Oscar Ferris Watkins
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Lt Col Oscar Ferris Watkins CMG CBE DSO (1877–1943) was a British colonial administrator, Commandant of the East African Carrier Corps in the First World War. After the war he was acting Kenya Chief Native Commissioner and a Provincial Commissioner, and first editor of a Swahili newspaper Baraza.
He was the son of Rev Oscar Dan Watkins (1848–1926) - Archdeacon of Lucknow, and Elizabeth Martha née Ferris (1846–1928) born in Allahabad.
Educated at Marlborough and a postgraduate at All Souls College, Oxford, by virtue of being a Founder's Kin, Watkins enlisted in ranks of the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry in the Second Boer War subsequently joining the South African Police. In 1907 he moved to Kenya and as a junior District Commissioner in Kenya he was a magistrate in the Kenya Slave courts, freeing slaves from Arab slavers on the East African coast and developing a lasting interest in Swahili culture.
During the First World War Watkins set up the Carrier Corps and strove to organise an effective force while at the same time protecting the hundreds of thousands of African porters conscripted into the force from the excessive demands of the British Military. After the war, as acting Kenya Chief Native Commissioner his active stance in protecting the land rights of the native Kenya tribes against the encroachments of white Kenya Settler interests earned him the enmity of the governor Sir Edward Denham.
In 1917 he married Olga Florence née Baillie Grohman, widow of Thomas Acland Douglas Thompson (1881-1915); and daughter of William Adolf Baillie Grohman (1851–1921) and Florence née Nickalls (1861–1945). They had three daughters:
- Olga Penelope Ferris 'Pella' Watkins (1917–1992) who married Oliver Montgomery
- Grace Veronica Ferris 'Ronnie' Watkins (1920–2011) who married Brigadier Patrick Malcolm Hughes MBE (1911–1996)
- Elizabeth June Ferris Watkins (1923–2012) who married Oliver Staniforth Knowles (1920–2008). She wrote biographies of both Olga[1] and Oscar.[2]
See also
- East African Campaign (World War I)
- History of Kenya - Colonial History
- History of Tanzania - First World War
- Elizabeth Watkins
Bibliography
- Oscar from Africa - Biography of O.F. Watkins. Radcliff Press 1995
- The Carrier Corps - Military Labour in the East African Campaign 1914-18. Geoffrey Hodges Greenwood Press NY 1986
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References
- ^ Watkins, Elizabeth (2005). Olga in Kenya: Repressing the Irrepressible. Brighton, Sussex, England: Pen Press Publishers Ltd. p. 9. ISBN 978-1905203741.
- ^ Watkins, Elizabeth (1995). Oscar from Africa - The Biography of Oscar Ferris Watkins 1877-1943. London, England: Radcliffe Press. ISBN 9781850439486. Retrieved 17 January 2016.
- Use dmy dates from April 2012
- 1877 births
- 1943 deaths
- Settlers of Kenya
- British Army personnel of the Second Boer War
- British military personnel of World War I
- Companions of the Distinguished Service Order
- Colonial Administrative Service officers
- Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry soldiers
- Alumni of All Souls College, Oxford
- Members of the Legislative Council of Kenya