Margaret Frances Carnegie AO (14 March 1910 – 5 August 2002) was an Australian writer, art patron and collector.

Biography

Margaret Frances Carnegie was born in Melbourne on 14 March 1910, daughter of Henry George Allen and Amelia Burberry.^[1] She was educated at Lauriston Girls' School and then a finishing school in Switzerland.^[2] She married Douglas Howard Carnegie on 11 March 1931 at Scots' Church, Melbourne.^[3]

Desmond Digby's portrait of Carnegie was a finalist for the 1966 Archibald Prize. It was acquired by the Art Gallery of New South Wales in 1991.^[4]

The 1976 film, Mad Dog Morgan, was based on her book, Morgan: The Bold Bushranger.^[5]

Carnegie was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia in the 1985 Australia Day Honours.^[6] She was promoted to Officer of the Order of Australia in the 1990 Queen's Birthday Honours for "service to art, literature and to local history".^[7]

Carnegie was awarded an honorary doctor of letters by Charles Sturt University in Wagga Wagga, New South Wales.^[8][9] The university holds the Margaret Carnegie Collection of Australiana within its archives.^[10]

Carnegie died on 5 August 2002.^[11] She was predeceased by her husband in 1998.^[2] Her son, Roderick Carnegie, and three daughters survived her.^[11]

Selected works

Books

• Carnegie, Margaret; Hawthorn Press (1973), Friday Mount : first settlement at Holbrook and the south-western slopes of New South Wales, Hawthorn Press, ISBN 978-0-7256-0108-9
• Carnegie, Margaret (1974), Morgan, the bold bushranger, Hawthorn Press, ISBN 978-0-7256-0109-6
• Swan, Keith; Carnegie, Margaret (1979), In step with Sturt, Graphic Books, ISBN 978-0-9596365-5-0
• Carnegie, Margaret; Shields, Frank (1979), In search of Breaker Morant: Balladist and bushveldt carbineer (Paperback ed.), H. H. Stephenson, ISBN 978-0-9596365-1-2
• Carnegie, Margaret (1992), William Knox D'Arcy: Australian gold and Persian oil, Kildrummie Press, ISBN 978-0-646-07850-2
• Carnegie, Margaret; Boldrewood, Rolf (1993), Pacific gold: California 1848 Australia 1851, including Genesis of gold-fields law in Australia, Kildrummie Press, ISBN 978-0-646-14045-2

Libretto

• Martin, Desmond; Carnegie, Margaret; Rolfe, Douglas G (1984), Gabriel and Louisa: An Australian ballad operetta : a somewhat frivolous version of the romantic history of Gabriel Louis Marie Huon de Keriliau and his wife Louisa, during the foundation years of Australia, 1788 to 1892, A.K.P.