Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Purves Phayre, GCMG, KCSI

Order of the Star of India

The Most Exalted Order of the Star of India is an order of chivalry founded by Queen Victoria in 1861. The Order includes members of three classes:# Knight Grand Commander # Knight Commander # Companion...

, CB

Order of the Bath

The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...

 (7 May 1812 – 14 December 1885) was a career British Indian Army

British Indian Army

The British Indian Army, officially simply the Indian Army, was the principal army of the British Raj in India before the partition of India in 1947...

 officer who was the first Commissioner

Commissioner

Commissioner is in principle the title given to a member of a commission or to an individual who has been given a commission ....

 of British Burma, 1862–1867, Governor

Governor

A governor is a governing official, usually the executive of a non-sovereign level of government, ranking under the head of state...

 of Mauritius

Mauritius

Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about east of Madagascar...

, 1874–1878, and author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

.

Related to Lt Gen Sir Robert Phayre, also served in India; part of Phayre family, of which Lt Col Robert Phayre, who served the British administration in Ireland in 1600s, also signed death warrant of Charles 1.

Descendants: Colonel Robert Bernard Phayre MC Queens Own Ghurkas, son Colonel Robin Desmond Phayre RA, son Lt Col Robin Phayre LI, cousin Col Terence Phayre Knott MC RM, of whom son Captain Robert Knott AAC changed name by deed poll to Phayre, to prevent family name dying out, lives in Kenya.

Early life

Phayre was born in Shrewsbury

Shrewsbury

Shrewsbury is the county town of Shropshire, in the West Midlands region of England. Lying on the River Severn, it is a civil parish home to some 70,000 inhabitants, and is the primary settlement and headquarters of Shropshire Council...

 and educated at Shrewsbury School

Shrewsbury School

Shrewsbury School is a co-educational independent school for pupils aged 13 to 18, founded by Royal Charter in 1552. The present campus to which the school moved in 1882 is located on the banks of the River Severn in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England...

. He joined the Indian Army in 1828. In 1846 he was appointed assistant to the commissioner of the province of Tenasserim, Burma, and in 1849 he was made commissioner of Arakan

Rakhine State

Rakhine State is a Burmese state. Situated on the western coast, it is bordered by Chin State in the north, Magway Region, Bago Region and Ayeyarwady Region in the east, the Bay of Bengal to the west, and the Chittagong Division of Bangladesh to the northwest. It is located approximately between...

. After the Second Anglo-Burmese War

Second Anglo-Burmese War

The Second Anglo-Burmese War was the second of the three wars fought between the Burmese and the British Empire during the 19th century, with the outcome of the gradual extinction of Burmese sovereignty and independence....

 (1852), he became commissioner of Pegu

Bago Division

Bago Region is an administrative region of Burma, located in the southern central part of the country. It is bordered by Magway Region and Mandalay Region to the north; Kayin State, Mon State and the Gulf of Martaban to the east; Yangon Region to the south and Ayeyarwady Region and Rakhine State...

. He was made a Brevet Captain in 1854 and in 1862 he was promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel.

Government office

In 1862 Phayre was made commissioner for the entire province of British Burma. He left Burma in 1867.

He served as 12th Governor of Mauritius from 21 Sep 1874 to 31 Dec 1878.

He was appointed a CB in 1864, promoted to Colonel in 1866 and was knighted with the KCSI in 1867. In 1871, he was promoted to Major-General and was promoted to Lieutenant-General in 1873. He retired to Bray

Bray

Bray is a town in north County Wicklow, Ireland. It is a busy urban centre and seaside resort, with a population of 31,901 making it the fourth largest in Ireland as of the 2006 census...

 in Ireland and was appointed a GCMG in 1878.

Naturalist

Phayre wrote the first standard History of Burma (1883). He is commemorated in the names of a number of animals, including:

• Phayre's Leaf Monkey
  Phayre's Leaf Monkey
  Phayre's leaf monkey , also known as Phayre's langur, is a species of lutung found in Southeast Asia. The species epithet commemorates Arthur Purves Phayre....
  
  , Trachypithecus phayrei
• Indochinese Flying Squirrel
  Indochinese Flying Squirrel
  The Indochinese Flying Squirrel is a species of rodent in the Sciuridae family. It is found in China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam....
  
  , Hylopetes phayrei
• Phayre's Squirrel, Callosciurus phayrei
• Eared Pitta
  Eared Pitta
  The Eared Pitta is a species of bird in the Pittidae family.It is found in Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam....
  
  , Pitta phayrei
• Brown Asian Forest Tortoise, Manouria emys phayrei subspecies of Manouria emys
  Manouria emys
  Asian forest tortoise , also known as Asian brown tortoise, is a species of tortoise found in India , Bangladesh, Burma , Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia .-Description:...
  
  

External links

• http://www.worldstatesmen.org/Myanmar.htm