People Australia

Jim Stubbs, by Bartletto, 1916

State Library of Western Australia, 67187176

Bartholomew James (Jim) Stubbs (1872-1917) tailor, trade union official and parliamentarian 

Birth: 31 May 1872 at Spring Gully, Sandhurst (Bendigo), Victoria, son of William Pardy Stubbs (1848-1911), a miner, born at Little Bredy, Dorset, England and Catherine, née Farrell (1850-1922), born at Tipperary, Ireland. Marriage: 11 November 1897 at Perth, Western Australia, to native-born Alice née Rewell, late Geddes (1863-1954), a widow with two children. They had no children. Death: 26 September 1917 at Ypres, Belgium. Religion: Catholic. 

• On leaving school he became apprenticed to a tailor. Was employed as a tailor in various parts of Victoria. Joined union and the Australian Labor Party in 1890.
• Arrived in Western Australia in 1894. Secured employment in Perth. Was a foundation member of Perth Tailors’ Union in 1896, president, and in 1911 secretary. Campaigned against sweating.
• Worked on goldfields for three years. President of the Metropolitan Council of Amalgamated Labour Federation several times.
• First president of the Amalgamated Tailors and Tailoresses’ Union on the eastern goldfields. President and vice-president of the Goldfields Trades and Labour Council.
• Returned to Perth and represented his craft on the Trades and Labor Council there. He contested preselection for the seat of Subiaco in the Legislative Assembly in 1909 and stood for Central Ward in Subiaco municipality 1910. Was elected Labor member of the Legislative Assembly for Subiaco in 1911 and held the seat until his death.
• Was a member of the Hibernian Australasian Catholic Benefit Society.
• Enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force on 14 February 1916. After training at the Royal Military College, Duntroon, he was commissioned 2nd lieutenant on 8 August 1916 and embarked for active service abroad on 23 December 1916. Served with the 51st Battalion in France and Belgium.. Killed in action in the battle of Passchendaele, Ypres, in 1917.

Sources
David Black and Geoffrey Bolton, Biographical Register of members of the parliament of Western Australia, vol 1, 1870-1930, (Perth, 1990); Cyclopedia of Western Australia, Vol. 1 1912 pp 352-353; West Australan, 6 October 1917; C. T. Stannage The People of Perth. A Social History of Western Australia's Capital City (Perth, 1979), pp 250-51.