Henry Pilcher

Mayor of Enfield 1903

Henry Chesterton Pilcher (1841-1926) came to Australia in 1883, selling his family farm in Sandwich, Kent, England.  Though offered a grant of 500 acres in Tasmania, he decided to settle in Sydney arriving in 1884.  By mid 1885, he started a bakery at the corner of Byers Street and Liverpool Rd.  With his sons, he started a family baking business that lasted nearly a century and became one of the largest bakery businesses in the western suburbs.  The 1892 Sands Directory notes the business as ‘H C Pilcher & Sons’ on Liverpool Rd.

He was elected to Enfield Council representing the Central Ward in February 1894, re-elected in February 1897 and in again in February 1903.  He was elected Mayor in 1903 but resigned in 1904 to go overseas.  He was associated with the introduction of electricity for street lighting purposes, Enfield being then practically the first municipality to have its own generating plant.

Henry Pilcher died 1926 at his residence at ‘Kenton’ 18 Brooklyn Street Enfield and is buried at St Thomas’ Anglican Church and Cemetery, Enfield.  His wife died three years earlier and he is survived by survive nine children, 35 grandchildren, and 16 great-grandchildren. Pilcher Street is named for him.

References

OBITUARY. (1926, June 16). The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 – 1954), p. 14.

Jackson, S ‘A matter of grave importance’, 1999