LOCH, HENRY BROUGHAM LOCH, 1ST BARON M.P., of Drylaw, Midlothian, was born on May 23, 1827. After two years' service in the navy, he entered the East India com pany's military service, and in 1842 obtained a commission in the Bengal light cavalry. In the Sikh war in 1845 he served on the staff of Sir Hugh Gough. In 1852 he became second in command of Skinner's Horse. At the outbreak of the Crimean war in 1854, Loch left India, and raised a body of irregular Bulgarian cavalry, which he commanded throughout the war. In 1857 he was ap pointed attache to Lord Elgin's mission to the East, was present at the taking of Canton, and in 1858 brought home the treaty of Yedo. In April 186o he again accompanied Lord Elgin to China, as secretary of the new embassy sent to secure the execu tion by China of her treaty engagements. The embassy was backed up by an allied Anglo-French force. With H. S. Parkes he negoti ated the surrender of the Taku forts. During the advance on Peking Loch was chosen with Parkes to complete the preliminary negotiations for peace at Tungchow. They were accompanied by a small party of officers and Sikhs. On the discovery that the Chinese were planning a treacherous attack on the British force, Loch rode back and warned the outposts. He then returned to Parkes and his party under a flag of truce. All were made pris oners and taken to Peking, where the majority died from torture or disease. Parkes and Loch were at first put in irons, but were afterwards more leniently treated. After three weeks their re lease was agreed, but they had only been liberated ten minutes when orders were received from the Chinese emperor, then a fugitive in Mongolia, for their immediate execution. Loch never entirely recovered his health after his experience in a Chinese dungeon. Returning home he was made C.B., and for a while was private secretary to Sir George Grey, then at the Home Office. In 1863 he was appointed lieutenant-governor of the Isle of Man. In 1882 Loch accepted a commissionership of woods and forests, and two years later was made governor of Victoria. In June 1889
he succeeded Sir Hercules Robinson as governor of Cape Colony and high commissioner of South Africa.
As high commissioner his duties called for the exercise of great judgment and firmness. The Boers were at the same time striv ing to frustate Cecil Rhodes's schemes of northern expansion and planning to occupy Mashonaland, to secure control of Swazi land and Zululand and to acquire the adjacent lands up to the ocean. Loch firmly supported Rhodes, and, by informing Presi dent Kruger that troops would be sent to prevent any invasion of territory under British protection, he effectually crushed the "Banyailand trek" across the Limpopo (189o-91). Loch, how ever, with the approval of the imperial government, concluded in July—August 1890 a convention with President Kruger respecting Swaziland, by which, while the Boers withdrew all claims to terri tory north of the Transvaal, they were granted an outlet to the sea at Kosi bay on condition that the republic enter the South African Customs union. This convention was concluded after negotiations conducted with Kruger by J. H. Hofmeyr on behalf of the high commissioner, and was made at a time when the British and Bond parties in Cape Colony were working in har mony. The Transvaal did not, however, fulfil the necessary con dition, and in view of the increasingly hostile attitude of the Pretoria administration to Great Britain Loch advocated the annexation by Britain of the territory east of Swaziland, through which the Boer railway to the sea would have passed. He induced the British government to adopt his view and on March 15, 1895, it was announced that these territories (Amatongaland, etc.), would be annexed by Britain. Meantime Loch had travelled to Pretoria to use his personal influence with President Kruger on behalf of the Uitlanders, and obtained the withdrawal of the obnoxious commandeering regulations. In the following year he entered a strong protest against the new Transvaal franchise law. In 1895 he returned home and was raised to the peerage. He died in London on June 20, 1900.