William Maturin

William Henry Maturin, (1814 – 5 March 1889) was a senior public servant in the early days of the colony of South Australia and had a further career in Great Britain. He and his brother Augustus arrived in Adelaide on the brig Elizabeth Buckham on 22 June 1843, and took the place of W. C. Darling in the Commissariat Department under administrator Sir Henry E. Fox Young, acting as his private secretary and holding the position of Deputy Assistant Commissary General and Auditor General, was promoted to Assistant Director in 1847, then Private Secretary to the Lieutenant Governor in May 1849, and at the same time appointed to the Legislative Council, but almost immediately relinquishing both when he was made acting Colonial Treasurer, reverting to Private Secretary in 1851. In 1850 his assistant William Edward Beddome was convicted of embezzling £4,000, which could only have happened because of lax security on Maturin's part. In 1857 the Commissariat Department was abolished, and on 1 June 1857 Maturin was relieved by Mr. Deputy Commissioner Monk, and retired on half-pay. He returned to England and was appointed to the Commissariat Department, also to a seat on the London directorate of the Bank of South Australia.