James Alexander Richey CIE (8 March 1874 – 24 October 1931) was a British educational administrator in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

and

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 ...

. The son of Sir James Bellet Richey, an administrator in

Bombay Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second- ...

, he was educated at

Elstree School Elstree School is an English preparatory school for children aged 3–13 at Woolhampton House in Woolhampton, near Newbury in the English county of Berkshire. The school has announced plans to become fully co-educational from September 2020. H ...

Rugby School Rugby School is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 13–18) in Rugby, Warwickshire, England. Founded in 1567 as a free grammar school for local boys, it is one of the oldest independent schools in Britain. Up ...

and

Balliol College, Oxford Balliol College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. One of Oxford's oldest colleges, it was founded around 1263 by John I de Balliol, a landowner from Barnard Castle in County Durham, who provided the f ...

, where he read

Classics Classics or classical studies is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, classics traditionally refers to the study of Classical Greek and Roman literature and their related original languages, Ancient Greek and Latin. Classics ...

. His first post was as a lecturer at the Diocesan College, Rondebosch,

Cape Colony The Cape Colony ( nl, Kaapkolonie), also known as the Cape of Good Hope, was a British Empire, British colony in present-day South Africa named after the Cape of Good Hope, which existed from 1795 to 1802, and again from 1806 to 1910, when i ...

. In 1902 he transferred to the

Transvaal Transvaal is a historical geographic term associated with land north of (''i.e.'', beyond) the Vaal River in South Africa. A number of states and administrative divisions have carried the name Transvaal. * South African Republic (1856–1902; af, ...

Education Department. In 1908 he was posted to the

Indian Education Service The Indian Education Service or Indian Educational Service (IES) formed part of the British Raj between 1896 and 1924, when overseas recruitment ceased. It was an administrative organisation running educational establishments in British India, larg ...

, where he remained for the rest of his career. He served as an Inspector of Schools and Assistant Director of Public Instruction in Eastern Bengal and Assam, alongside

Richard Ramsbotham Richard Bury Ramsbotham (27 April 1880 – 23 September 1970) was an English first-class cricketer, British Indian Army officer and educator. The son of Philip Bury Ramsbotham and Florence Elizabeth King, he was born at Prestwich in April 1880 ...

, until he was appointed Director of Public Instruction of the

North-West Frontier Province The North-West Frontier Province (NWFP; ps, شمال لویدیځ سرحدي ولایت, ) was a Chief Commissioner's Province of British India, established on 9 November 1901 from the north-western districts of the Punjab Province. Followin ...

in 1911. In 1917 he was transferred to the same post in the

Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...

. In 1920, he was appointed Educational Commissioner of the Government of India. In these posts he introduced many educational reforms designed to increase literacy among the Indian peasantry. He retired in 1929. He was appointed Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire (CIE) in the 1920 New Year Honours. Richey had suffered from ill-health since his youth and died at the age of 57 after an illness of a few months.

Footnotes

References

*Obituaries, ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...

'', 28, 29 & 31 October 1931 {{DEFAULTSORT:Richey, James Alexander 1874 births 1931 deaths People educated at Elstree School People educated at Rugby School Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford Companions of the Order of the Indian Empire Indian Education Service officers South African civil servants South African educators