William Henry Ogilvie (21 August 1869 – 30 January 1963) was a Scottish-Australian narrative poet and horseman, jackaroo, and drover, and described as a quiet-spoken handsome Scot of medium height, with a fair moustache and red complexion. He was also known as Will Ogilvie, by the pen names including 'Glenrowan' and the lesser 'Swingle-Bar', and by his initials, WHO.
Ogilvie was part of the trio of Australian bush poets, with Banjo Paterson (1864–1941) and Henry Lawson (1867–1922). His Fair girls and gray horses (1896) was considered second only to Banjo Paterson's Man from Snowy River (1895). A reader ballot in 1914 saw him placing seventh of Australia's twelve most favourite poets.
Wearing the title of 'Universally acclaimed in Australia as a bush balladist of the "Outback"', Will H. Ogilvie wrote over 1,100 poems, including A Scotch night, The Australian, Summer country, Kings of the earth, and Whaup o' the rede.
Ogilvie was born at Holefield, near Kelso, Borders, Scotland on 21 August 1869 to George Ogilvie and Agnes Christie, the second child of eight. George farmed the lands of the Earl of Dalkeith on the Buccleuch Estates. Agnes, an orphan of the Indian Mutiny at Cawnpore, was a gifted pianist. Of the eight children – Zoe (b. 1867), George (b. 1872), Winifred (b. 1873), Tom (b. 1875), Eric (b. 1876), Kate (b. 1879), and Gladys (b. 1884) – William was the only one to marry.
Ogilvie was educated at Kelso High School for two terms as a weekly boarder, had some tutoring in Yorkshire, before entering Fettes College, Edinburgh where he excelled as a runner and in rugby.
Having just turned twenty years of age, he travelled from Scotland to Australia on the SS Arcadia for four weeks, via the Suez Canal, arriving in Sydney on 1 November 1889. During his time in Australia he worked on sheep stations in north-western New South Wales, south-eastern South Australia, and central New South Wales, where he was a proficient horseman, and gained the reputation as one of Australia's top bush poets.
After eleven years on the continent, on 9 February 1901 aged thirty-one, in Sydney the poet and bushman boarded the SS Persic travelling by way of Cape Town to Liverpool, England. Ogilvie returned to Scotland to Edinburgh to become a freelance journalist. From 1905 to 1908, he held the position of professor of agricultural journalism at the Iowa State College, United States of America. American ranch life however held no attraction to that of Australian properties.
In 1908 he returned again to Scotland and married Katharine Margaret 'Madge' Scott Anderson (1879 – 25 June 1965), the daughter of Tom Scott Anderson and a descendant of Dr Alexander Anderson who participated in the last and fatal expedition of explorer Mungo Park. Will and Madge had two children, Margaret Deloraine 'Wendy' Ogilvie (1909–2003), and George Thomas Anderson Ogilvie (1912–1995), when living at 'Brundenlaws' in the village of Bowden.
Australia remained important to the poet, prizing a stockwhip made by Alexander Patton with a silver tacks spelling out 'W.H.O.' on the handle, and making a damper for visiting guests. Australia also remembered Ogilvie through continued correspondence over his later years, including school children wishing him a happy 70th birthday.
During World War I, Ogilvie remained in Great Britain, and was in charge of and prepared Canadian horses for military service at the Army Remounts Branch in Wiltshire, England. Fellow Australian poet A. B. 'Banjo' Paterson was placed with the Australian Remount Service in 1915, rising to become its officer in charge in Cairo, Egypt.
In 1918 he first leased then bought the Presbyterian church manse 'Kirklea' at Ashkirk, Selkirkshire, Scotland. At the start of World War II Ogilvie, aged 71, undertook ARP warden duties in Selkirk. He continued to live in Kirklea until his death at 93 years of age in 1963, followed by his wife Madge in 1965. His ashes were scattered on the hill road to Roberton, Scotland, along with Australian wattle leaves.
Ogilvie's son George wrote the biography entitled Balladist of Borders & Bush in 1994.
The poet actively acknowledged the influences of Australian poet Adam Lindsay Gordon (1833–1870):
Our Lindsay Gordon! From the north-most cape
South to the Otway he is loved and known.
The boughs that shadow and the dusts that drape
His horse and horseman— are they not our own?
And every bronzed, burnt bushman in the east,