Brisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864 - 1933), Tuesday 31 August 1926, page 4


PIONEER PASSES.

MR. W. E. PARRY

OKEDEN, I.S.O.

A DISTINGUISHED AUSTRALIAN.

The death of Mr. W. E. Parry- Okeden I.S.O. occuned at 5 o'clock vestcrday morning at the age of 85 years. He had been in fairly good health despite the cffect of a serious street accident a couple of years ago and was able on Sunday to talk with members of his family. His putting was peaceful. After service at St. John's Cathedral at 2 o'clock this after-

noon the funeral will take place to the Bulimba Cemetery.

A NOTABLE CAREER

Few men in the Queensland public service had a more varied and more ener-

getic career than Mr. W. E. Parry-Okeden, I.S.O. -one time Commissioner for Police in Queensland. He came of a fighting family, and Mr Parry-Okeden,

in the evening days of his life, was cheered by the knowledge that his eldest son, Captain Uvedale, now a grazier in

THE LATE MR. W. E. PARRY

OKEDEN.

the Burnett district, won the Military Cross at Gallipoli, and a second son, David, in Mesopotamia, had earned fame as an aviator, just as his grandfather had earned fame as a naval lieutenant at the Battle of Navarino in 1827. Lieutenant David Parry-Okeden, after retiring from the navy, took up a station on the Snowy River, in New South Wales. It was there that Mr. W.E. Parry-Okeden was born in May, 1841. He was educated in Mel- bourne at the St. Kilda Grammar School,

and subsequently studied for the law. In 1861 his father engaged in pastoral pursuits in the young colony of Queensland, and the son, reiinquish-

ing the law, came to Queensland with him. Then began a varied and re-markable career. IHe became a member of the Border Police, of which he was appointed inspector 1n 1870. Two years later, because of his knowledge of law and in recognition of his services as Border Inspector, he was appointed police magistrate at Cunnamulla, after-wards being resident police magistrate at Charleville and Gayndah. In 1SS7, in conjunction with Mr. Kinnaird Rose, then editor of the "Courier" he acted as a member of a Royal Commision to inquire into the problems of prison re-form. For a time he also acted as Immi-

gration Agcnt, and 1n 18S0 he became Under Secretary to the Colonial Secre-tary and subsequently he was appointed Principal under Secretary in Queens-land. During the troublous times of the maritime and shearers strike in the

early " 'nineties" Mr. Parry- Okeden was appointed a Special District Magis-trate, an office which carried greater powers than were vested in any other magistrate in Australia. He had full control of both police and magisterial duties 1n the Winton district, and he carried out those duties so tactfully that in the year 1895 he was appointed Commissioner, for Police in Queensland. Ten years later he retired, on pension, from that office, being suc-ceeded by Major W.G. Cahill, C.M.G. In the following year Mr. Parry-Okeden was appointed by the Commonwealth Govern-ment as a Royal Commission to visit Papua to report upon the best methods of government. In 1908 the honour of Imperial Service Order was conferred on him by the Imperial Government in re-

cognition of his varied and successful public career. The deceased was the only child of David Parry-Okeden (youngest son of David Okeden Parry-Okeden, of More Crichel Dorset) and of Rosalie Caroline Dutton, his wife, a descendant of the Sherborne family. In 1873 he mar-ied Elizabeth Gertrude, eldest daughter of the Rev john Pilgrim Wall, an Eng-lish clergyman and one time Rector of Barbados, West Indies, and of Rachel Malthy Gascoigne, of the well known English family of that name. In recent years Mr. Parry-Okeden made his home at Okewal, Redcliffe, but spent much of his time in visits to the married members of his family.

The late Mr. Parry-Okeden had seven children - three sons and four daughters -Captain Parry-Okeden, M.C. of Wells station, Mundubbera; C.F. Parry-Okeden, of Glen Haughton, Taroom; Captain H. D. Parry-Okeden, of Bungleburra, Chin- chilla; Mrs. H.R. Pockley, Redlands, Corinda; Mrs. H. Roger Cope, of Goul-

burn, New South Wales; Mrs. Edmund Parry-Okeden, of Dosetshire, England; and Mrs. C.D. Persse, of Tabragalba,

Beaudesert.