Regency Personalities Series-Sophia Campbell nee Palmer

Regency Personalities Series

In my attempts to provide us with the details of the Regency, today I continue with one of the��many period notables.

Sophia Campbell nee Palmer

December 14 1777���May 5 1833

Sophia Campbell nee Palmer was one of eight children, Sophia Palmer was born in Portsmouth and educated in London. She came to Sydney with her naval officer brother John Palmer (1760-1833) and his family, a second unmarried naval officer brother Christopher Palmer (1767-1821), and her unmarried sister Sarah Sophia Palmer (1774-?) on board the Porpoise in November 1800. Her brother John Palmer was bringing his family to settle permanently in New South Wales, and had previously come to Sydney in 1788 as Purser on the Sirius, the flagship of the First Fleet. He had also been Commissary General of New South Wales from 1791 to 1811, remaining employed in the Commissariat until he retired in 1819; and he was a magistrate from 1793.

Sophia first settled on John Palmer’s 100 acres (40 ha) 1793 grant which he named Woolloomooloo Farm. Within a year, on 17 September 1801, Sophia married the merchant Robert Campbell, a Scottish Presbyterian eight years her senior, in St Philip’s Church, Sydney.

Sophia moved to Wharf House, her husband Robert Campbell���s home behind his wharves on the west side of Circular Quay. Apart from two trips to England (in 1805-06 and 1810���15) and shorter journeys to various parts of New South Wales, she lived in Sydney until her death.

Sophia was until 2009 thought to have been an artist in the early colony. This was disproved and she is now known not to have been one.

Sophia died in 1833 and was buried in St John���s Cemetery, Parramatta.