William John Napier, 9th Lord Napier, Baron Napier ()

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and Literature, letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". ...

(13 October 1786 – 11 October 1834) was a British

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...

officer and trade

envoy Envoy or Envoys may refer to: Diplomacy * Diplomacy, in general * Envoy (title) * Special envoy, a type of Diplomatic rank#Special envoy, diplomatic rank Brands *Airspeed Envoy, a 1930s British light transport aircraft *Envoy (automobile), an au ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

Early life

Napier was born in

Kinsale Kinsale ( ; ) is a historic port and fishing town in County Cork, Ireland. Located approximately south of Cork (city), Cork City on the southeast coast near the Old Head of Kinsale, it sits at the mouth of the River Bandon, and has a populatio ...

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

, on 13 October 1786.Laughton, J. K.. "Napier, William John, ninth Lord Napier of Merchistoun (1786–1834)". ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (2004 ed.). Oxford University Press. . He was the son of

Francis Napier, 8th Lord Napier Francis Scott Napier, 8th Lord Napier (23 February 1758 – 1 August 1823) was a British peer and army officer. Biography Napier was born in Ipswich in 1758, the son of William Napier (later 7th Lord Napier) and his wife, Mary, a daugh ...

(1758–1823) and the father of Francis Napier, 10th Lord Napier and 1st Baron Ettrick (1819–1898). He enlisted in the

in 1803 and served - with distinction - as a midshipman on HMS Defiance at the

Battle of Trafalgar The Battle of Trafalgar was a naval engagement that took place on 21 October 1805 between the Royal Navy and a combined fleet of the French Navy, French and Spanish Navy, Spanish navies during the War of the Third Coalition. As part of Na ...

(1805). He later served as

lieutenant A lieutenant ( , ; abbreviated Lt., Lt, LT, Lieut and similar) is a Junior officer, junior commissioned officer rank in the armed forces of many nations, as well as fire services, emergency medical services, Security agency, security services ...

under

Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald Admiral Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald (14 December 1775 – 31 October 1860), styled Lord Cochrane between 1778 and 1831, was a British naval officer, politician and mercenary. Serving during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic ...

Career

In 1818 he was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was establis ...

. His proposers were Sir

David Brewster Sir David Brewster Knight of the Royal Guelphic Order, KH President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, PRSE Fellow of the Royal Society of London, FRS Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, FSA Scot Fellow of the Scottish Society of ...

, Sir

George Steuart Mackenzie Sir George Steuart Mackenzie, 7th Baronet FRS FRSE FSA (22 June 1780–26 October 1848) was a Scottish geologist, chemist and agricultural improver. Life The only son of Major General Sir Alexander Mackenzie of Coul (d.1796), a General in ...

, and

John Playfair John Playfair FRSE, FRS (10 March 1748 – 20 July 1819) was a Church of Scotland minister, remembered as a scientist and mathematician, and a professor of natural philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. He is best known for his book ''Illu ...

. A peer of Scotland, Lord Napier was an elected Scottish representative in the

House of Lords The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the lower house, the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. One of the oldest ext ...

from 1824 to 1832. In December 1833, upon the ending of

British East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to Indian Ocean trade, trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (South A ...

's monopoly on trade in the

Far East The Far East is the geographical region that encompasses the easternmost portion of the Asian continent, including North Asia, North, East Asia, East and Southeast Asia. South Asia is sometimes also included in the definition of the term. In mod ...

, he was appointed by Foreign Secretary

Lord Palmerston Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston (20 October 1784 – 18 October 1865), known as Lord Palmerston, was a British statesman and politician who served as prime minister of the United Kingdom from 1855 to 1858 and from 1859 to 1865. A m ...

, a family friend of Napier, as the first Chief Superintendent of Trade at Canton (now

Guangzhou Guangzhou, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Canton or Kwangchow, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Guangdong Provinces of China, province in South China, southern China. Located on the Pearl River about nor ...

), in China. The Second and Third Superintendents were

John Francis Davis Sir John Francis Davis, 1st Baronet (16 July 179513 November 1890) was a British diplomat and sinologist who served as second Governor of Hong Kong from 1844 to 1848. Davis was the first President of Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong. Backgro ...

and Sir George Best Robinson, respectively. He arrived at

Macau Macau or Macao is a special administrative regions of China, special administrative region of the People's Republic of China (PRC). With a population of about people and a land area of , it is the most List of countries and dependencies by p ...

on 15July 1834 on board the East India Company frigate ''Andromache'', and reached Canton ten days later, with the mission of expanding British trade into inner China. Lacking the necessary diplomatic and commercial experience, he was not successful in achieving the objective. Having failed to secure a meeting with

Lu Kun Lu Kun (17721835; courtesy name Jingzhi, ''hao'' Houshan 厚山), was a Chinese politician of the Qing dynasty. He was a student of politician and scholar Ruan Yuan. He was born in Zhuozhou Prefecture (涿州 modern day Zhuozhou City, Hebei p ...

, the Governor-general of the Liangguang, because of Napier's rigid demands contravening longstanding protocols, Napier's frustration led to his favoring a military intervention as personal retribution. He sent the frigates ''

Andromache In Greek mythology, Andromache (; , ) was the wife of Hector, daughter of Eetion, and sister to Podes. She was born and raised in the city of Cilician Thebe, over which her father ruled. The name means "man battler", "fighter of men" or "m ...

'' and '' Imogene'' to Whampoa on 11 September, defying an edict issued by Lu Kun, in a 'casualty-less' skirmish of cannon fire as the British warships breached defences at the

Bocca Tigris The Humen, also known as the Bocca Tigris or the Bogue, is a narrow strait in the Pearl River Delta The Pearl River Delta Metropolitan Region is the low-lying area surrounding the Pearl River estuary, where the Pearl River flows into the S ...

. After a prolonged stalemate, Lord Napier, sapped by typhus, was forced to retire to Macau in September 1834, where he died of the fever on 11October. Originally buried in Macau, he was later exhumed for reburial at Ettrick in Scotland. Napier was the first British representative to suggest seizing

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

. In a dispatch to Lord Palmerston on 14 August 1834, he suggested a commercial treaty, backed by an armed force, be done to secure the rights and interests of European merchants in China. He recommended that a small British force "should take possession of the Island of Hongkong, in the eastern entrance of the Canton River, which is admirably adapted for every purpose".

Family

Lord Napier married Elizabeth Cochrane-Johnstone (c. 1795–1883), daughter of Scottish adventurer Andrew Cochrane-Johnstone, in 1816; they had two sons and six daughters. His eldest son, Francis Napier, also entered diplomatic service and was promoted by Palmerston for the rest of his life.

Honours

Following his death, 120 years later, the British Government placed a memorial to him before the Macao Customs Office. After being lost for a short time, it was moved to the

Hong Kong Cemetery Hong Kong Cemetery, formerly Hong Kong (Happy Valley) Cemetery and before that Hong Kong Colonial Cemetery, is one of the early Christian cemeteries in Hong Kong dating to its colonial era beginning in 1845. It is located beside the racecour ...

, and then to the

Hong Kong Museum of History The Hong Kong Museum of History is a public museum that preserves Hong Kong's historical and cultural heritage. It is located next to the Hong Kong Science Museum, in Tsim Sha Tsui East, Kowloon, Hong Kong. The collections of the museum enc ...

, where it now rests.

Notes

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Napier, William Napier, 9th Lord 1786 births 1834 deaths William Napier, 9th Lord Royal Navy officers Royal Navy personnel of the Napoleonic Wars Scottish representative peers Lords Napier