The Dictionary of Australasian Biography/M'Crae, George Gordon
M‘Crae, George Gordon, is the eldest son of the late Andrew Morison M‘Crae, at one time a Writer to the Signet in Edinburgh, who emigrated to Sydney in 1839, but afterwards settled in Port Phillip, where he abandoned his profession, and took up a station at Arthur's Seat, Mornington. Mr. M‘Crae, sen., relinquished squatting in 1851, on being appointed police magistrate and Goldfields Warden at Kilmore, and died about 1874. Mr. George Gordon M‘Crae's mother, whose maiden name was Georgiana Huntly Gordon, was a woman of remarkable general ability and culture, and an admirable artist. She was born in London in 1804, and married Mr. M‘Crae, sen., in 1830, arriving in Hobson's Bay with her children on March 1st, 1841. She died at Hawthorn, near Melbourne, on May 24th, 1890. Mr. G. G. M‘Crae's uncle, Dr. Farqahar M‘Crae, formerly of the Enniskillen Dragoons, was one of the first medical men to start practice in Melbourne. Another uncle, Captain Alexander M‘Crae, of her Majesty's 84th Regiment, was the first Postmaster-General of Victoria. George Gordon M‘Crae was born at Anchorfield, Leith, Scotland, on May 29th, 1833, and received the principal part of his education from a private tutor at Arthur's Seat, his father's station. When about sixteen he went into a merchant's office in Melbourne, but only remained a year, and tried banking, but ultimately entered the Victorian Civil Service in Jan. 1854, in which he holds the position of Deputy Registrar-General, Senior Examiner of Patents, and Registrar of Copyrights. In the same year Mr. M‘Crae joined the Volunteer force, and served eight years. In 1864 he revisited Scotland, and spent some time in France. In 1871 he married Miss Augusta Helen Brown; and in 1887 he occupied a second leave of absence in exploring Mauritius, the Seychelles, and Bourbon. Mr. M‘Crae was in intimate association with the literary circle typified by the names of R. H. Horne, Henry Kendall, Lindsay Gordon, and Marcus Clarke. He has contributed largely to the colonial press, most of his verses appearing in the Melbourne Australasian, and a large number of pieces, prose and verse, in Sydney Athenæum and Critic and Centennial Magazine. He contributed a naval novel, "Afloat and Ashore; or, the Story of Oginski" to the Sydney Mail, and "Under the Yellow Flag," a quarantine experience in the Seychelles, to the Sydney Echo, He has published in book form, "Balladeadro and Mamba" (Dwight: Melbourne), and "The Man in the Iron Mask," a poetical romance (George Robertson: Melbourne), also "A Rosebud from the Garden of the Taj," in the Melbourne Monthly Magazine.