Dudley Erwin

---

title: "Dudley Erwin" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1917-births", "1984-deaths", "liberal-party-of-australia-members-of-the-parliament-of-australia", "members-of-the-australian-house-of-representatives-for-ballarat", "members-of-the-australian-house-of-representatives", "leaders-of-the-australian-house-of-representatives", "military-personnel-from-victoria-(state)", "royal-australian-air-force-officers", "australian-hoteliers", "royal-australian-air-force-personnel-of-world-war-ii", "australian-mps-1955–1958", "australian-mps-1958–1961", "australian-mps-1961–1963", "australian-mps-1963–1966", "australian-mps-1966–1969", "australian-mps-1969–1972", "australian-mps-1972–1974", "australian-mps-1974–1975"] description: "Australian politician" topic_path: "history" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dudley_Erwin" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Australian politician ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox officeholder"]

Field	Value
honorific-prefix	The Honourable
name	Dudley Erwin
image	Dudley Erwin 1974 (cropped).jpg
caption	Erwin in 1974
office	Minister for Air
primeminister	John Gorton
predecessor	Gordon Freeth
successor	Tom Drake-Brockman
term_start	13 February 1969
term_end	12 November 1969
office1	Leader of the House
leader1	John Gorton
predecessor1	Billy Snedden
successor1	Billy Snedden
term_start1	13 February 1969
term_end1	12 November 1969
constituency_MP2	Ballaarat
parliament2	Australian
predecessor2	Bob Joshua
successor2	Jim Short
term_start2	10 December 1955
term_end2	11 November 1975
birth_date
birth_place	Winchelsea, Victoria, Australia
death_date
death_place	Canberra, Australia
spouse	{{plainlist
* {{marriage	Alma Cleburne
* {{marriage	Virginia Burrows
party	Liberal
::

| honorific-prefix = The Honourable | name = Dudley Erwin | honorific-suffix = | image = Dudley Erwin 1974 (cropped).jpg | caption = Erwin in 1974 | office = Minister for Air | primeminister = John Gorton | predecessor = Gordon Freeth | successor = Tom Drake-Brockman | term_start = 13 February 1969 | term_end = 12 November 1969 | office1 = Leader of the House | leader1 = John Gorton | predecessor1 = Billy Snedden | successor1 = Billy Snedden | term_start1 = 13 February 1969 | term_end1 = 12 November 1969 | constituency_MP2 = Ballaarat | parliament2 = Australian | majority2 = | predecessor2 = Bob Joshua | successor2 = Jim Short | term_start2 = 10 December 1955 | term_end2 = 11 November 1975 | birth_date = | birth_place = Winchelsea, Victoria, Australia | death_date = | death_place = Canberra, Australia | spouse = {{plainlist|

| party = Liberal George Dudley Erwin (20 August 191729 October 1984) was an Australian politician who served in the House of Representatives from 1955 to 1975, representing the Liberal Party. He was Chief Government Whip from 1967 to 1969, and played a role in the ascension of John Gorton to the prime ministership after the disappearance of Harold Holt. He was briefly Minister for Air in 1969, but a falling-out with Gorton ended his ministerial career.{{cite web |title=Members of the House of Representatives since 1901 |publisher=Parliament of Australia |work=Parliamentary Handbook |url=http://www.aph.gov.au/library/handbook/historical/representatives/courtnay.forrest.htm |accessdate=2008-01-27 |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20071117114003/http://www.aph.gov.au/library/handbook/historical/representatives/courtnay.forrest.htm |archivedate=17 November 2007 |url-status=dead |df=dmy

