Background
McCarthy was born in Walhalla, Victoria on 30 March 1896 to parents Catherine McCarthy (née Kennedy) and Daniel McCarthy.
McCarthy was born in Walhalla, Victoria on 30 March 1896 to parents Catherine McCarthy (née Kennedy) and Daniel McCarthy.
He was a prominent senior trade official, including as head of the Department of Commerce and Agriculture between 1945 and 1950. He joined the Commonwealth Public Service as a messenger in the Postmaster-General"s Department in April 1911. McCarthy married Marjorie Mary Graham on 4 July 1939 in Sydney.
From 1945 to 1950, McCarthy was Secretary of the Department of Commerce and Agriculture.
His primary expertise was grain commodity matters, and he devised the Australian wheat price stabilisation scheme after World World War World War II Between 1958 and 1962, McCarthy was Australian Ambassador to the Netherlands. He was accredited to Belgium also, from 1959.
In 1962, McCarthy was appointed Head of the Australian Permanent Mission to the European Atomic Energy Community in Brussels. McCarthy died on 4 September 1980 at Woden Valley Hospital, in Garran, Canberra.
He had been admitted earlier in the same week after an aneurysm.
