-1918) engineer and trade union leader

Birth: 1878 in Liverpool, New South Wales, son of Edwin Dengate (1843-1924), farmer, and Amelia Elizabeth, née Lackey. Marriage: 1904 in Brisbane, Queensland, to Clare Sophia Gough. They had one son. Death: 22 June 1918 in Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney. Religion: Anglican.

• Joined the Amalgamated Society of Engineers [which later became the Amalgamated Engineering Union] about 1898. Worked as an engineer at Clyde Engineering Company at Granville, Sydney, in 1904.
• Sometime secretary of the Sydney district committee of the ASE, he was State organiser at the time of his death. Was a leading figure in a strike during 1917.
• In the 1917 split in the Australian Labor Party, Dengate remained loyal to the party, accusing premier Holman of betrayal of the labour cause. Defeated as Labor candidate for the seat of St George in the NSW Legislative Assembly in March 1917, in June he was elected executive committee member of the NSW Political Labor League as part of the ‘Industrialists’ ticket.
• Appointed justice of the peace at Granvillle in July 1913. Was a member of the Lodge Sir Walter Scott, No. 123.
• Cause of death: subphremic abscess after a long illness and a series of operations for appendicitis.