Sir Andrew Caldecott (1884–1951) was a British colonial administrator, born on 26 October 1884 at Boxley in Kent and educated at Uppingham School and Exeter College, Oxford, where he took a BA in Classics in 1907. He joined the Colonial Office in November 1907 and was posted to Malaya, serving in Negeri Sembilan, and over nearly three decades held posts from district officer to Colonial Secretary of the Straits Settlements (1933–1935), briefly acting as Governor of the Straits Settlements in 1934 and gaining a name for conciliation and good race relations; he was also the first president of the Football Association of Malaysia. On 12 December 1935 he arrived in Hong Kong as its nineteenth Governor, unusually electing to wear civilian dress. His tenure brought a run of reforms: on 1 January 1936 the old Sanitary Board was reconstituted as the Urban Council, Kai Tak saw its first regular flights and Queen Mary Hospital opened as an adjunct to the University of Hong Kong, while the Jubilee Reservoir was also completed. As conditions in China worsened he met Nationalist officials repeatedly, hosting Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek in Canton in September 1936, and more than 100,000 refugees from the mainland flooded into the colony, while he advocated promoting Chinese civil servants. Hong Kong became a haven for mainland capital, talent and refugees and its population and business activity rose sharply; he also dealt with air-raid precautions, defence and sanitation and expanded schools and medical facilities. On 16 April 1937 he left Hong Kong to govern Ceylon, a posting prompted by the national liberation movement there; his departure dismayed the community, and locals petitioned Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden to keep him, to no avail. He served as Governor of Ceylon from 16 October 1937 to 19 September 1944. In retirement he published two collections of supernatural fiction, Not Exactly Ghosts (1947) and Fires Burn Blue (1948), and he also composed the melody of the Negeri Sembilan state anthem. He died at Itchenor, Sussex, on 14 July 1951. Caldecott Road in Kowloon Tong, and Caldecott Hill and Caldecott MRT station in Singapore, are named after him.
Caldecott's reconstitution of the Sanitary Board as the Urban Council turned Hong Kong's municipal management from a sanitation-led body into a broader civic service and shaped the postwar council. Facing war in China and an influx of refugees, he expanded defence, sanitation, schooling and medical facilities, and was among the last prewar governors able to plan the city's development in relative order.
Achievements
- 1907 · Joined the Federated Malay States government, beginning a long colonial service career in Malaya and the Straits Settlements
- 1935 · Arrived in Hong Kong on 12 December to become the nineteenth Governor
- 1936 · Reconstituted the Sanitary Board as the Urban Council on 1 January and hosted Chiang Kai-shek in Canton in September