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Sir Arthur Percy Douglas, Bart

 

 

 

 

 

Sir Arthur Percy Douglas, Bart., Under-Secretary for Defence, New Zealand, was born in Devonshire, England, in 1845. He is the third son of the late Sir Robert Douglas, Bart., who was five years Governor of Jersey, and for a similar period Lieutenant-Governor of the Cape of Good Hope.

 

Sir Arthur, the fifth baronet, was educated in England, at Harrow and at Stubbington House, Hampshire. He entered the Navy in 1858 as a cadet, speedily rising to the position of lieutenant.

 

In 1873, he was appointed to the office of instructor to the Naval Artillery Volunteers in Liverpool, and this post he held till deciding to come to New Zealand at the end of 1876. The following year he arrived in Wellington per ship “Ocean Mail.” During the Russian War scare of 1885 he was employed as Naval Staff Officer, and in 1887 he was appointed to the positions of secretary to the Council of Military Education, and staff officer of Artillery to the Colony, with the rank of major. These offices he held till 1891, when he went to Lyttelton as officer commanding the Permanent Militia, and in June, 1895, was promoted to his [present position] (sic).

 

Sir Arthur was married in 1871 to Mary Caroline, youngest daughter of the Rev. William Foster, M.A., of Stubbington, and has had four daughters, of whom three survive. He resides at Wellington (sic).

 

He was the author of 'The Dominion of New Zealand' in 1919

 

 He died in the railway disaster at Ais Gill on the Settle-Carlisle Railway in the north of England on 2 September 1913, journeying to visit the grave of his late wife.