George Cooper (public servant)


George Cooper was the first Colonial Treasurer and head of Customs of New Zealand.

Biography

Cooper was born in County Kildare, Ireland, in 1793. He worked for United Kingdom Customs until he emigrated to New South Wales, where he was appointed Comptroller of Customs for the colony. In NSW, he also became Superintendent of Distilleries. He was appointed Colonial Treasurer and Collector of Customs on 5 January 1840 for New Zealand, and later that month moved to the Bay of Islands in the north of New Zealand, arriving aboard with William Hobson and other officials. His annual salary was £600, the same as it was in Sydney. He was a witness and signatory to the Treaty of Waitangi. When the General Legislative Council was formed in May 1841, Cooper became a member due to role as treasurer. In May 1842, he resigned from his position as Colonial Treasurer and returned to Sydney.
Cooper was later secretary and treasurer to the Shire of Ballan west of Melbourne. His health deteriorated for the last two years of his life and he died in Geelong, Victoria, on 7 April 1867, at the home of his son-in-law. His son, George Sisson Cooper, had a long career in the New Zealand civil service; from 1870 to 1892, he was Under-Secretary for the colony.
Cooper was a beekeeper and was one of the first who tried to establish honeybees in New Zealand. Fellow beekeeper, William Cotton, noted that Cooper arrived in Auckland in October 1842 with a hive of bees "seemingly dead" after a stormy ten-day passage from Sydney.