Richard Clement Moody
Richard Clement Moody was a British Governor and Commander of the elite Royal Engineers, Columbia Detachment, as which he was the founder and the first Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia, in which he owned more than 3049 acres of land.
He was also Commanding Executive Officer of Malta during the Crimean War; and was the first British Governor of the Falkland Islands, of which he founded their capital Port Stanley, Moody Brook, and Moody Point in Antarctica.
Moody founded the Colony of British Columbia whilst selected to 'found a second England on the shores of the Pacific' by Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton: who desired to send 'representatives of the best of British culture' who had 'courtesy, high breeding, and urbane knowledge of the world'. The British Government deemed Moody to be the definitive 'English gentleman and British Officer'. Moody's original title was 'Chief Commissioner of Lands and Works for British Columbia' before he was redesignated the first Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia, as which he founded the capital of British Columbia, New Westminster, for which been described as 'the real father of New Westminster'.
Moody also founded the Cariboo Road and Stanley Park, and named Burnaby Lake after his secretary Robert Burnaby, and Port Coquitlam's 400-foot 'Mary Hill' after his wife, Mary Susannah Hawks. He designed the first Coat of Arms of British Columbia. Port Moody, and Moody Park and Moody Square in New Westminster, are named after him.
Like his father and siblings, Moody was a polymath who excelled in engineering, architecture, and music. He planned the restoration of Edinburgh Castle using musical chords, for which he was summoned to Windsor Castle for commendation by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. He has been described as "a visionary in a plain land".
Birth and ancestry
Richard Clement Moody was born on 13 February 1813 at St. Ann's Garrison, Barbados, into a high church landed gentry family with a history of military service, which included Jacobites who had fought Britain's Protestant monarchy, and had ancestry in common with George Washington, the founder and first President of the United States of America.He was the third of ten children of Colonel Thomas Moody, CRE WI, ADC, Kt., and Martha Clement, who was the daughter of the Napoleonic Wars veteran and Barbados landowner Richard Clement after whom he was named, and the aunt of Belgravia cricketers Reynold Clement and Richard Clement. His father's English residences were 23 Bolton Street, Mayfair and 13 Curzon Street, Mayfair.
His paternal cousin was the high church clergyman Clement Moody, Vicar of Newcastle. His eldest paternal uncle, Charles Moody, of Longtown, was a gentleman farmer who inherited the family's trade of foreign food-commodities. His paternal grandmother was Barbara Blamire of Cumberland, a cousin of William Blamire MP High Sheriff of Cumberland and of the poet Susanna Blamire.
Siblings
Richard Clement Moody's siblings included Major Thomas Moody ; The Rev. James Leith Moody ; Colonel Hampden Clement Blamire Moody CB ; and the sugar-manufacture expert Shute Barrington Moody, through whom his nephew was Commander Thomas Barrington Moody of the Royal Navy.Education
Richard Clement Moody was educated by private tutors. His primary intellectual influence were the works of Montesquieu, and he was said to be interested from a young age in 'political economy and in learning the character and peculiarities of the people amongst whom he was thrown'.Like his father, and like his brother Hampden Clement Blamire Moody, Richard Clement Moody was a polymath who excelled in engineering, architecture, and music. He later planned the restoration of Edinburgh Castle using music.
He was from the age of 14 years educated as a Gentleman Cadet at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, at which he became Head of School during his second year and graduated during his third year.
Overview of military and civic career
Richard Clement Moody trained on the Ordnance Survey in 1829, when he received an inheritance from his maternal grandfather and namesake the landowner Richard Clement.Moody was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Royal Engineers, in which his father was a prestigious officer, in 1830. The Royal Engineers during the 19th century were a socially exclusive elite land-marine force, whose officers were drawn from the upper middle class and landed gentry of British society, who performed, in addition to military engineering, 'reconnaissance work, led storming parties, demolished obstacles in assaults, carried out rear-guard actions in retreats and other hazardous tasks'.
Moody was promoted to Lieutenant 1835, to Second Captain in 1844, to Captain in 1847, to Major in January 1855, to Lieutenant-Colonel in 1855, to Colonel in 1858, and to Major-General in 1866.
Moody served with the Ordnance Survey in Ireland from 1832 to 1833.
He served on Saint Vincent from October 1833 to September 1837, where his elder brother Thomas died in 1839. He subsequently served on a tour the United States, with Sir Charles Felix Smith, from 1837 to 1838. On his return from the USA, Moody was stationed at Devonport. Moody served as Professor of Fortifications at Royal Military Academy, Woolwich from July 1838 to October 1841.
