People Australia

Edward Henry Augustus (Harry) Smith (1878-1927) grocer and trade union official

Birth: 1878 at Boort, Victoria, son of English-born parents William Smith (1857-1901?), a wood carter and farmer, from Fenton, Staffordshire, and Fanny Elizabeth, née Weaver (1854-1926), born at Condover, Shropshire, England. Marriage: 1901 at Castlemaine, Victoria, to native-born Eliza Hargreaves (1865-1929). Death: 28 May 1927 in a private hospital at Carlton, Victoria; usual residence Brunswick, Melbourne, Victoria. Religion: Anglican. 

• His family were early settlers in Boort, Victoria. Harry spent his early career in Ballarat.
• He was a member of the mining section of the Australian Workers’ Union (AWU). Organiser in the United Grocers’ Employees’ Tea and Dairy Produce Employee’s Union of Victoria and vice-president in 1917 and, after amalgamation into the Federated Union with the Shop Assistants’ Union of Victoria, of which he had been organiser.
• Was praised by David Charles McGrath for his help in winning the seat of Ballarat for Labor in the Federal House of Representatives after the retirement of Afred Deakin in 1913.
• Member of Trades Hall Council (THC) executive in 1917 and member of its disputes committee. Vice-president of Ballarat THC. Member of the Federated Council of Unions.
• Active in anti-conscription referendums during World War I. Secretary of the Unemployment Relief Committee in 1919. Honorary secretary of the Salaried Officers’ Association and received a presentation of appreciation in 1925. Secretary of the Victorian Female Confectioners’ Union from 1917 to his death.
• Contested seat of Polwarth for the Australian Labor Party in November 1917. Assisted Labor candidates in various Federal and State campaigns.
• In 1923 with general secretary Margaret Wearne visited Tasmania to negotiate with Cadbury-Fry-Pascal Ltd at Claremont.
• In 1924-1925 made a visit to England.
• Often referred to in the press as “E. H. A. Smith”, he was popularly known as “the Alphabetical Smith”.
• Cause of death: cerebral haemorrhage (1 week).
• His uncle Isaac Job Weaver (1869-1954), a farmer, was a Victorian Farmers’ Union then Country Party member of the Victorian Legislative Assembly from 1917 to 1927.

Sources
Labor Call (Melbourne), 2 June 1927, p 5; Australian Worker (Sydney), 15 June 1927, p 1; Woman’s Clarion, August 1925 pp 4-5, December 1925 p 3, June 1927 pp 4-5.