Sir Thomas Stamford Bingley Raffles (1781-1826), Colonial governor and zoologist

Sitter in 4 portraits
A collector and scholar, Raffles was a colonial administrator in South East Asia. In 1805 he was Assistant Secretary to the government of Penang, off the Malay coast. In 1811 he was made Lieutenant-Governor of Java following Britain's invasion. After introducing a series of laws to reform local customs, he was recalled in 1815 when the British returned Java to the Dutch. In 1819 he took over the governorship of Sumatra and acquired Singapore where, between 1822 and 1824, he oversaw the development of a thriving commercial port for the British.