Dr Barcroft Boake (1814 - 9 September 1876) was an Irish born clergyman and educator, who was the longest serving principal of

Royal College Colombo Royal College, Colombo is a selective entry boys' school located in Cinnamon Gardens, Colombo, Sri Lanka. Started as a private school by Rev Joseph Marsh in 1835, it was established as the Colombo Academy by Sir Robert Wilmot-Horton in Janua ...

, from 1842 to 1870. Barcroft Boake was born in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

in 1814, the only son of John Fuller Boake (1792-1865), a brick merchant, and Mary née Lodge. In 1828, at the age of 14, he entered

Trinity College Dublin , name_Latin = Collegium Sanctae et Individuae Trinitatis Reginae Elizabethae juxta Dublin , motto = ''Perpetuis futuris temporibus duraturam'' (Latin) , motto_lang = la , motto_English = It will last i ...

, and in 1836 received a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

. He subsequently obtained granted a

Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Tho ...

Bachelor of Divinity In Western universities, a Bachelor of Divinity or Baccalaureate in Divinity (BD or BDiv; la, Baccalaureus Divinitatis) is a postgraduate academic degree awarded for a course taken in the study of divinity or related disciplines, such as theology ...

and

Doctorate of Divinity A Doctor of Divinity (D.D. or DDiv; la, Doctor Divinitatis) is the holder of an advanced academic degree in divinity. In the United Kingdom, it is considered an advanced doctoral degree. At the University of Oxford, doctors of divinity are ra ...

. Boake was ordained as a deacon by the

Bishop of Cork The Bishop of Cork was a separate episcopal title which took its name after the city of Cork in Ireland. The title is now united with other bishoprics. In the Church of Ireland it is held by the Bishop of Cork, Cloyne and Ross, and in the Roman C ...

, Samuel Kyle, in 1838 and as a priest in 1839. In 1841 the

Church Missionary Society The Church Mission Society (CMS), formerly known as the Church Missionary Society, is a British mission society working with the Christians around the world. Founded in 1799, CMS has attracted over nine thousand men and women to serve as mission ...

proposed to establish a new school in southern India and offered Boake the position of headmaster. The scheme however broke down and the Society recommended to the Secretary of State that he be offered the position of principal of the

Colombo Academy Royal College, Colombo is a selective entry boys' school located in Cinnamon Gardens, Colombo, Sri Lanka. Started as a private school by Rev Joseph Marsh in 1835, it was established as the Colombo Academy by Sir Robert Wilmot-Horton in Janua ...

, a state school operated by the government. He accepted and sailed to

Ceylon Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

in September 1942. In October 1842 Boake took up the role as the principal of Colombo Academy and he remained at that post until September 1870. In 1859 he helped establish the Queen's College, the first institution of higher education in Ceylon. The college was affiliated with

Calcutta University The University of Calcutta (informally known as Calcutta University; CU) is a public collegiate state university in India, located in Kolkata, West Bengal, India. Considered one of best state research university all over India every year, C ...

, and prepared students from the Colombo Academy for entrance examinations to English universities. In 1865 the Morgan Committee, a committee of the

Legislative Council of Ceylon The Legislative Council of Ceylon was the legislative body of British Ceylon, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) established in 1833, along with the Executive Council of Ceylon, on the recommendations of the Colebrooke-Cameron Commission. It was the first f ...

, conducted an inquiry into education, recommending that it be reorganised and that scholarships should be awarded to study at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

.Historical Overview of Education in Sri Lanka, The British Period: (1796–1948 )
As a result, in 1869, Queen's College was amalgamated with the Colombo Academy. In 1868 he set up a

hostel A hostel is a form of low-cost, short-term shared sociable lodging where guests can rent a bed, usually a bunk bed in a dormitory, with shared use of a lounge and sometimes a kitchen. Rooms can be mixed or single-sex and have private or shared b ...

at the Colombo Academy, in San Sebastian, establishing it as one of the first

boarding school A boarding school is a school where pupils live within premises while being given formal instruction. The word "boarding" is used in the sense of "room and board", i.e. lodging and meals. As they have existed for many centuries, and now exten ...

s in Ceylon. Boake also served as acting colonial chaplain and rector of Trinity Church, Colombo. On 23 March 1843 he married Mary Catherine Slade (1818-1860), the eldest daughter of Major General William Henry Slade (1787-1874) of the Royal Engineers and Mary née Holden, in Colombo, and they had eight children, including: William John Slade (1867-1889), the Police Magistrate Kalpitiya and Assistant Government Agent in various districts in the island; Mary Catherine; Emily and Fanny Lousia. Following Catherine's death on 17 January 1860, Boake married a second time, on 27 August 1861, to Agnes Jane Marsh (the daughter of Reverend

Joseph Marsh Joseph Marsh (January 12, 1726February 9, 1811) was a Vermont officer in the American Revolution and a government leader who served as lieutenant governor of Vermont. Biography Joseph Marsh was born in Lebanon, Connecticut on January 12, 1726. ...

, the first headmaster of the Colombo Academy), to whom he had a further five children, including: Alfred Hogarth; and Walter Hovenden. Boake wrote several treatises which were published by the Ceylon Times in 1853 and 1854. He also had a sermon published by the Church Mission Press, Cotta 1857 which was preached at Trinity Church, Colombo on 1 June 1851. After his retirement Boake and his family migrated to

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

, Australia on 26 October 1870 and served as the

pastor A pastor (abbreviated as "Pr" or "Ptr" , or "Ps" ) is the leader of a Christian congregation who also gives advice and counsel to people from the community or congregation. In Lutheranism, Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and ...

of the Holy Trinity Church in Saint Kilda. He died in Melbourne, Victoria on 9 September 1876.

References

Further reading