Sir Edwin James King
(1877-1952), ColonelSitter in 6 portraits
by Walter Stoneman
bromide print, 1921
NPG x67632
by Walter Stoneman
bromide print, October 1944
NPG x168753
by Walter Stoneman
half-plate glass negative, October 1944
NPG x169716
by Walter Stoneman
half-plate glass negative, October 1944
NPG x169717
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Charles Ashby (great nephew to E J King)
01 January 2020, 23:00
"Edwin James King eldest son of Edwin King and Susannah Louisa his wife was born at South Hackney on April 29th 1877 and was educated at Cheltenham College and Christ Church, Oxford taking his degree as a Master of Arts. In 1896, after serving for a year in the ranks of the Artists' Rifle Volunteers, he was appointed a Second Lieutenant in what became the 7th Battalion Middlesex Regiment, and in the following year was promoted Lieutenant. In the autumn of 1899 the South African War broke out, and in January he proceeded to Cape Town, where he was attached to the Duke of Edinburgh's Own Volunteer Rifles, a Cape Town regiment.
He took part in the operations of Orange River from February to May 1900, and in the operations north of that river from May to July, his regiment forming part of General Sir Charles Warren's Griqualand West Field Force, detached from the main army to suppress the rebels in Griqualand West and Bechuanaland. On May 30th he received his baptism of fire at Faber's Put, where his column was badly surprised at daybreak by a Boer Commando under Commandant De Villiers, only beaten off with great difficulty after heavy losses. After the capture of the town of Campbell and the surrender of De Villier's Commando at Blikfontein on June 22nd, he was transferred to the Imperial Yeomanry Scouts, a corps of Colonial Mounted Rifles, with a body of Zulus and Basutos attached for Intelligence duties.
In July his troop joined Major-General the Earl of Erroll's Mounted Brigade at Mafeking, forming part of General Sir Frederick Carrington's Rhodesia Field Force which had come south from Buluwayo. He took part in the operations west of Pretoria from July to November, including the attempts to relieve Colonel Hore's garrison, blockaded at Eland's River. He was present at the action at Eland's River on August 5th, where his column defeated by General Delarey, and driven back to Mafeking. He took part in the fighting around Zeerust and Ottoshoep from August to October, and on September 5th was attached to the staff of Major-General the Earl of Erroll. At the end of the year he returned to England to resume his studies at Oxford. For his services in South Africa he received the War Medal and three clasps.
On coming down from Oxford he was entered as a member of Lincoln's Inn, and read for the Bar, but was never actually called. He was married at Scarborough Parish Church on March 1st 1905, by the Bishop of Hull, to his second cousin Mildred, the youngest daughter of Richard Ashby and Rosina (born King) his wife, and went to live in Bishop's Avenue, East Finchley; there were no children of this marriage...…" extract from Records of the Family of King.