one of the first poets to write in a distinctly Australian idiom.

The son of a retired military officer, Gordon was so wild as a youth that his father sent him from England to South Australia, where he became a horsebreaker and gained a reputation as a fine steeplechase rider. He began writing sporting verses for Victoria newspapers and served for a year and a half in the South Australian House of Assembly. While in South Australia he published two volumes of poems, Sea Spray and Smoke Drift (1867) and Ashtaroth (1867); neither book had much impact. Early in 1868 Gordon sustained a serious riding injury and suffered the loss of his only child, Annie. His wife left him later that year. In 1869 he moved to Brighton, near Melbourne, where his wife rejoined him, and there he published a third volume of poetry, Bush Ballads and Galloping Rhymes (1870). Further misfortune (another serious riding injury and the loss of his claim to a family estate in Scotland) befell him, and he suffered severe depression. The day after Bush Ballads was published, he shot himself on the beach near Brighton.

Gordon's strong rhythms and homespun philosophy make his poetry memorable. His work eventually was widely accepted, and some of his lines have been adopted into the Australian vernacular.