William Haynes-Smith


Sir William Frederick Haynes-Smith was an English colonial administrator in the British Empire.

Early life

Haynes-Smith was born in Blackheath, Kent on 26 June 1839. He was the fourth son of Sir John Lucie-Smith, the Chief Justice of Jamaica, and the former Marie van Waterschoodt. Among his siblings was older brother Sir Alfred Lucie-Smith, who was also a colonial judge who married Mary Ross.

Career

He was called to the Bar by the Middle Temple in 1863, and shortly after was sent to British Guiana as Solicitor-General. In 1874, he was appointed Attorney-General. A decade later, he served as acting Governor for a few months, which he also did 1887. In November 1888, he was appointed Governor of the Leeward Islands, followed by a transfer to the Bahamas in 1895. He served as High Commissioner of Cyprus from 1898 to 1904.
He was appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1887, and knighted in the same order in 1890.

Personal life

In 1867, he was married to Ellen Parkinson White at Tunbridge Wells. Ellen was a daughter of English-born James Thomas White and Anne Gordon Hubbard. Ellen's aunt, Mary Greene Hubbard, was the second wife of Russell Sturgis, an American merchant and banker who was the head of Baring Brothers in London. Together, they were the parents of a son and a daughter:
In 1920, he purchased Brandon Park in Suffolk. He died at Turleigh Mill in Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltshire on 18 December 1928.

Descendants

Through his daughter Anne, he was a grandfather of Vice Admiral Sir Michael Villiers, the Fourth Sea Lord and Vice Controller of the Navy.

Appointments