How often do we look at familiar landmarks and give no thought to those associated with them? For instance, we would probably not have the striking building that is the former Sandgate Baptist Church (now a childcare centre) on Flinders Parade had the Reverend Benjamin Gilmore Wilson not come to preach to the citizens of Sandgate in the 1860s.
The Rev Wilson, a notable personage and landowner in early Sandgate, was born in Ireland in 1823. An ordained Baptist minister, he married Mary Jane Matchett in County Armagh in 1854. As a “town missionary” (as he was described on his marriage licence) he had preached in England, where he had also studied homoeopathic medicine. Both of his callings were recorded on his son’s death certificate, which gave his father’s profession as “medical missionary”.
With their first two children (there would be five more), the Wilsons migrated to Brisbane in 1858 where the Rev Wilson had been appointed pastor of the Wharf Street Baptist Church. His ministry was not confined to Brisbane; he travelled extensively throughout Queensland, visiting other congregations in his pastoral capacity and applying his medical skills where needed.
Rev. Wilson: The Physician Who Shaped Sandgate’s History and Landmarks
One of his visits was to the outlying settlement of Sandgate where his first service was said to have been held on the beach. Recognising the need for a church, he was instrumental in purchasing land, in Loudon Street, where a chapel was constructed and opened in 1872. The Rev Wilson’s original congregation eventually outgrew the Loudon St premises and the new church was constructed on Flinders Parade and opened in 1887.
In addition to the performance of his religious and medical duties, Wilson was a canny investor in land. He had considerable holdings along the beachfront in Sandgate – on one portion of which he built, in 1869, a seaside house, Rothsay, still extant today – and is also recorded as owning 640 acres of pastoral land north of Brisbane and more at Pimpama. In 1873, he offered for sale “21 magnificent building allotments” of “salubrity and charms” near his Brisbane residence. Much of the “Wilson Estate” in Sandgate (“47 splendid marine villa sites”) was sold by Mary Jane in 1883.
Benjamin Gilmore Wilson died in February 1878 following a long illness, during which he had sought to recuperate at Rothsay, situated just steps from the site of the handsome church his old congregation would build and move to in 1887. He was widely mourned as a man of “generous and warm-hearted disposition”, held in “deservedly high esteem by a large body of the citizens”.
Read more stories from the Sandgate Guide print magazine here:
- Patricia Marks 100th Birthday with Double Celebration
- A Feast for the Artistic Senses
- Sparks Fly At Women In Welding Event At Bracken Ridge State High
- Canadian Guitar Virtuoso Kicks Off Australian Tour in Sandgate
- Colour Run Brightening The Future For Inclusion
- Funk It Up at the Sands Bowlo
- Organic Gardening in September
- Local Family Honour Daughter’s Memory with Charity Day
- New Future for Historical Society
- Run, Cycle, Swim for a Cause
- School’s Out On The Green Gets Spooky This September
- Why Students Need Extracurriculars
- Get Up Close and Personal with Aussie Animals
[With thanks to the Sandgate Historical Museum (Opening Hours: Sunday and Wednesday, 10am to 3pm)]
