Des Vœux was born as the eighth of nine children of Reverend Henry Des Vœux and his second wife Fanny Elizabeth Hutton in Baden-Baden, Germany, on 22 September 1834. His grandfather was Sir Charles des Voeux, 1st Baronet. His great-grandfather was a Huguenot from Normandy, France, who settled in Ireland in the early 18th century. Des Vœux attended a public school in London before starting his studies at Charterhouse School and Balliol College, Oxford, but left without a degree after his father gave him the choice of finishing his degree and become a clergyman or seeking his fortune in the colonies. Des Vœux then moved to Canada, where he finished his BA at the University of Toronto and became a barrister in Upper Canada in 1861.
Colonial services
Des Vœux became stipendiary magistrate and superintendent of rivers and creeks in British Guiana from 1863 to 1869, where he championed native causes. He reorganised and codified old French system of law when he was the Administrator and Colonial Secretary of St. Lucia between 1869 and 1880. Afterwards, Des Vœux was appointed Governor of Fiji and High Commissioner for the Western Pacific from 1880 to 1885. He was appointed Governor of Newfoundland from 1886 to 1887. Based on his experience in Guiana where he witnessed many instances of cruel and unjust treatment of indentured servants by plantation owners and managers, des Vœux wrote a 10,000-word report in 1869 to Lord Granville, the Secretary of State for the Colonies in which he detailed many abuses. When the contents of the report were published, there was a great outcry and the Commission of Inquiry into the Treatment of Immigrants was conducted. Des Vœux gave testimony before the commission in Georgetown and its report led to many improvements in the workers' treatment.
Des Vœux served as the tenth Governor of Hong Kong from 1887 to 1891. This was the last post he held in the Colonial Services. During his tenure, in 1888, the Peak Tram began operation, providing relatively affordable transportation for people living on The Peak, an area he segregated, together with effectively all the elevated areas of Hong Kong Island, from crowded Chinese-style tenements by the enactment, in November of that year, of the European District Reservation Ordinance. A year before he left office, the newly established Hong Kong Electric Company began providing electricity to Hong Kong Island.
Post-governorship
After Des Vœux's time as Governor of Hong Kong ended, he entered retirement. He was created a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1893. In 1903, he published his memoirs called My colonial service in British Guiana, St. Lucia, Trinidad, Fiji, Australia, Newfoundland and Hong Kong, with interludes.
Personal life
On 24 July 1875, Des Vœux married Marion Denison Pender, daughter of submarine telegraphy pioneer John Pender. They had two daughters and five sons, three of whom died in infancy. Des Vœux died in Brighton, England, on 15 December 1909.
