Lord Charles Henry Somerset

Lord Charles Henry Somerset (1767-1831) [1]. Governor of the Cape of Good Hope from 1814-1827.

A controversial yet influential man, who battled, inter alia, with Pringle and Fairbairn about the freedom of the press, the farmers on the border about their safety and the Dutch about their language. But he also provided Cape Town with the Somerset Hospital, the South African Library and Museum. Like sir George Yonge (qv) before him, he was also a keen supporter of the theatre and during his term of office theatre in Cape Town flourished. He not only supported it, he and his wife attended everything he could - English and Dutch, and thus encouraged theatrical activity immeasurably.

Sources

Fletcher, 1994.

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