News Archive

Science student Matthew Goss loves living at St Georges College.

"Who wouldn't love living in a castle?" he laughed. "And while I'm eating my breakfast I look up, and there's my great-great-grandfather looking down at me."

The portrait above the majestic fireplace in St George's dining hall is of UWA founder Sir John Winthrop Hackett, and Matthew, his great-great-grandson, is the first of the dynasty to study at UWA .

The 18-year-old has left his home in Zimbabwe to live and study at the University to which his great-greatgrandfather gave life. "We all knew the story as we were growing up, that Grandad had left a vast amount of money to establish a university, but it wasn't until I came here on a family holiday a few years ago that it really hit me what he had done," Matthew said.

"When I saw UWA and Winthrop Hall I was bowled over. I just felt wow, I hadn't thought of anything so big and wonderful."

The University has awarded Matthew a scholarship to study here and St George's College has also recognised his family by giving him a residential scholarship.

He is majoring in neuroscience, with a second major in marketing. "I'm keeping my options open. I'm not sure what I want to do. I might follow my mother, who is a nurse, into medicine, or my father, into business."

Matthew said he had thought of following his famous forebear into journalism and still might end up there one day. "I used to win the English prizes at school, so I guess that could be his genes."

His great-great-grandfather's genes are also evident in his face, although it's not such an obvious likeness that other diners at St George's do a double take.

A streak of philanthropy has also been handed down. Matthew's mother, Sir John's great granddaughter, helped to set up an equivalent of Australia's Royal Return of the Hackett family Flying Doctor Service in Africa. And Matthew worked with children in orphanages and under-privileged schools while he was still at school. "It's a bit overwhelming in Africa, where the need is so great," he said.

"It was my long-term plan to come here to study, and I'm so grateful and appreciative of the University and the College supporting me to do this.

"Everywhere I go, the names Winthrop and Hackett remind me of my family. It still feels very special. I went to the intercollege ball in Winthrop Hall a few weeks ago and I just love it; it is an amazing building."

Matthews' praise extends beyond the University to the safety of Perth's streets and its public transport system.

"In Harare, it just doesn't occur to anybody to go walking in the city at night, but it feels so safe here. And I love catching the air-conditioned bus down to Fremantle to see my aunt. We have no public transport in Harare. I guess I'm experiencing a bit of first world fever!"

The line of descendancy from Sir John Winthrop Hacket to Matthew Goss goes directly through the women in the family: from Deborah, Sir John's daughter, to her daughter Jacintha, to her daughter Kim, to her son, Matthew.

"My grandmother, Jacintha Chapman, was christened in Winthrop Hall, then she moved to Melbourne as a child, then to Zimbabwe. She and her husband, my grandfather, still live in a cottage on our property outside Harare. My favourite family story of hers is about her grandfather's (Sir John's) mother-in-law, Grace Bussell, riding into the sea on her horse at Busselton, to save people from a shipwreck. When we were down south on our holiday here a few years ago, we saw her name everywhere too."

Matthew has a younger brother, Nicholas (17), who is thinking about studying at UWA , and a sister Joanna (10).

Published in UWA News , 28 May 2012