Michael Rush (3 January 1844 – 17 December 1922) was an Irish Australian sculler noted for his one-on-one competitions against champion opponents, which drew vast crowds of spectators. He attempted to win the World Sculling Championship.

Rush arrived in Sydney from Ireland in 1861 at the age of 16, an assisted immigrant brought to augment Australia's mostly agricultural workforce. Rush was a farm labourer, who knew nothing of boats or boating, but within ten years of his arrival in Australia, Rush was Champion Sculler of the Clarence River, as well as a selector, cattle-raiser and butcher. His interest in the sport of rowing dominated Rush's life, and hampered his prosperity. He repeatedly travelled from his Clarence River home to compete for large money prizes on Sydney's Parramatta River, neglecting his business affairs.

Rush became Champion Sculler of Australia in 1873, and defended his championship several times, not always successfully. Rush succeeded on a few occasions in having the Championship venue moved from Sydney to the Clarence River, the first to shift the focus of sculling away from the capital city. From 1874, there was talk of Rush travelling to England to compete for the World Sculling Championship, but this did not eventuate. Instead, Edward Trickett won the World Championship on the Thames in 1876. Rush and Trickett in 1877 competed on the Parramatta River for the World Championship, but Rush lost this race.

Rush was unique in early Australian sculling in that he provided opportunities for others to compete and excel, by organising regattas and other rowing events, though financially he gained little. He raised and raced horses, organised athletic carnivals, and was a generous supporter of charities, churches, and schools. His background as the son of Irish tenant farmers, a class traditionally debarred by law from owning land and hence accumulating wealth, gave Rush little understanding of the management of money. Rush and his wife had fourteen children, and the Rush family lived in grand, if not extravagant style; most Rush enterprises were financed by mortgages or promissory notes. When the Banks Crash of 1893 came, Rush was not only deeply in debt, he did not even own the house he lived in.

Though his finances remained shaky, and his attempts at various business enterprises were unsuccessful, Rush continued to the end of his life to be interested and involved in the sport of rowing and sculling, organising carnivals and umpiring important matches. Rush died on his small farm in Hurstville, in December 1922.

Youth and early life

Rush was the second son of William and Margery Rush née McGrath. He was born and spent his early years on a tenant farm in the Townland of Dooish, County Tyrone, in the province of Ulster, now Northern Ireland. The Rushes were cattle-raisers, but their 26-acre holding was too small to support their family of sons, of whom four have been identified; there were reputedly ten Rush sons. Rush's birth-date is given as 3 January 1844.

Seeking employment and better opportunities than their native land offered, Rush and his brother John emigrated in 1860, arriving in Sydney in February 1861 per Hotspur, as assisted immigrants. The brothers at first worked in Camperdown for their uncle Michael McGrath, a retail (or 'cutting') butcher, who sponsored their immigration. McGrath's brother, Thomas McGrath, was a Champion Sculler of the Colony of New South Wales.

Rush then spent some months as a drover in southern New South Wales, while his brother John, taking advantage of the new Crown Lands Act took up a selection on the Lower Clarence River in 1863. Rush soon joined his brother, at first working for other settlers as a stockman and slaughterman. In 1866, he selected land at Ashby and began business in his own right as a butcher.Gard, Ch. 4, and

Early rowing matches

During its early days of settlement, the Lower Clarence district lacked roads; virtually all communication within the area and with the outside world depended upon water transport.McFarlane, A History of the Clarence River Ch. 8. Lower Clarence settlers were by necessity good oarsmen, and several of them became national and even world champion scullers. Rush, who in his prime was over six feet tall and weighed 13 stone, soon distinguished himself as a powerful 'puller'.puller is 19th-century slang for an oarsman, specifically one who rows against a tide. See an example of contemporary usage He rowed the heavy settlers' boats, also known as 'butcher boats' delivering meat to Clarence River customers. By 1866, Rush was competing in various regattas regularly held among the riverside settlements of Ulmarra, Lawrence, Brushgrove and Rocky Mouth.

In 1869, Rush won the title of Champion of the Clarence from Prospero Coulon. The two men then joined forces as a rowing team and competed at the Anniversary Day Regatta of 26 January 1870 held at Port Jackson. Rush and Coulon contested several events, notably winning the single-scull and pair-oar races, and while the prize money they received was modest, their performances were noted by Sydney rowers who quickly challenged them to private matches for large stakes.Old Times, July 1903 Rush and Coulon remained in Sydney for some months after the January regatta, and continued to win as a team.

