b. 1820
d. 1896
Captain George Henry Richards, was born 13 January 1820 and entered the Royal Navy
in 1832. He joined the
Sulphur as midshipman in 1836, saw active service in China, 1838-40, and was promoted to
lietenant in July 1842. He spent the next three years surveying the southeast coast
of South America and won promotion to commander while on active service up the Parana
River in 1845.
From 1847 to 1852, Richards was second in command to Capt. John L. Stokes's survey
of the New Zealand coast. He then served on the
Assistance, travelling to the Arctic in 1852-54 in search of Sir John Franklin's expedition.
Promoted captain on 21 October 1854, Richards was commissioned on the
Plumper in 1856; he arrived at
Esquimalt on 9 November 1857 as second commissioner in the commission to survey the British-American
boundary. Richards transferred to the
Plumper's replacement, the
Hecate, in January 1861 and returned to England in December 1862. He became Hydrographer
of the Navy in 1864. Richards retired in 1874, was knighted in 1877, and became admiral
in 1884. He died on 14 November 1896.
Dorothy Blakey Smith, The Journal of Arthur Thomas Bushby, 1858-1859, BCHQ 21, (1957-58): 192-93. See also London Times, 17 November 1896. VI 37.4. See Clowes, Royal Navy, pp. 464-65. BCMM dossier.