LETTERS PATENT, APPOINTMENT OF SEPTIMUS BURT TO KING'S COUNSEL

George Throssell, who authorised the appointment, was Premier & Colonial Treasurer of Western Australia February-May 1901.
Alexander Onslow, witness to the appointment, was Administrator of Western Australia 1900-1901.

It is of interest that this Letters Patent was produced in a period of some political instability in Western Australia during the three-month term of the second Premier, George Throssell, whose signature appears at the bottom. At the time Western Australia did not have a Governor in residence (Governor Smith having relinquished the post on 29 June 1900 and Governor Lawley not being appointed until 1 May 1901). Alexander Onslow as Chief Justice had duly taken on the role of Administrator of Western Australia (as he had done on two previous occasions during the absence of Governors) and his signature is also on the document. Onslow retired on 3 March 1901, so it is unlikely there were many official documents from this era that contained both these men's signatures.

The Honourable Septimus Burt KC (1847-1919), son of Sir Archibald Paull Burt, was born in St Kitts Island (formerly known as St Christopher in the West Indies) and came to Western Australia in 1861. S Burt became a prominent lawyer, politician and grazier. His political work was central to the achievement and development of the Western Australian constitution as the first Attorney General after self-government was achieved. The Hon Septimus Burt rejected knighthood and offers to be a Supreme Court Judge.