Rush then engaged in a series of one-on-one matches with the scullers William Hickey, the Australian champion, and his brother Richard Hickey. Rush, being unfamiliar with rowing outrigger wager boats, on that occasion failed to win the championship from Hickey, but returned to the Lower Clarence with prize money totalling over £700.

Business ventures

Rush set up as a store-keeper in the town of Rocky Mouth (Maclean). He operated a 'floating store' which was anchored at Chatsworth Island during the sugar-cane harvesting season when hundreds of itinerant labourers moved into the district. His steam launch Jinnie Rush was used as a mobile general store, delivering goods to farmers and villagers along the river. Rush also bought several racing boats, importing 'riggers'Racing skiffs fitted with steel outriggers from England, as well as ordering them custom-made from local boatbuilders.

Rush divided his energies between his business ventures and his sculling contests, organising as well as competing in regattas and 'aquatic carnivals', so much so, that he never achieved the solid prosperity of other Clarence River commercial pioneers. He added the Criterion Hotel and a string of race-horses to his business 'empire' at Rocky Mouth.Gard Ch. 4 As a former farm-boy from impoverished Ireland, where he might never have owned even a house plot, Rush now purchased many acres of Clarence River land, much of it having little value. Rush's Irish background of tenant farming gave little understanding of managing capital, property, or conducting a business career.cf. Thompson, E.P. The Making of the English Working Classes: III. The Irish Rush fits an Irish immigrant model offered by historian Patrick O'Farrell:

Major sculling matches

Rush set his sights on the Australian Sculling Championship, and in February 1873, won it from William Hickey in a controversial match: many claimed that Hickey 'sold' the race.That is, Hickey deliberately lost, having been paid a large sum of money to do so. Cf. the libel case which followed: Rush insisted that the championship be contested on his home waters of the Clarence River. To make this condition was his right as the holder of a current championship.On the matter of sculling championship customs, cf. Rush's enterprise in arranging for sponsors to provide substantial sums of prizes encouraged Australia's best scullers to compete. These events drew large crowds of spectators and gamblers to the Clarence River, especially the town of Grafton. Rush helped to organise, and took part in, aquatic contests held Grafton in 1874, and 1875 Two of these were held in conjunction with Grafton's celebration of the Queen's Birthday.Held each 24 May during the reign of Queen Victoria. Rush also organised an Intercolonial Regatta, held at Grafton 7 October 1874 at which he successfully defended his championship. However, at the Queen's Birthday regatta of 1875, Rush, who was ill, lost the race to Elias C. Laycock.

World Sculling Championship

Edward 'Ned' Trickett sought to win the Australian Championship from Rush. Trickett was outclassed by Rush at the 1874 and 1875 events, but afterwards competed at numerous regattas and in private matches, and his form was consistently improving. Trickett and his backers demanded that Rush contest the title on the Parramatta River where he won it from Hickey.The course ran for just over three miles from the present John Whitton Railway Bridge near Meadowbank to a rocky outcrop known as The Brothers, on which stands the Searle Monument, off the present Henley. Rush declined to row anywhere but on the Clarence River, and demanded that the stakes be not less than £500. By 1875, Rush had a wife and five children to support, as well as many business commitments, and could not afford to undertake a sporting endeavour involving a major investment in time and money, unless there was a chance of an adequate financial return. Dozens of letters and articles in the Australian press debated the issuecf. Gard, Ch. 8 for nearly two years, as Trickett and his supporters became increasingly incensed at Rush's stalling. Finally, former champion sculler and now a prosperous publican and backer of sculling events, offered to finance an attempt by an Australian sculler to topple the current holder of the World Sculling Championship, Englishman Joseph Sadler.Only one other Australian sculler had attempted this feat, Richard A. W. Green, in 1863. Rush declined to travel to London. Trickett agreed to the journey, went to the Thames, beat Sadler, and brought home the World Championship to Australia.cf. Trickett, G. Ned Trickett pp 22–23 Rush challenged Trickett for the World title. Trickett demanded that the race be rowed on the Parramatta River, and the match came off on the afternoon of 30 June 1877.

Largest number of spectators ever at a Sydney sporting event The Rush vs. Trickett match attracted the largest number of spectators ever before gathered at a Sydney sporting event, and the event is part of Australian sporting history.Cf. Estimates of the size of the crowd range from 30,000 to 70,000.One estimate claims 50,000 spectators: Shops and government offices closed for the event, special trains brought people into the city. Steam-ships carrying spectators accompanied the competing champions, and hundreds of smaller, private vessels crowded the river. Special Regulations were published by the Marine Board of the NSW Government to deal with the problems of regulating maritime traffic during the event.This 1877 Regulation created a useful precedent which benefited participants in later contests; spectator vessels frequently hampered and even endangered scullers.