Maj.-Gen. Sir Howard Douglas

Maj.-Gen. Sir Howard Douglas, 3rd Baronet GCB GCMG FRS (1776–1861) was a British military officer born in Gosport, England, the younger son of Admiral Sir Charles Douglas, and a descendant of the Earls of Morton. He was a British general, author, colonial administrator and Member of Parliament for Liverpool.

Following the death of his mother in 1779, Howard was raised by his aunt near Edinburgh. As a boy, he wanted to join the Royal Navy and follow in the footsteps of his father and older brother. His father agreed to take him to sea when he was thirteen years of age, but Sir Charles died of apoplexy while in Edinburgh just after he arrived to collect Howard in 1789. Howard's guardians thought it better that he serve in the Army instead, and he entered the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, in 1790. He was commissioned Second Lieutenant in the Royal Artillery in 1794, becoming Lieutenant a few months later.

In 1795 he was shipwrecked while in charge of a draft for Canada, and lived with his men for a whole winter on the Labrador coast. Soon after his return to England in 1799 he was made a Captain-Lieutenant. In his regimental service during the next few years, he was attached to all branches of the artillery in succession, becoming Captain in 1804, after which he was placed on half-pay to serve at the Royal Military College, then located at High Wycombe. He taught military strategy and was an authority on military and naval engineering. He served intermittently as commandant of the senior department and as inspector general of instructions at the Royal Military College. In 1804, Douglas was appointed to a majority in the York Rangers, a corps immediately afterwards reduced. He remained on the roll of its officers until promoted Major-General. The senior department of the RMC at High Wycombe, of which he was in charge, was the forerunner of the Staff College. Douglas was promoted brevet Lieutenant-Colonel in 1806. He served in 1808-1809 in the Peninsular War and was present at the Battle of Corunna, after which he took part in the Walcheren Campaign.

On the death of his half-brother, Vice-Admiral Sir William Douglas in 1809, he succeeded to the baronetcy. In 1812 he was employed in special missions in the north of Spain, and took part in numerous minor operations in this region, but he was soon recalled, the Home Government deeming his services indispensable to the Royal Military College. He became brevet Colonel in 1814 and a fellow of the Royal Society in 1816.

In 1820 he wrote A Treatise on Naval Gunnery (of which numerous editions and translations appeared up to the general introduction of rifled ordnance) which became a standard text-book, and indeed first drew attention to the subject of which it treated.

Sir Howard became Governor of New Brunswick (1823–31) and had to deal with the Maine boundary dispute with the United States of 1828. He also founded Fredericton College (King's College), now known as the University of New Brunswick, of which he was the first Chancellor. He was governor during the Miramichi fire of 1825, and his actions during that crisis increased his popularity with the people of the province. From 1835 to 1840 Douglas, now a GCMG, was Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands, where, amongst other reforms, he introduced a new code of laws. In 1837 he became a Lieutenant-General, in 1840 a KCB, in 1841 a civil GCB, and in 1851 a General. From 1842 to 1847 Douglas sat as a Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) for Liverpool, where he took a prominent part in debates on military and naval matters and on the corn laws. He was frequently consulted on important military questions. He was one of the founders of the Royal Geographical Society and was awarded an honorary Doctor of Civil Law from Oxford University.