Bishop of Goulburn-Canberra from 1934 to 1960
Ernest Henry Burgman was born on 9 May 1885 at Central Lansdowne. He was the third child of Henry Burgman and Mary Ann Philomena Flick and they lived on a small 40 acre selection covered in dense bush, which they cleared to farm. As a small boy he attended Koppin Yarratt School about 4 miles from his home.
When he was 6 years old his mother took him to be enrolled at Koppin Yarratt Public School. The unwilling scholar escaped, followed his mother home and retained his freedom till about a year later when his father joined forces with his mother.
He woke one morning to find only his school clothes in his room. Clad only in a nightshirt he bolted into the bush. His father and uncle abandoned their ploughing to round up the fugitive. He was caught, dressed and forcibly started along the road which was to lead eventually to Goulburn.
At aged 13½ he then proceeded to Cleveland Street Public School in Sydney for a year. At 14½ he was back in the bush where he worked until he reached the age of 20. On his return he worked on the farm and helped local bullock team drivers getting timber. As he got older he became an expert at getting logs out of the rough mountain country surrounding Lansdowne, and became an excellent axeman.
At age 21 he decided that the Church was where he would best be able to serve and took one year of private reading to pass his theological examination from the Australian College of Theology before he was old enough to be ordained.
He assisted Canon Phillips as a lay reader and attended Taree Superior Public School under Mr Alban McLachlan in 1908 as he was not yet matriculated. After matriculation he went to St Paul’s College, Sydney University on a scholarship in 1909 and graduated 3 years later with Honours in Philosophy in 1912. He followed that by gaining his M.A. in March 1914.
He was ordained a priest on 18 October 1912. A short stay in London in 1914-15 as curate at South Wimbledon confronted him with conflicting attitudes towards war and brought him into contact with schools of Anglican theology that ranged from tractarianism to modernism. He returned to Australia to become Rector of Wyong in 1915.
On 8 February 1916 he married Edna Carey Crowhurst and they went on to have five children: Victor, Alan, Joyce, Betty and Dorothy.
Appointments in 1918 as Warden of St John’s College, Armidale followed in 1926 as Rector of Morpeth filled in the time between leaving Wyong and election as Bishop of Goulburn in 1934.
In 1934 Ernest Burgmann became the 5th Anglican Bishop of Canberra and Goulburn with a vast Diocese covering 32,000 square miles. He served for 26 years until his retirement in 1960.
In November 1945 Dr Burgmann spoke at the opening of the Education Conference in Taree.
Again on 1 July 1947 Bishop Burgmann and his wife visited St Matthew’s Church in Wingham. The next day Bishop Burgmann and his wife journeyed on to Grafton via Cedar Party and Upper Lansdowne.
In August 1954 a ceremony was held at Central Lansdowne Public School (formerly Koppin Yarratt) for the hanging of two photographs presented to the school by Dr E H Burgmann, Bishop of Goulburn and Canberra. The oldest ex-pupil Mrs Andrew Drury (who went to school with Bishop Burgmann) was given the honour of hanging the photos. One photo was of the Bishop in his robes, and one of the Queen with the Bishop when leaving St John’s Church, Canberra after the morning service on 14 February 1954.
In September 1955 Bishop Burgmann returned to Central Lansdowne Public School where he took part in the 70th anniversary celebrations.
Bishop Burgmann was a controversial figure during his life. It was reported in September 1944 that he had been a turbulent priest. Since 1919 he had been a Workers’ Educational Association tutor and had lectured in Freudian psycho-analysis, to the horror of fundamentalists. He had taken part in highly unrespectable gatherings after eviction riots, had assailed capitalism before and during the depression in stinging newspaper articles and sermons, had addressed Friends of Russia as “Comrades” at public meetings. Friends and protagonists were surprised at his appointment as Bishop of Goulburn and Canberra.
Bishop Burgmann died at Canberra on 14 March 1967 from pneumonia and congestive heart failure aged 82.
Bishop Burgmann remained a bushman at heart all his life and loved his humble beginnings. He is best known as The Bishop from the Bush.
There are many articles available about Bishop Burgmann online.
Compiled by Gloria Crittenden – August 2024