The Dictionary of Australasian Biography/Drury, Lieut.-Colonel Edward Robert
Drury, Lieut.-Colonel Edward Robert, C.M.G., J.P., is a son of the late Rev. William Drury, M.A., sometime a master at Harrow School, and tutor to the late Prince Consort and his brother and to the sons of the King of the Belgians, by his wife Anne, daughter of Robert Nicholas, M.P., of Ashton Keynes, Wilts. He was born and educated at Brussels, and in 1852 emigrated to Australia, entering the service of the Bank of Australasia in the following year. In 1860 he was appointed manager of that Bank in Brisbane; and in 1872 he became general manager of the Queensland National Bank, which appointment he still holds. Mr. Drury served in the first volunteer corps raised in Queensland in 1854, and holds the rank of lieut.-colonel commanding the Field Artillery of the Queensland Defence Force, and has several times filled the position of Acting Commandant. His services in connection with the force were favourably noticed by H.R.H. the Commander-in-Chief in 1883, and he was deputed by the Queensland Government to give evidence before the Royal Commission on the defence of British possessions, being created C.M.G. in 1885. Mr. Drury is consul for Belgium, and a J.P. of Queensland. He married, in 1869, Barbara, daughter of the late John Grahame, of Sydney, N.S.W.