The passionate private life of George Meredith “King of Oyster Bay” is the back story to a new exhibition at Narryna, Battery Point.

The exhibition features the recently donated large four poster bed that belonged to George Meredith and featured so prominently in his very private and personal letters to his wife Mary. The bed made in the 1830’s by leading colonial Tasmanian cabinet maker William Hamilton is a stunning example of early colonial furniture.

The Meredith family played a prominent role on Tasmania’s east coast and the exhibition also includes previously unseen watercolours by Louisa Anne Meredith, niece and daughter-in-law of George Meredith. As well, the Thomas Bock portraits of George and Mary Meredith from the collection of the East Coast Heritage Museum, Swansea will be displayed.

The exhibition provides an unusually personal insight into the private lives of a Tasmanian colonial family through their own family treasures.