Before he left, Wakehurst was appointed as a Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (KCMG) and later a Knight of Justice of the Order of St John of Jerusalem (KStJ) in June 1937. He was to be the last non-Australian governor of the State. The Wakehursts, accompanied by their three sons (Henrietta, at school at the time, would join them three months later), arrived in Sydney, New South Wales on 8 April 1937 and the six-foot, red-haired Wakehurst was sworn in at Government House on the same day.