Everard im Thurn

{{Short description|British colonial administrator, explorer and author (1852–1932)}}

{{Infobox governor

| honorific-prefix =

| name = Sir Everard Ferdinand im Thurn

| honorific-suffix = KCMG KBE CB FRAI

| image = Henk-sneevliet.gif

| alt = Black and white portrait photograph of Everard im Thurm

| order = 8th

| office = Governor of Fiji

| term_start = 11 October 1904

| term_end = 21 February 1911

| predecessor = Sir Henry Jackson

| successor = Sir Francis May

| order1 = 7th

| office1 = High Commissioner for the Western Pacific

| term_start1 = 11 October 1904

| term_end1 = 21 February 1911

| predecessor1 = Sir Henry Jackson

| successor1 = Sir Francis May

| monarch1 = Edward VII, George V

| order2 = Acting

| office2 = Governor of British Ceylon

| term_start2 = 19 November 1903

| term_end2 = 3 December 1903

| predecessor2 = Joseph West Ridgeway

| successor2 = Henry Arthur Blake

| monarch2 = Edward VII

| birth_date = 9 May 1852

| birth_place = Camberwell, London, England

| death_date = {{death date and age|df=y|1932|10|09|1852|5|9}}

| death_place =

| nationality = British

| spouse = Hannah Cassels Lorimer, Lady im Thurn

| alma_mater = University of Edinburgh

}}

Sir Everard Ferdinand im Thurn {{post-nominals|country=GBR|size=100%|KCMG|KBE|CB|FRAI}} (9 May 1852 – 9 October 1932) was an author, explorer, botanist, photographer and British colonial administrator. He was Governor of Fiji in the years 1904–1910.

Life

Im Thurn was born in Camberwell, London,{{Cite web |url=http://search.findmypast.co.uk/results/world-records/england-and-wales-births-1837-2006?firstname=everard%20&lastname=thurn |title=Findmypast.co.uk |access-date=21 April 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170422134352/http://search.findmypast.co.uk/results/world-records/england-and-wales-births-1837-2006?firstname=everard%20&lastname=thurn |archive-date=22 April 2017 |url-status=dead }} the son of a Swiss immigrant banker, and educated at Marlborough College, University of Oxford, the University of Edinburgh, and the University of Sydney. His first book, dedicated to his headmaster, was a study of The Birds of Marlborough (1870).{{cite web|title=The Birds of Marlborough|url=https://archive.org/details/birdsofmarlborou00imth|website=Archive.org|year=1870 }}

After his education, im Thurn travelled to British Guiana—called Guyana since its independence from Great Britain—to become (at the age of 25) curator of the British Guiana Museum from 1877 until 1882. He later became a stipendiary magistrate in Pomeroon.

In December 1884 he led the first successful expedition to the summit of Mount Roraima, in Venezuela's Gran Sabana region, along with Harry Perkins, an Assistant Crown Surveyor who was also living in British Guiana. He was a keen photographer and author of several works related to his expedition to Roraima, which were published in scientific journals, including: "The Botany of Roraima Expedition of 1884: being notes on the plants observed; with a list of the species collected, and determinations of those that are new" (Linnean Society, 1887), and "Among the Indians of Guiana: being sketches, chiefly anthropologic from the interior of British Guiana, etc.", which includes detailed observations of the Pemon Indians of Venezuela. Im Thurn went on to become a government agent in British Guiana from 1891 to 1899, and was employed on the Venezuelan boundary commission 1897–99, for which he was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath (CB) in the 1900 New Year Honours list on 1 January 1900{{Cite newspaper The Times |title=New Year Honours |date=1 January 1900 |page=9 |issue=36027}} (the order was gazetted on 16 January 1900),{{London Gazette |issue=27154 |date=16 January 1900 |page=285 }} and was invested by Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle on 1 March 1900.{{Cite newspaper The Times |title=Court Circular|date=2 March 1900 |page=6 |issue=36079}}

He then spent a couple of years back in the United Kingdom, holding several positions from 1899 to 1901, including 1st class clerk and later principal clerk in the Colonial Office. In July 1901 he moved to Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), where he was appointed colonial secretary{{London Gazette |issue=27330 |date=5 July 1901 |page=4470}} and lieutenant-governor.{{London Gazette |issue=27339 |date=30 July 1901 |page=5047}} He ended his colonial career as Governor of Fiji from 1904 to 1910,{{cite journal |title = Modern buccaneers in the West Pacific |url= http://dl.lib.brown.edu/pdfs/1140814207532014.pdf |date= 5 June 1913|journal= New Age |pages=136–140 }} during which time he was knighted as a Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (KCMG) in the 1905 Birthday Honours.{{London Gazette|issue=27811|page=4549|supp=y|date=27 June 1905}} He was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) in the 1918 New Year Honours, at which time he was vice-chairman of the King George and Queen Mary's Club for Overseas Forces.{{London Gazette|issue=30576|date=12 March 1918|supp=y|page=3286}}

He was a well-respected figure in the scientific circles of his time. Whilst in Ceylon he served as president of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society from 1902 to 1904.{{cite web|url=http://www.royalasiaticsociety.lk/about-2/past-presidents/|title=Past Presidents|date=18 November 2009 |publisher=Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka|access-date= 7 January 2017}} He was later elected president of the Royal Anthropological Institute 1919–1920 and made an Honorary Fellow of Exeter College, Oxford.

In 1895, he married Hannah C. Lorimer, daughter of Professor James Lorimer, of the University of Edinburgh.{{Cite journal|last=Albuquerque|first=Sara|date=2012-10-01|title=Watercolours of orchids native to British Guiana at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, attributed to Hannah Cassels im Thurn (1854–1947)|url=https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q61045915|journal=Archives of Natural History|volume=39|issue=2|pages=344–347|doi=10.3366/anh.2012.0101}} In 1921 they moved to live at Cockenzie House in East Lothian, where he died in 1932.

In 1886, he was honoured by English botanist Henry Nicholas Ridley, who named a genus of plants from tropical South America after him:{{cite book | last=Quattrocchi | first=Umberto | title=CRC World Dictionary of Plant Names, Volume II, D–L | publisher=CRC Press | location=Boca Raton, Florida | year=2000 | isbn=978-0-8493-2676-9}} Everardia, in the family Cyperaceae.{{cite web |title=Everardia Ridl. {{!}} Plants of the World Online {{!}} Kew Science |url=https://powo.science.kew.org/taxon/urn:lsid:ipni.org:names:13758-1 |website=Plants of the World Online |access-date=14 May 2021 |language=en}}

References

This article contains content from the defunct wiki, Hierarchypedia, used here under the [https://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html GNU Free Documentation License].
Im Thurn, E.F. (1885). The Ascent of Mount Roraima. Proceedings of the Royal Geographic Society VII: 497–521.