Thomas Southorn

Sir Wilfrid Thomas Southorn KCMG, KBE (* August 4, 1879, † March 15, 1957, in Chinese translation修 顿) was a British colonial administrator, who represented the British monarch in the British colonies of Hong Kong and The Gambia.

Life

Wilfrid Thomas Southorn attended Warwick School and Corpus Christi College, University of Oxford.

He served in the years 1903-1926 in the colonial administration of Ceylon. In his career, he went on to the treasurer of the colony and harbor master. Subsequently, he was appointed Colonial Secretary in Hong Kong, where he worked from 1926 until 1932. During this time he was employed three times as deputy governor.

His first and only job as governor, he was in The Gambia on 22 October 1936. He had that position until March 23, 1942 then he was until 1946 a liaison officer of the colonial authority. All plans Southorns which served to improve the Colony and Protectorate of the Gambia, were in the context of the global depression. After 1939, the economy grew Gambia, Gambia as was an important base during the Second World War. The location between the years 1940 and 1942 was particularly tense, as the surrounding French colony of Senegal was controlled by the Vichy regime.

Southorn was married to Lady Bella Southorn Sidney, sister of Leonard Woolf and sister of the famous novelist Virginia Woolf. Bella Southorn wrote ( under the name Bella Sidney Woolf ) itself has a variety of books and articles on Gambia. In 1952 she published, among others, the work of The Gambia: The story of the Groundnut colony. Southorn died on 15 March 1957.

The Southorn Playground in Wan Chai, Hong Kong is named after him.