Colonel Sir Thomas Hungerford Holdich, KCMG, KCIE, CB (1843-1929) was a British geographer and president of the Royal Geographical Society. He is best known as Superintendent of Frontier Surveys in British India and author of numerous books, including The Gates of India and Political Frontiers and Boundary Making. The Royal Geographical Society is a learned society, founded in 1830 with the name Geographical Society of London for the advancement of geographical science, under the patronage of King William IV. It absorbed the Association for Promoting the Discovery of the Interior Parts of Africa (founded by Joseph Banks in... British India (otherwise known as The British Raj) was a historical period during which most of the Indian subcontinent, or present-day India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Myanmar, were under the colonial authority of the British Empire (Undivided India). ...

Born in Dingley, Northamptonshire, United Kingdom to the Rev. Thomas Holdich, he was educated at Godolphin Grammar School and the Royal Military Academy, obtaining a commission in the Royal Engineers in 1862. He saw active service in the Bhutan expedition of 1865, the Abyssinian campaign of 1867-68 and the Second Afghan War of 1878-79. Northamptonshire (abbreviated Northants or Nhants) is a landlocked county in central England with a population of 629,676 (2001 census). ... The Royal Military Academy was founded in 1741 in Woolwich, south-east London. ... The Corps of Royal Engineers, usually just called the Royal Engineers (RE), and commonly known as the Sappers, is one of the corps of the British Army. ... This article needs cleanup. ... ...

During peacetime, he was largely occupied with the survey of India, and served on the Afghan Boundary Commission of 1884-86, the Tasmar Boundary Commission of 1894, the Pamir Boundary Commission of 1895 and the Perso-Baluchistan Boundary Commission of 1896. He was also engaged by the governments of Argentina and Chile in 1892 to define the boundary along the Andes Mountains. He was awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Geographical Society in 1887 in recognition of his work on the Afghan frontier. The Andes form the longest mountain chain in the world. ...

On his retirement in 1898, he thanked "that providence which had been good to me in that during that last year of my Indian career I had been able to put a round finish on the last of our frontier maps". In later years, he wrote and lectured extensively on geographical issues, and served as president of the Royal Geographical Society from 1917-19.

Sir Thomas was married to Ada Vanrenan, and had two daughters and one son. He died in 1929 at his home at Parklands in Merrow, Surrey, near Guildford, at the age of 86. The village of Merrow, in Surrey, United Kingdom, is now a relatively anonymous suburb of Guildford, but within its church you can still find signs of its great age. ... Statistics Population: 66819 (2001) Ordnance Survey OS grid reference: SU9949 Administration District: Guildford Shire county: Surrey Region: South East England Constituent country: England Sovereign state: United Kingdom Other Ceremonial county: Surrey Historic county: Surrey Services Police force: Surrey Police Ambulance service: South East Coast Post office and telephone Post town...

External links

• Biography from the Holdich Family History Society