List of Lord High Commissioners of the Ionian Islands
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The Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands was the local representative of the British government in the United States of the Ionian Islands between 1814 and 1863. At the time, the United States of the Ionian Islands was a federal republic under the amical protection of the United Kingdom, as established under the 1815 Treaty of Paris. Governors were based in Corfu, northernmost of the seven Ionian islands.
A list of the islands' High Commissioners. After the tenure of Sir James Campbell, High Commissioners added 'Lord' to their titles. Gladstone who served for just under 12 weeks was appointed as 'Extraordinary' Lord High Commissioner:
- Sir James Campbell 1814–1816
- Sir Thomas Maitland (1815 - 1823)
- Sir Frederick Adam (1823 - 1832)
- Lord Nugent (1832 - 1835)
- Howard Douglas (1835 - 1840)
- James Alexander Stewart Mackenzie (1840 - 1843)
- Lord Seaton (1843 - 1849)
- Sir Henry George Ward (1849 - 1855)
- Sir John Young (1855 - 1859)
- William Ewart Gladstone (1859-1860)°
- Sir Henry Knight Storks (1860 - 1864)
- Count Dimitrios Nikolaou Karousos (1864)°°
°Between 24 November 1859 and 19 February March 1860, William Ewart Gladstone served as Lord High Commissioner Extraordinary to negotiate the political future of the Ionian Islands. He recommended that the Ionian Islands remain under British protection. However, when the Bavarian-born King of Greece, Otto I, was deposed and replaced by an Anglophile, George I, the Ionian Islands were ceded to Greece, ending the position of Lord High Commissioner.
°°Count Dimitrios Nikolaou Karousos, President of the Ionian Parliament, took the post of transitional Greek Governor a year prior to Enosis (Union) with Greece on 21 May 1864.
