Colonial Despatches

Galton was educated at Rugby School and Birmingham, Geneva; he began studies in engineering with the Royal Military Academy at fifteen years of age.1 He was the cousin of the notable geneticist and biostatistician, Sir Francis Galton.2 Galton excelled in the scientific as well as the military aspect of his position with the army.3 He furthered his education in engineering at Chatham and quickly rose within the ranks of the army, being commissioned second lieutenant by 1840, and eventually named captain in 1855.4 Captain Galton took a strong interest in the construction, science and safety of railways.5 He took on the position of secretary to a Royal Commission tasked with the investigation of the use of iron in railway construction.6 Galton held many distinguished titles throughout the 1860s, such as Under-Secretary for War and Director of Public Works and Buildings.7 It was during this later and distinguished period of his life that he was in contact with colonial officials in British Columbia.8 When a discrepancy was found in the accounts of the Royal Engineers working in the Colonies in 1864, Captain Galton sent a letter questioning the accounts and asking Governor Seymour for an explanation.9

• 1. R.H. Vetch, rev. David F Channell Galton, Sir Douglas Strutt (1822-1899), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography; Unknown Obituary. Sir Douglas Strutt Galton, K.C.B, D.C.L., F.R.S., 1823-1899, Minutes of the Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, 137(1899), 413-417.
• 2. Vetch Galton, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
• 3. Unknown Obituary. Galton, Minutes of the Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.
• 4. Vetch Galton, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
• 5. Unknown Obituary. Galton, Minutes of the Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.
• 6. Ibid.
• 7. Vetch Galton, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
• 8. Lugard to Rogers, 27 August 1864, 8264, CO 60/20, p. 280.
• 9. Ibid.