Sir Edward Temperley Gourley VD (8 June 1826 – 15 April 1902) was a coal fitter, shipowner, and politician born in Sunderland, England.
Born on the banks of the River Wear on 8 June 1826, he left school at 13 and served his apprenticeship as a coalfitter with John Halcro.
His job took him to the Netherlands and Germany, where he studied foreign trade, and, after finishing his apprenticeship, he was rewarded with a percentage of the firm's profits.
Working from an office in Villiers Street, Gourley expanded his business to include the exportation of coal and the importation of timber.
At that time, when a wretched and niggardly government was starving the Tommy Atkins of that day in the trenches before Sebastopol, Sir Edward had a number of vessels engaged as transports.
When the bad luck and disasters continued, the politician Samuel Plimsoll brought serious charges against the "fair fame of Sir Edward" in an appeal on behalf of "Our seamen."
[4] The Sunderland Echo reported at the time: "It was his pleasing duty to make his first speech in the local Parliament in moving a resolution, the outcome of which was the Havelock statue, which now stands in Mowbray Park.
"Under his directing every possible precaution was taken and the result was that a single case of cattle plague occurred in the borough," the Echo reported.
[1][8] The Echo reported after his death: "He never lost sight of the fact that he was a representative of a shipping centre, and whenever the opportunity offered his abilities were devoted to the good of that industry.
[9] "He was probably the most persistent questioner in the House of Commons, and much of his work there consisted in interrogating the Government on points on which he desired information or with the object of exposing an abuse.
The subject of the royal yachts was one in which he manifested an especially keen interest, as he did also in the condition of the mercantile marine, in connection with which he constantly impressed the necessity of having the vessels manned as much as possible with Britishers, so that they could be depended upon in the event of war.
[10][11] Gourley was a Congregationalist and, in early life, he attended Bethel Chapel in Villiers Street, conducting a Sunday school there.