Adam Lindsey Gordon
Adam Lindsey Gordon was born in 1833 in Fayal, Azore. He was the only son of Adam Durnford Gordon, a retired captain of the Bengal cavalry and teacher of Hindustani, and his wife Harriet Gordon- they were cousins. His family was very wealthy, because his mother had inherited 20, 000 dollars. From a young age he was interested in reckless horse riding and poetry. By 1852 his riding career had begun. A year later, his father secured him a job in South America, and he sailed in the Julia and arrived in Adelaide. He worked for some years as a mounted policeman, before striking up a renewed interest in literature. All the while he was doing horse riding, a horse-breaker and steeple-chaser. In 1862, he married Margaret Park, who had little education but was a skilled horse rider. As time went by, he began to get a lot of his writing published, beginning in 1865, with the Poem The Feud, published in The Border Watch. He also won a lot of horse riding competitions, although his reckless riding also meant his injuries were frequent. However, despite these successes, he became depressed and unstable. In 1862 he suffered a serious horse riding accident and his young daughter died, these events triggering his wife’s leaving. Soon, however, things began to look up, with great reviews on his poetry being published and his wife moved back. But then he killed himself. He has a statue of himself in the city.