John Seymour Keay (30 March 1839 – 27 June 1909) was a Scottish businessman in India, and later a Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom. John Seymour Keay Vanity Fair 1892-10-08

John Seymour Keay Vanity Fair 1892-10-08

Life

Born at Bathgate,

Linlithgowshire West Lothian ( sco, Wast Lowden; gd, Lodainn an Iar) is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, and was one of its historic counties. The county was called Linlithgowshire until 1925. The historic county was bounded geographically by the Av ...

, on 30 March 1839, was younger of the two sons of John Keay (died 15 July 1841), minister of the Church of Scotland, of Bathgate, by his wife Agnes Straiton (died 3 June 1864). Educated at Madras College, St. Andrews, Keay was apprenticed in 1856 to the

Commercial Bank of Scotland The Commercial Bank of Scotland Ltd. was a Scottish commercial bank. It was founded in Edinburgh in 1810, and obtained a royal charter in 1831. It grew substantially through the 19th and early 20th centuries, until 1958, when it merged with th ...

, and in 1862 went to India to manage branches of the Government Bank of Bengal, which was recently started to develop the cotton trade between India and the UK. He next entered the service of

Sir Salar Jung The Salar Jung family was a noble Hyderabad family under the Nizams, who ruled from 1720 to 1948. They are credited with safeguarding rare artifacts and collections, which are now at Salar Jung Museum. The family were one of the remaining fa ...

, minister of

Hyderabad Hyderabad ( ; , ) is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana and the ''de jure'' capital of Andhra Pradesh. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part ...

. After a successful public career Keay opened a private banking and mercantile business at Hyderabad, and founded the cotton spinning and weaving mills that became the Hyderabad (Deccan) Spinning and Weaving Co. Ltd.. He remained a director of the company until his death. After twenty years in India Keay returned to England in 1882, and busily engaged in both home and Indian politics. He sympathised with the Indian wish for a larger share in the government, and was a member of the British committee of the

Indian National Congress The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party but often simply the Congress, is a political party in India with widespread roots. Founded in 1885, it was the first modern nationalist movement to emerge in the British Em ...

. As an advanced Liberal, Keay unsuccessfully contested at the general election in February 1886, but he won a seat at the by-election for on 8 October 1889. Keay constantly intervened in the debates on the land purchase bill of 1890, concerning which he published an elaborate ''Exposure'', and won the reputation of a bore. He was re-elected at the general election of 1892, but was defeated after a close contest in that of July 1895; and was again unsuccessful at in January 1906. Keay had a country residence at

Minchinhampton Minchinhampton is an ancient Cotswolds market town in the Stroud District in Gloucestershire, South West England. The town is located on a hilltop, south-east of Stroud. The common offers wide views over the Severn Estuary into Wales and furth ...

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean. The county town is the city of Gl ...

, and was president of the

Stroud Stroud is a market town and civil parish in Gloucestershire, England. It is the main town in Stroud District. The town's population was 13,500 in 2021. Below the western escarpment of the Cotswold Hills, at the meeting point of the Five ...

Liberal club. He died on 27 June 1909 aged 70 at his London residence, 44 Bassett Road, North Kensington, and his remains were cremated at Golder's Green.

Works

In a long treatise ''Spoiling the Egyptians, a Tale of Shame told from the Blue Books'' (1882, three editions) Keay protested the British invasion and occupation of Egypt in 1882. His views were echoed by British radicals. In ''The Great Imperial Danger: an Impossible War in the near Future'' (1887) he deprecated the fear of war with Russia, and discussed the Afghan frontier question. He attacked tariff reformers in ''The Fraud of the Protection Cry'' (1906).

Family

Keay married on 22 October 1878 Nina, second daughter of William Came Vivian of

Penzance Penzance ( ; kw, Pennsans) is a town, civil parish and port in the Penwith district of Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is the most westerly major town in Cornwall and is about west-southwest of Plymouth and west-southwest of London. Situated ...

. She died on 16 January 1885, leaving two daughters.

Notes

Attribution

External links

* Liberal Party (UK) MPs for Scottish constituencies {{DEFAULTSORT:Keay, John Seymour 1839 births 1909 deaths UK MPs 1886–1892 UK MPs 1892–1895 Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Scottish constituencies Scottish writers 19th-century Scottish businesspeople