Colebatch, Hal Sir

Sir Harry Pateshall Colebatch was a long-serving figure in Western Australian politics. He was a member of the Western Australian Legislative Council for nearly 20 years, the twelfth Premier of Western Australia for a month in 1919, agent-general in London for five years, and a senator for four years. He was known for supporting free trade, federalism and Western Australian secessionism, and for opposing communism, socialism and fascism. Born in England, his family migrated to South Australia when Colebatch was four years old. He left school aged 11 and worked for several newspapers in South Australia before moving to Broken Hill in New South Wales in 1888 to work as a reporter for the Silver Age. In 1894, he moved to the Western Australian Goldfields following the gold rush there, working for the Golden Age in Coolgardie and the Kalgoorlie Miner in Kalgoorlie. Two years later, he moved to Perth to join the Morning Herald, but after that newspaper collapsed, he moved to Northam where he started The Northam Advertiser. He also became friends with local bank manager James Mitchell and convinced Mitchell to run for state parliament. Colebatch was the mayor of Northam between 1909 and 1912.