Harry Smith (1787 - 1860)

Harry Smith

Harry George Wakelyn Smith was a British military officer, colonial governor and high commissioner in South Africa.

Smith began his career in the army as an ensign in 1805, serving in South America (1807), then in Spain. During the War of 1812 in America, Smith Sir Harry Smith was with the British forces that captured and burned Washington, D.C.. He was also a brigade major at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. Smith later commanded a division in the Kafir War (1834-36), during which he made the famous 1,130 km journey from Cape Town to Grahamstown.

From 1835 he was governor of the newly annexed frontier territory named Queen Adelaide prov. Smith was then transferred to India as deputy adjutant general and distinguished himself in the Sikh Wars, especially at the Battle of Aliwala in 1846. Returning to South Africa as governor of the Cape Colony (1847-52), he continued his policy of expansion and waged war on the Boers. In March 1852 he was recalled to Britain, where he held various military posts for the rest of his life. Harry Smith wrote an autobiography which was first published in 1901.