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Governor Arthur Phillip (1738 - 1814)
Arthur Phillip was born in 1738 in London, the son of Jacob Phillip, a language teacher who came from Frankfurt, and Elizabeth, nee Breach. He attended the Greenwich school for the sons of seamen and was apprenticed to the Merchant Navy, graduating in 1755, after two years at sea. He transferred to the Royal Navy and was promoted to lieutenant in 1762 before being retired in 1763 when the Seven Years War ended.
Phillip spent the next 15 years farming in Hampshire, returning to the sea during the Spanish-Portuguese war when he served with the Portuguese navy from 1774 to 1778. During the American War of Independence in 1778, he returned to the English navy and became a post captain in 1781. After the war, Phillip was doing survey work for the British Admiralty when he was appointed as first governor of New South Wales in October 1786. He had risen in the navy by his own effort at a time when patronage was the norm, and was considered reliable and trustworthy. His knowledge of farming may have also influenced the decision.
Phillip established the convict colony in NSW, which he governed in a sensible and humane way, despite adverse conditions which included poor quality food, largely infertile land and a lack of experienced farm labour which led to near-famine. He requested to be allowed to return to England in 1790, pleading ill-health, and eventually sailed for England in 1792, leaving a colony with more than 1,700 acres of land under cultivation or cleared and ready for sowing and which, within another year, was almost able to support itself.
Phillip had hoped to return to the colony when his health was restored. Instead he went back to active service in the navy, commanding several ships during the Napoleonic Wars. In 1789 he was made a rear-admiral, on the 11th December 1792 Phillip sailed for England on the "Atlantic" to seek medical attention, & his health compelled him to resign formally on 23rd July 1793. He continued his progression in the naval hierarchy, becoming an admiral of the blue in 1814, the year of his death.
Governor Lachlan Macquarie (1761 - 1824)
The year 1810 saw his arrival in the Colony of New South Wales, just after Lachlan Macquarie was installed governor of New South Wales, sealers stumbled on a remote Southern Ocean island so naturally the island took his name. The island like so many other institutions, structures and places bear testimony to the claim Macquarie "Father of the Nation"
Macquarie was born on the island of Ulva in the Inner Hebrides, Scotland, on 31st January 1761. His father was a carpenter by trade who around 1772 moved his wife and family to Mull, where he leased 75 acres from the Duke of Argyll.
In April 1809 Macquarie was appointed Governor of New South Wales, designated to take over from William Bligh (of the mutiny on the Bounty fame), whose controversial governorship ended with the "Rum Rebellion". Lachlan and Elizabeth Macquarie sailed with the 73rd Regiment from Portsmouth in the storeship Dromedary, escorted by H.M.S Hindostan, in May 1809, arriving at Port Jackson on the 28th December. He took up his commission as governor on the 1st January 1810.
Macquarie understood that comprised settled communities as well as penal institutions. He dealt with an increase in the number of convicts sent to the colony by employing them in an ambitious program of public works From the outset, Macquarie saw the colony of New South Wales (including its daughter colony Van Diemens Land) as a settled community as well as a penal settlement. However, his term of office also coincided with an increase in the number of convicts sent to the colony. His solution was to commence an ambitious programme of public works (new buildings, towns, roads) to help absorb these numbers. He encouraged well-behaved convicts into the wider community through tickets-of-leave.
The National Trust of Australia administers his grave on Mull. He is remembered in many place names, including Macquarie Street, Sydney, Lake Macquarie, New South Wales, Macquarie Harbour, Tasmania, the Antarctic dependency of Macquarie Island and Macquarie University, Sydney; named for his wife Elizabeth are Campbelltown, Elizabeth Bay and Mrs Macquarie's Chair (a headland jutting into Sydney Harbour beside Sydney Cove).
[source: www.hawkesburyhistory.org.au]
Will this information help you find Mrs COD's first-ever placed cache? If you find the connection between the two governors within the CBD, it quite possibly will! GPSr is the pits around here, so the additional clue is a big help. Cache is a small magnetic container. Please bring a writing implement.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Jrfgrea fvqr bs gur ohvyqvatf. Fvg naq unir n erfg ba 1 bs gur 3 tneqraf arneol. Abgr gur fgrry evz vafvqr.