National Library of Australia

Provided by The Australian Dictionary of Biography

CHINNERY, ERNEST WILLIAM PEARSON (1887-1972), public servant and anthropologist, was born on 5 November 1887 at Waterloo, Victoria, son of John William Chinnery, miner, and his wife Grace Newton, née Pearson, both of whom were Victorian-born. His father joined the Victorian Railways and the boy was educated in the state schools of towns in which he served. Articled briefly to a Melbourne law firm, Chinnery joined the public service of Papua in April 1909 as a clerk in Port Moresby. Seeking the prestige of field service, he won appointment as a patrol officer in July 1910 and was posted as relieving officer to Ioma in the Mambare division. In the Kumusi division for the next three years his work on routine patrols was said to have 'gained the respect and the confidence of the local tribes'; he reputedly underwent a tribal initiation ceremony. He was not on good terms either with local Europeans or with Lieutenant-Governor (Sir) Hubert Murray whom he disliked as something of a humbug. In November 1913 Chinnery was charged with infringing the field-staff regulations and was reduced in rank. In the Rigo district in 1914, a patrol led by him clashed with tribesmen and shot seven; Murray saw the incident as probably unavoidable. By 1917 Chinnery was patrolling into new country in the central division behind Kairuku and into the Kunimaipa valley. There he discovered the source of the Waria River.

Author: Francis West

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