Sir Denison Samuel King Miller, 1919. Photo: Reserve Bank Archives.
Sir Denison Miller was born at the National School in Fairy Meadow in March 1860 to Samuel King Miller and Sarah Isabella Miller (nee Jones). He was the eldest son of eight children.
His father was apparently an excellent teacher of music and his own father, Anderson Miller, had also been a schoolmaster.
At Fairy Meadow, parents and neighbours reputedly often came in the afternoons before milking time just to hear the high standards of singing achieved by the children under Samuel Miller’s tuition.
At the age of 16, young Denison Miller began a career in banking. He joined the Deniliquin branch of the Bank of NSW on 19 August 1876 as a junior, with a salary of £40 per annum.
His brother Aubrey and his sister, Tennyson, also worked for the Bank of NSW. Given the posh names of the children it was likely a highly intellectual family and to name the youngest daughter after the English poet laureate tends to support this.
Denison Miller himself may have even received his first name in honour of Sir William Thomas Denison (1804–1871) who favoured the Irish National system of education and maintained that interest while serving as Governor of NSW and Governor General (1855–1861).
The young Fairy Meadow-born Denison, however, first worked at the Deniliquin branch of the Bank of NSW branch for some six years before being transferred, at his own request, to the bank’s head office in Sydney. There he gained experience in every department of banking, becoming assistant accountant within 10 years.
By 1899 Denison Miller had been appointed the assistant to the general manager.
In this role in 1905 he was allowed to occupy an old beachfront mansion named Cliffbrook at Coogee rent free. In 1907 Miller’s title was changed to general manager’s inspector, and later to metropolitan inspector.
He occupied this position until 1911, when he left Australia for a 12-month world tour with members of his family.
While overseas, he familiarised himself with contemporary banking issues.
On his return, Denison Miller accepted the role offered by the prime minister to lead the newly established Commonwealth Bank but in the meantime, he had been able to purchase the Cliffbrook mansion and its extensive grounds.
He paid £8000 for the land and house and later sold the foreshores to Randwick Municipal Council for £3000.
On the remaining site, a new Cliffbrook mansion was built in 1921. It was thought to be at least jointly designed by the now ageing architect John Kirkpatrick (1856-1923) who was Denison Miller’s cousin.
John Kirkpatrick had earlier benefited from quite a nice bit of nepotism when it was decided in 1912 to construct major Commonwealth Bank buildings in each state.
Denison Miller’s cousin thus became the bank’s official architect and by 1916 saw completion of his design for the magnificent Commonwealth Bank on the corner of Martin Place and Pitt Street in Sydney. The famous Carrington Hotel at Katoomba is yet another of Kirkpatrick’s many designs.
When the idea for a Commonwealth Bank in Australia was first raised, it had been decided to make it independent of government. And so, in 1911, management of the bank was solely vested in its governor. This made Denison Miller extraordinarily powerful.
He oversaw the move of the bank’s head office from Melbourne to Sydney and established branches in all states of Australia, as well as an office in London.
But having been given carte blanche to manage the bank as he wished also entailed a big responsibility – as any failure or scandal would fall squarely on his shoulders.
Remarkably, the boy born at Fairy Meadow succeeded in making the bank very profitable. Moreover, his salary of £4000 a year was substantially more than either the prime minister or the chief justice of the High Court of Australia.
“Denny Boy”, as he was sometimes known, was also entitled to a traveling allowance equivalent to those of High Court justices.
In addition, he had in 1885 married well – to Maude Evelyn Dean, the daughter of an affluent family who owned a large portion of Paddington, but who tragically died just five years later.
Denison Miller then married Laura Constance Heeley, daughter of Dr J T Heeley. They had six more children in addition to the two sons Miller had conceived with his first wife.
Denison Miller, however, only got to live for just two years at his newly built Coogee oceanfront mansion, Cliffbrook.
“Denny Boy” died in 1923 but Cliffbrook, after becoming the headquarters of the Atomic Energy Commission from 1953-1982, was purchased by the University of NSW in 1993 for restoration, and eventually added to the NSW Heritage Register in 1999.
All in all, not bad for a boy born in the wilds of Fairy Meadow in 1860.
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