Early life

Erwin was born in Winchelsea, Victoria, as the fifth of nine children born to Alfreda Mary Elizabeth (née Blake) and Herbert Edward Erwin. He grew up on his father's farming property near Wensleydale. He attended the local state school until the age of 13, leaving during the Great Depression to help on the farm. Erwin took a correspondence course in Morse code, later attending the Marconi School of Wireless in Sydney. He enlisted in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) in January 1940, training as a radio operator. He finished the war with the rank of flight lieutenant, serving as a navigator with No. 25 Squadron and No. 31 Squadron. Erwin was discharged in October 1945 and bought a farm of 360 acre near that of his father.{{cite news|url=https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/erwin-george-dudley-12464|title=Erwin, George Dudley (1917–1984) |author=Ian Hancock|publisher=Australian Dictionary of Biography (vol. 17)|year=2007}} He also owned a successful hotel in Ballarat.{{cite web |last = Peacock |first = Andrew |authorlink = Andrew Peacock |title = Deaths of The Hon G D Erwin, The Hon Sir William Haworth and Mr L H Irwin |work = Hansard |publisher = Parliament of Australia |date = 21 February 1985 |url = http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=359926&TABLE=HANSARDR |accessdate = 2008-01-29 |url-status = dead |archiveurl = https://web.archive.org/web/20110524195707/http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=359926&TABLE=HANSARDR |archivedate = 24 May 2011 |df = dmy-all

Politics

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/DudleyErwin1961.jpg" caption="Erwin in 1961"] ::

Erwin was elected for the Liberal Party as the member of the House of Representatives seat of Ballaarat at the 1955 election. He was Government Whip from February 1967 to February 1969 and strongly supported John Gorton's election as Liberal leader following the disappearance and presumed drowning of Prime Minister Harold Holt on 17 December 1967. On 13 February 1969 he was appointed Minister for Air, in the reshuffle following Paul Hasluck's appointment as Governor-General. Gorton subsequently appointed one of his young staffers, Ainsley Gotto as his private secretary and came to rely on her for political advice. In November 1969, Erwin was left out of Gorton's second ministry.{{cite web |last = Hawke |first = Bob |authorlink = Bob Hawke |title = Deaths of The Hon G D Erwin, The Hon Sir William Haworth and Mr L H Irwin |work = Hansard |publisher = Parliament of Australia |date = 21 February 1985 |url = http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=359922&TABLE=HANSARDR |accessdate = 2008-01-27 |url-status = dead |archiveurl = https://web.archive.org/web/20110524195641/http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=359922&TABLE=HANSARDR |archivedate = 24 May 2011 |df = dmy-all | title =Obituary: Larger-than-life nationalist | newspaper = The Sydney Morning Herald | date = 20 May 2002 | url = https://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/05/19/1021801642162.html | accessdate = 2008-01-27 }}}} Erwin chaired the Joint Select Committee on Parliamentary and Government Publications, which produced the first edition of the Australian Government Style Manual. He retired from parliament at the 1975 election. His final political candidacy occurred at the 1979 elections for the Australian Capital Territory House of Assembly, where he ran unsuccessfully as an independent.

Personal life

On 8 January 1944, Erwin married Alma Betty Cleburne. The couple had a son and a daughter. However, in 1957 Erwin divorced his first wife on the grounds of desertion. He remarried to Virginia Joan Burrows (née Eagan), an American divorcee, in 1962. His second marriage also ended in divorce, and he married for a third time in 1977 to Gwendolyne Phyllis Potter (née Pennant). After leaving parliament, Erwin split his time between Canberra and Caloundra, Queensland, where he owned a block of units. He died of a heart attack in Canberra on 29 October 1984.{{cite web |last = Sinclair |first = Ian |authorlink = Ian Sinclair |title = Deaths of The Hon G D Erwin, The Hon Sir William Haworth and Mr L H Irwin |work = Hansard |publisher = Parliament of Australia |date = 21 February 1985 |url = http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=359930&TABLE=HANSARDR |accessdate = 2008-01-29 |url-status = dead |archiveurl = https://web.archive.org/web/20110524195718/http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=359930&TABLE=HANSARDR |archivedate = 24 May 2011 |df = dmy-all |last = Cohen |first = Barry |authorlink = Barry Cohen (politician) |title = Deaths of The Hon G D Erwin, The Hon Sir William Haworth and Mr L H Irwin |work = Hansard |publisher = Parliament of Australia |date = 21 February 1985 |url = http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=359942&TABLE=HANSARDR |accessdate = 2008-01-29 |url-status = dead |archiveurl = https://web.archive.org/web/20110524195815/http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=359942&TABLE=HANSARDR |archivedate = 24 May 2011 |df = dmy-all

Notes

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::