Charles Vyner Brooke

Sir Charles Vyner Brooke DeWindt ( born September 30, 1874 † May 9, 1963 in London) was of English descent and the third and last of the white Rajas of Sarawak ( North Borneo).

Life

Charles spent his youth as the son of the second white Rajas Charles Johnson Brooke in Borneo. From 1897 to 1898 he was aide- de-camp of his father and from 1904 to 1911 Vice- President of the Supreme and General Councils. On 21 February 1911 he married Sylvia Brett, the daughter of Lord Esher. By George V granted the title of Highness was awarded on June 22, 1911. In World War Brooke incognito served as an ordinary soldier in an air defense unit.

On May 24, 1917 Charles Vyner Brooke succeeded his father on the throne of Sarawak. Due to the booming oil industry in Sarawak, he was able to modernize his country. The huge forest area of ​​Sarawak and the oil deposits were personal property of the Brooke family (as it is still in Brunei today). 1927 Brooke was knighted by King George V..

Brooke was expelled by the Japanese army during the Second World War in 1942 with his family to Sydney, Australia in 1945 and returned back to Sarawak. 1946 ended the rule of the White Rajas of Borneo, when Charles Vyner Brooke gave his country Sarawak to the British Crown, and so transformed a British Crown Colony. He was awarded a substantial pension for himself and his three daughters. His nephew and heir of Anthony Walter Dayrell Brooke, the son of his brother Bertram Willes Dayrell Brooke, was initially against this decision. 1951, however, he renounced any claim to the crown of Sarawak.

Charles Vyner Brooke died on May 9, 1963 in London, four months before Sarawak joined the Federation of Malaysia.

Honors

Sir Charles Vyner Brooke is pictured on the stamp of Sarawak, Mi No..

• Briton
• English
• Person ( Sarawak )
• Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George
• Born in 1874
• Died in 1963
• Man