Thomason, James

▪ British colonial governor

born May 3, 1804, Great Shelford, near Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, Eng.

died Sept. 27, 1853, Bareilly, India

      British lieutenant governor of the North-Western Provinces in India and founder of a system of village schools.

      The son of a British clergyman stationed in Bengal, Thomason was educated in England, but he returned to India in 1822. He held numerous positions there, including magistrate-collector and settlement officer in Azamgarh (1832–37) and foreign secretary to the government of India (1842–43). In 1843 he was named lieutenant governor of the North-Western Provinces, and for the next 10 years he served in that post, improving communications, police protection, and social services. By 1853 he had also established a system of 897 locally supported elementary schools in centrally located villages that provided a vernacular education for children throughout the region. He died on the day that Queen Victoria appointed him governor of Madras.

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