Moody was in October 1841 appointed Lieutenant-Governor of the Falkland-Islands: this office was renamed Governor of the Falkland Islands in 1843, when he also became Commander-in-Chief of the Falkland Islands. He served in these offices until July 1848, when he left Stanley, and arrived in England in February 1849. Moody in 1848 received the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Military Merit of France.
He served as an aide-de-camp to the British Colonial Office, on special service, from August 1849. He served at Chatham Dockyard and at Plymouth during 1851. Moody was appointed Commanding Royal Engineer of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1852, as which he served until 1854. Moody was Executive Officer at Malta, during 1854, during the Crimean War, but was compelled to resign from this post in May 1855 as a consequence of insufficient health. He toured Germany before his appointment as Commander of the Royal Engineers in Scotland in November 1855.
Moody was appointed the Commander of the elite Royal Engineers, Columbia Detachment; the Chief Commissioner of Lands and Works for British Columbia; and the first Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia, from December 1858 to July 1863.
Moody returned to England from British Columbia in December 1863, whilst he continued to own over 3049 acres of land in British Columbia. Moody was Commanding Royal Engineer at Chatham Dockyard between March 1864 and January 1866. On 25 January 1866, he was promoted to Major-General, and he retired from the British Army, on full pay, later that month.
Moody then served as a Municipal Commissioner, and expended his time between the learned societies of which he was a member. Moody was elected an Associate of the Institution of Civil Engineers on 23 April 1839, and was therefore one of its oldest members. He was also a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, and a Member of the Royal Agricultural Society, and an Honorary Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects.
Moody during his retirement lived at Burwarton, Shropshire, and at Caynham House, Ludlow, Shropshire, and at Woodfield, Weston under Penyard, near Ross, and later at Fairfield House, Charmouth, Lyme Regis. His friends included the politician Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton and the biologist Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker.
Moody died at the Royal Bath Hotel, Bournemouth, on 31 March 1887, whilst visiting Bournemouth with his daughter, and was buried at St Peter's Church, Bournemouth. He left over £24,000 in money in addition to his estates which included over 3049 acres in British Columbia.
Governor of the Falkland Islands (October 1841 – July 1848)
Settlement
In 1833 the Great Britain asserted its authority over the Falkland Islands. In 1841, Moody, aged only 28 years, was appointed, on the recommendation of Lord Vivian, to be the first Lieutenant-Governor of the Falkland Islands. It is likely that the lauded reputation, at the Colonial Office, of Richard Clement Moody's father, Colonel Thomas Moody, CRE WI, ADC, Kt., contributed to the Office's decision to appoint him to an important position at an unprecedentedly young age, and to grant him powers that were exceptional relative to those of other British Colonial Governors. Moody was directed by Lord John Russell to exercise an authority of 'influence, persuasion, and example'. Richard Clement Moody departed England, for The Falkland Islands, on 1 October 1841. His office was renamed Governor of the Falkland Islands in 1843, when he became Commander-in-Chief of the Falkland Islands.When Moody arrived, on the Hebe, at Port Louis on 16 January 1842, the Falklands was 'almost in a state of anarchy', but he used his powers 'with great wisdom and moderation' to develop the Islands' infrastructure. Moody's General Report of the Falkland Islands for the British Government was completed on 14 April 1842 and was sent to London on 3 May. In his General Report, Moody recommended that the Government encourage settlers and promote extensive sheep farming. He estimated that the population of sheep were 40,000 in 1842 and encouraged the Government to import quality stock from Britain to be crossed with the local breeds: this policy was implemented to considerable success and was adopted by future settlers.
Moody's secretary, Murrell Robinson Robinson, a surveyor and engineer, was the nephew of one of Moody's tutors. Moody appointed Robinson as a JP in 1843, but banished him from the Islands in March 1845, with the statement that he set-out 'axe in hand' for some other colony. The botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker, who arrived on the Islands with the expedition of Sir James Clark Ross, described Moody as 'a very active and intelligent young man, most anxious to improve the colony and gain every information respecting its products'. Moody granted Hooker use of his personal library, which Hooker described as 'excellent', and the two became friends. Moody's refusal to acquiesce to George Thomas Whitington's attempt to force him to travel in the brig Alarm provoked a feud between their families that continued during Moody's tenure as Governor of the Falkland Islands and in the Colonial Magazine of November 1844.