A conservative, he was President of the Board of Lands and Works in the short-lived government of Charles Sladen in 1868, which cost him his seat at Ballarat, a strongly liberal constituency.

[2] He also assisted the passage of a bill to allow the Melbourne Tramway and Omnibus Company monopoly rights to operate a cable tram network in the city and suburbs.

There was no regulation of the banking and finance industries at that time, and no expectation that governments could or should protect investors against unsound or unscrupulous financial schemes.

More than 50 million pounds of speculative capital from Britain flowed into the colony, much of which was spent buying land in suburban Melbourne at hugely inflated prices.

In October, Gillies was defeated in a confidence motion when a section of his own followers led by James Munro turned against him.

He had always been considered to be a bachelor but, after his death, it was disclosed that, in 1897, he had married Harriett Turquand Fillan (née Theobald), a widow of 37, while in London.