Sir Harry Edward Spiller Cordeaux

KCMG KCMG may refer to * KC Motorgroup, based in Hong Kong, China * Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George, British honour * KCMG-LP, radio station in New Mexico, USA * KCMG, callsign 1997-2001 of Los Angeles radio station KKLQ (FM) ...

CB (15 November 1870 – 2 July 1943) was an

Indian Army The Indian Army is the land-based branch and the largest component of the Indian Armed Forces. The President of India is the Supreme Commander of the Indian Army, and its professional head is the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), who is a four- ...

officer and colonial administrator who became in turn Governor of

Uganda }), is a landlocked country in East Africa East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territor ...

Saint Helena Saint Helena () is a British overseas territory located in the South Atlantic Ocean. It is a remote volcanic tropical island west of the coast of south-western Africa, and east of Rio de Janeiro in South America. It is one of three constitu ...

and the

Bahamas The Bahamas (), officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to ...

Birth and education

Cordeaux was born on 15 November 1870 in

Poona Pune (; ; also known as Poona, (List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name from 1818 until 1978) is one of the most important industrial and educational hubs of India, with an estimated population of 7.4 million ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. His father Edward Cordeaux was a judge in Bombay. He was educated at

Brighton College Brighton College is an independent, co-educational boarding and day school for boys and girls aged 3 to 18 in Brighton, England. The school has three sites: Brighton College (the senior school, ages 11 to 18); Brighton College Preparatory Sc ...

and

Cheltenham College ("Work Conquers All") , established = , closed = , type = Public schoolIndependent School Day and Boarding School , religion = Church of England , president = , head_label = Head , head = Nicola Huggett ...

. In 1888 he won a scholarship to

St. John's College, Cambridge St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge founded by the Tudor matriarch Lady Margaret Beaufort. In constitutional terms, the college is a charitable corporation established by a charter dated 9 April 1511. The ...

, graduating with a B.A. in 1892.

Early career

Cordeaux joined the Indian Staff Corps in 1895. He was promoted to Lieutenant in 1896, Captain in 1903 and Major in 1912. He entered the Bombay Political Department in 1898, and that year was appointed Assistant Resident at

Berbera Berbera (; so, Barbara, ar, بربرة) is the capital of the Sahil region of Somaliland and is the main sea port of the country. Berbera is a coastal city and was the former capital of the British Somaliland protectorate before Hargeisa. It ...

, on the Somali Coast. Cordeaux was appointed Vice-Consul at Berbera on 15 October 1900, and upgraded to Consul on 15 November 1902, serving until 1906, during which he was also Deputy Commissioner of

British Somaliland British Somaliland, officially the Somaliland Protectorate ( so, Dhulka Maxmiyada Soomaalida ee Biritishka), was a British Empire, British protectorate in present-day Somaliland. During its existence, the territory was bordered by Italian Soma ...

(1904-1906). He was appointed Commissioner and Commander-in-Chief of British Somaliland from 1906 to 1910. He took a keen interest in the fauna of Somaliland. He identified the small antelope Cordeaux's Dik-dik Madoqua (saltiana) cordeauxi, now usually seen as a subspecies of

Salt's Dik-dik Salt's dik-dik (''Madoqua saltiana'') is a small antelope found in semidesert, bushland, and thickets in the Horn of Africa, but marginally also in northern Kenya and eastern Sudan. It is named after Henry Salt, who was the first European to ack ...

Colonial governor

Cordeaux was appointed Governor of Uganda (1910-1911). He supervised construction of the railway from Jinja to Kakindu. He was appointed

Governor of St Helena The Governor of Saint Helena is the representative of the British monarch in the United Kingdom's overseas territory of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha. The Governor is appointed by the monarch on the official advice of His Majest ...

(1911-1920) and Governor and Commander-in-Chief of the Bahama Islands (1920-1926). In 1920 he laid the foundation stone of the Supreme Court of the Bahamas. In 1923 concessions were granted to Sir Harry Cordeaux and Arthur Sands to cut the pine forest on

New Providence New Providence is the most populous island in the Bahamas, containing more than 70% of the total population. It is the location of the national capital city of Nassau, whose boundaries are coincident with the island; it had a population of 246 ...

. They built a sawmill south of Gambier Village near Jack Pond, but the licence was never profitable and was relinquished in 1930. During the period of

Prohibition in the United States In the United States from 1920 to 1933, a Constitution of the United States, nationwide constitutional law prohibition, prohibited the production, importation, transportation, and sale of alcoholic beverages. The alcohol industry was curtai ...

(1920-1933), there was a huge increase in exports of whiskey from Britain to the Bahamas. By February 1921, Cordeaux reported that there were thirty-one bonded warehouses in the island. Revenue rose from 81,049 pounds in 1919 to 1,065,899 pounds in 1923, and remained above 500,000 per year until 1930. Speaking in Montreal, Cordeaux said that the liquor traffic was the reason for the island's healthy economy, including the ability to finance a 250,000-pound improvement to the harbor in

Nassau Nassau may refer to: Places Bahamas *Nassau, Bahamas, capital city of the Bahamas, on the island of New Providence Canada *Nassau District, renamed Home District, regional division in Upper Canada from 1788 to 1792 *Nassau Street (Winnipeg), ...

. This statement was widely circulated in the American press. The British took no measures to stop the trade. He was appointed a Companion of the

Order of St Michael and St George The Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George is a British order of chivalry founded on 28 April 1818 by George IV, George IV, Prince of Wales, while he was acting as prince regent for his father, George III, King George III. ...

(CMG) in the

1902 Coronation Honours The 1902 Coronation Honours were announced on 26 June 1902, the date originally set for the coronation of King Edward VII. The coronation was postponed because the King had been taken ill two days before, but he ordered that the honours list shou ...

list on 26 June 1902, a Companion of the

Order of the Bath The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I of Great Britain, George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate medieval ceremony for appointing a knight, which involved Bathing#Medieval ...

(CB) in 1904 and knighted as a Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (KCMG) in 1921. Cordeaux died on 2 July 1943.

Family

Cordeaux married Maud Wentworth-Fitzwilliam on 2 October 1912.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cordeaux, Harry 1870 births 1943 deaths Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge British governors of the Bahamas Companions of the Order of the Bath Governors of Saint Helena Governors of Uganda Governors of British Somaliland Knights Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George 20th-century Bahamian people 20th-century British politicians British colonial governors and administrators in Africa British colonial governors and administrators in the Americas