Edmund Webb (1830-1899), storekeeper and politician, was born on 4 September 1830 at Liskeard, Cornwall, England, younger son of Thomas Webb, farmer, and his wife Catherine, née Geake. Educated at Saltash, after his father’s death he was advised to seek a better climate and with his mother and sisters reached Sydney in the Penyard Park on 13 September 1847. Refusing to be tied to an apprenticeship which would last beyond his majority, he found work with a draper at Bathurst; three years later, having saved £200 and being refused a partnership, he accepted a loan from a friend and opened his own business in November 1851. On 18 January 1854 at Springfield near Bathurst he married Selina Jane Jones (d.1929), daughter of William Tom.  

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Edmund became a wealthy Bathurst businessman and was appointed MLC in 1881. During his lifetime he held many public offices. In the 1860s he built a fine house Hathrop on the banks of the Vale Creek near Bathurst. (Hathrop is now an RC Hospital). Was married in double ceremony (at Springfield) with his brother Thomas, and Selina’s sister Emma. Was buried after a public funeral.


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SMH of 29 March 1937 says:
BATHURST FIRM
86th Anniversary.
EARLY DAYS RECALLED.
BATHURST, Sunday
Past and present employees and members of the firm of Messrs. E Webb and Co of Bathuist attended a reunion dinner at the Walshaw Hall on Saturday to celebrate the 86th anniversary of the firms establishment. About 400 persons were present Mr E. G. Webb the present principal, presided.

The firm was founded by Edmund Webb who in 1848 sailed for Australia He was a descendant of Baron Hathrop. The youth cast about for a means of earning a living for himself, his mother and a sister and obtained a position as a mercery hand in Bathurst.

In 1851 he established the existing business. Later he married Selina Jane Joan Tom of Molong.

The business grew rapidly, and in 1872 the existing building was completed.

Mr Edmund Webb was twice a member of the Legislative Assembly once as member for West Macquarie and later as member for East Macquarie. He was appointed to the Legislative Council in 1882.

In 1880 he admitted his son Edmund Tom Webb and his nephew William Henry Webb as partners and retired.

To day the business is operated on a large scale under the direction of Edmund Guy Webb the eldest son of Edmund Tom Webb who was admitted as a partner in 1901.  

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Bathurst Times says:
Considerations of health compelled Mr. Webb, while a youth in his teens, to emigrate to Australia. On arrival in Sydney a situation was found for him by a relative, which did not suit him, and which with characteristic self reliance he soon forsook for one of his own choosing. By dint of industry and economy he managed to save a few hundred pounds. But Sydney did not suit his health, and he sought the drier atmosphere of Bathurst. There he began in a small way on his own account in the early ’fifties. With the discovery of gold, the western city boomed, and Mr. Webb’s business grew, until it be came one of the recognised emporiums of the west. An instance of the influence he came to exercise in the town and district is given in connection with the general election of 1861. The squatting industry of the district had, up to that time, dominated the constituency. But Mr. Webb nominated a candidate who did not even visit the district, but who professed allegiance to the new policy of ’free selection before survey,’ and on Mr. Webb’s championing of his cause the absent candidate was triumphantly returned. Afterwards Mr. Webb himself accepted a requisition to stand for election, and represented the district. Ultimately, he was appointed to a seat in the Legislative Council, of which he remained a member to the time of his death.  

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Mother-in-law Ann Tom said:
[He] carries on a great Mercantile Business. The Lord has prospered him. If ever you read the life of Samuel Budgett, the successful merchant, you have read of one whom I think Edmund Webb resembles very much, I think he was born a Merchant.

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