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- Thomas W Edge-Partington
- Also known as
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Thomas W Edge-Partington
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primary name: Edge-Partington, Thomas W
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other name: Edge Partington, Thomas W
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other name: Partington, Thomas W Edge
- Details
- individual; military/naval; official; British; Male
- Life dates
- 28 August 1883-20 April 1920
- Biography
- Son of James Edge-Partington (q.v.) the collector of Pacific Islands artefacts; a lieutenant in the Royal Navy who joined the colonial service in the British Solomon Islands Protectorate, serving as follows:
December 1904 to August 1905 District Magistrate, Gizo
January 1906 to 12 May 1908 District Magistrate, Gizo
20 July 1908 to 31 May 1909 District Magistrate, Gizo
1 September 1909 to 22 February 1912 District Magistrate, Malaita
26 February 1913 to 26 January 1915 District Magistrate, Malaita
During his time in Solomons Islands, collected a large number of photographs of the islands from various sources, including some he took himself. He mounted them in 6 albums, probably during home leave in England, but some remained loose, including a set of stereographs by George Rose.
Thomas' wife Mary ('May') joined him at Auki, Malaita, in 1913. He resigned in 1915 and went to work for a plantation company in Ceylon, where he died in 1920. Mary returned to England and lived until 1971. She donated an important collection of Solomon Islands artefacts to the British Museum. The photograph albums and a few Solomon Islands artefacts were inherited by their son Capt. T. E. Edge-Partington, born 1920 after his father's death and the photographs were copied for the British Museum in 2005.
- Bibliography
- Neich, Roger ‘James Edge-Partington (1854-1930): an ethnologist of independent means’ Records of The Auckland Museum – (Auckland War Memorial Museum) Vol 46, 2009 by pp 57- 110. (pp 89-92 ‘Thomas Edge-Partington in the Solomon Islands’)
Ben Burt (2015) Malaita: A Pictorial History from Solomon Islands. British Museum