Sir Percy Emerson Watkins (3 December 1871 – 5 May 1946) was a Welsh civil servant and public administrator. Born on 3 December 1871 at

Llanfyllin Llanfyllin ( – ) is a market town, community and electoral ward in a sparsely populated area in Montgomeryshire, Powys, Wales. Llanfyllin's community population in 2011 was 1,532, of whom 34.1% could speak Welsh. Llanfyllin means ''church or p ...

, he attended the high school in

Oswestry Oswestry ( ; ) is a market town, civil parish and historic railway town in Shropshire, England, close to the Welsh border. It is at the junction of the A5, A483 and A495 roads. The town was the administrative headquarters of the Borough of ...

before he was appointed clerk of the

Central Welsh Board Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known a ...

in 1896. He was Chief Clerk to the Education Department of the

West Riding of Yorkshire The West Riding of Yorkshire is one of three historic subdivisions of Yorkshire, England. From 1889 to 1974 the administrative county County of York, West Riding (the area under the control of West Riding County Council), abbreviated County ...

from 1904 to 1911, and was then

registrar A registrar is an official keeper of records made in a register. The term may refer to: Education * Registrar (education), an official in an academic institution who handles student records * Registrar of the University of Oxford, one of the se ...

of the

University College, Cardiff , latin_name = , image_name = Shield of the University of Cardiff.svg , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms of Cardiff University , motto = cy, Gwirionedd, Undod a Chytgord , mottoeng = Truth, Unity and Concord , established = 1 ...

, from 1911 to 1913 and Assistant Secretary to the Welsh Insurance Commission from 1913 to 1925. In the latter year, he became

Permanent Secretary A permanent secretary (also known as a principal secretary) is the most senior Civil Service (United Kingdom), civil servant of a department or Ministry (government department), ministry charged with running the department or ministry's day-to-day ...

of the Welsh Department of the

Board of Education A board of education, school committee or school board is the board of directors or board of trustees of a school, local school district or an equivalent institution. The elected council determines the educational policy in a small regional are ...

, serving until 1933. At the Welsh Department, he improved the relations between the department and the Central Welsh Board, prompted surveys on Welsh language teaching, and was an advocate of adult education. From 1933, he led the Council of Social Services in Wales. In the view of the historian R. Lewis, Watkins belonged to a "social radical coterie"; for him, unemployment in the Welsh valleys in the 1920s and 1930s was "a barrier to the emergence of an educated democracy in Wales" to which the implementation of social services offered a chance "to foster the old Welsh ideal of a democratic popular culture".R. Lewis, "The Welsh Radical Tradition and the Ideal of a Democratic Popular Culture, 1900–40", in Eugenio F. Biagini (ed.), ''Citizenship and Community: Liberals, Radicals and Collective Identities in the British Isles, 1865–1931'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), p. 339. He was

knighted A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the Christian denomination, church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood ...

in 1930 and died on 5 May 1946, having published an autobiography two years earlier.Sir Wynn Powell Wheldon
"Watkins, Sir Percy Emerson"
''Dictionary of Welsh Biography'' (National Library of Wales, 2001). Retrieved 2 February 2022.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Watkins, Percy 1871 births 1946 deaths Welsh civil servants Knights Bachelor People from Montgomeryshire