A half-length portrait of Morgan showing him in a black jacket, cream waistcoat with watch and fob, a white shirt and black stock, with a tie-pin. He holds a telescope in his right hand; his left elbow rests on a rocky outcrop. Sea and sky form the background.
Robert Clark Morgan was born in Deptford on 13 March 1798. Orphaned aged 11, he entered the Royal Navy, serving until 1814. Morgan then moved into the merchant marine, beginning as an apprentice in the London-based whaler, the ‘Phoenix’. A capable seaman, he rose rapidly, becoming first mate of the ‘Phoenix’ in 1826 and then master of the South Sea whaling ships ‘Sir Charles Price’ (1828–31) and ‘Recovery’ (1831–5). Morgan married Mary Dorrington of Greenwich in 1822. He became a committed Wesleyan in 1828 after attending a revivalist service in Greenwich.
Captain Morgan was then appointed master of the ‘Duke of York’, owned by the South Australia Company, which was fitted out to carry the first emigrants to the region and then to undertake whaling. The ship sailed from London in February 1836 and reached Australia five months later, carrying 42 passengers and crew. Having set off whaling, the ‘Duke of York’ was wrecked off the Queensland coast; the crew sailed and rowed 300 miles to Brisbane in open boats.
Upon his return to London in 1838, Morgan approached the London Missionary Society, enquiring about the command of the mission ship ‘Camden’, which was scheduled to take John Williams back to Samoa. He gained the command, serving first as captain of the ‘Camden’ (1838–43) and then of the ‘John Williams’ on three voyages between 1844 and 1855. He was with Williams and James Harris when they were murdered and eaten by Islanders at Erramanga (Vanuatu) on 20 November 1839.
Morgan retired from the sea in 1855. He died at the home of his son in South Yarra, Victoria on 23 September 1864. His diaries are in the State Library of New South Wales.