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Name: HOWARTH, George Dall MC

Birth Date: 28 May 1888 Rochdale

Death Date: 13 Oct 1964 Nairobi

First Date: 1910

Last Date: 1964

Profession: Went to Kenya to work for Smith Mackenzie in Mombasa, then got a job in Mwanza because of his fluent German. Farmer, farm manager Hatwara Estate, Thika

Area: Mombasa, Eburru, Ngobit, Ruiru, Ridgeways Est. Kiambu for more than 50 years, 1937 Hatwara Est. Thika, Turi, Nairobi

Married: In 1919 Violet Mary Harvey b. 25 Aug 1893 Bethulie, Orange Free State, d. 1980 Harlow, Warwickshire (dau. of George Morgan Harvey, arrived with her parents from S. Africa in 1904)

Children: Una (Tippetts) (1921 Kenya-2008 Adelaide, Australia); Richard Thomas (26.6.1921 Nairobi-18.8.2015 UK); Ruth Violet Harvey (Winsloe-Warder) (1924); Joyce (1925); Geoffrey Dall Harvey (1926); Hilary J. Harvey (1927-1963); Clive Harvey (1928 Ruiru); Robert Francis Harvey (1930); Michael (1931); Eve (1933)

Book Reference: Gillett, Howarth, KAD, Red 25, Hut, Legion, Red 22, Ruiru, Gazette, Medals, Red Book 1912

War Service: Hannington Scouts, Intelligence service in WW1. Awarded MC, Legion - Captain, joined Kenya British Legion in 1931

General Information:

Howarth - During WW1, at one time served under Col. Richard Meinertzhagen, whom he admired tremendously. ....... In searching for the "Konigsberg", on at least one occasion he flew as observer in the primitive aircraft brought up from SA. .......... By the end of WW1 he was in a terrible state of health and had lost considerable weight. ..... During 1917 sent to a convalescent home in Nairobi. One day a local farmer visited the home and invited any of the servicemen to complete their convalescence at his farm at Eburru. He immediately responded "Thanks very much - may I come tomorrow?" The farmer was George Morgan Harvey and his daughter, Violet, was to become his wife .................. In 1918, when the war was finally over, he was asked to remain in the Political Service which was the administration of Tanganyika, but he was thoroughly fed up with living in those unhealthy and lonely areas, so he resigned. He went up to Eburru to live with the Harveys: his health improved as he planned his new life and decided what he wanted to do. He had become interested in coffee planting and was offered a job in this line at Fort Ternan. In February 1919 he married and went to Fort Ternan to live. ........... The owner of the Fort Ternan farm, who had gone to England at the beginning of the war to join his regiment, returned to Kenya in early 1920 to take over the farm so Dad became jobless. ............ He drew a soldier settlement farm in Laikipia on the Ngobit River ..... the northern boundary was the Equator. .... He lived on the farm for a year as required by the S.S.S. and then had to take a job to keep his growing family. He got a job, once more in Mwanza; this time with the Anglo-Baltic Timber Co., and his immediate boss, whom Dad liked very much, was the well-known hunter Denys Finch-Hatton ... After a couple of years this job too came to an end and, once more, the family moved to Eburru while Dad looked around for other employment. ........... got the job of managing a coffee estate a few miles from Ruiru, called "Magumu" which belonged to a Dr. Ramsay Smith. ....... In 1932 Dad had to leave Magumu and, aided by Dr. Ramsay Smith, was lucky to get the job of managing Hatwara, a coffee estate near Thika ... Hatwara had been previously owned by a couple of bachelor brothers named Duncan who had little knowledge of farming and less of housebuilding so, not surprisingly, had gone bankrupt; the farm being taken over by the National Bank of India. ........... They left Hatwara in 1946, farmed at Ruiru for a few years then went into partnership with Uncle Herb on the Turi farm. The altitude here proved too much for Mum so they moved back to the lower Nairobi area where Dad managed several farms at Kiambu, Thika and Nyeri until he retired to a plot on Ridgeways Estate, Kiambu, in 1956. He died in Nairobi in 1964. Mum remained at Ridgeways until 1969 when she sold out, leaving the country to live in SA, Rhodesia and, eventually, England ... where she died in 1980.
Gazette - 7/4/15 - Liable for Jury service, Mombasa - G.D. Howarth - Smith Mackenzie & Co. (Gazi)
Gazette - 11/8/1915 - Appt. - Intelligance Department - To be Lieutenant - Mr George Dall Howarth
Medals - East African Political Department - EA Intelligence Dept., Lieutenant
Red Book 1912 - G.D. Howarth - Mombasa
Gazette - 12/11/1919 - Register of Voters - Lake Area - George Dall Howarth - Farmer - Fort Ternan
Gazette 6 Dec 1938 Ukamba Voters List
Gazette 27 Oct 1964 probate
Barnes Langate Cemetery, Nairobi :in loving / memory of / George Dall / Howarth / 1888 - 1964, d. 13 Oct 1964

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