Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 15.djvu/306

 opinions formed respecting the state of gunnery in the British navy during the war had led the writer to reflect how that important branch of our national system might be improved. The work was dedicated to Lord Melville, then first lord, and published with the sanction of the admiralty. Contrary to expectation, it attracted little notice from the public, but was well received by the navy, and long afterwards bore fruit in the establishment of the Excellent gunnery-ship and other improvements. Douglas's strictures on Carnot drew a rejoinder from a French engineer, M. Augoyat. Copies of the latter work were forwarded by Douglas, then residing in Paris, to the Duke of Wellington, who was officially interested in the fortresses then in course of erection by the Prussians on the Rhine frontier, and led to the artillery experiments carried out at Woolwich, in accordance with Douglas's suggestions, in 1822. In 1823 he was governor of New Brunswick, where he founded the university of Fredericton, and did much to improve the roads, the lighting of the coast, and other matters, and displayed great firmness and tact in checking the attempted American encroachment on the Maine frontier in 1828. The Maine boundary question having been referred for arbitration to the king of the Netherlands, Douglas was recalled and sent on a mission to the Hague to supply information on certain points. He was afterwards employed on a secret mission of observation on the Dutch frontier during the Belgian revolution. He opposed the views of the government of the day regarding the timber duties, and after its defeat on that question gave in his resignation. While at home at this period he published his work on naval tactics, defending his father's claim as originator of the manœuvre of ‘breaking the line.’ The work was suggested by a conversation with Douglas's very old friend and school companion Sir Walter Scott, during a visit to Abbotsford (, Life of Scott, p. 365). Douglas unsuccessfully contested Liverpool in the conservative interest in 1832, and again in 1835. In the latter year he was appointed lord high commissioner of the Ionian Islands, which he held, conjointly with the command of the troops without staff pay, until 1840. The post was acknowledged to be a difficult one, but despite much misrepresentation at home Douglas governed wisely and well. He foiled conspiracy, domestic and foreign, used his position in the very focus of Russian intrigue to turn his information to the best account, promoted education and public works, and improved the revenue. He introduced a new code of laws based on the Greek model, known as the Douglas code. He founded a prize medal to be given annually in perpetuity at the Ionian College, under the name of the Douglas medal, for the higher proficiency in mathematics, physic, or law. At his departure the Ionian States erected a column at Corfu recording the many useful public acts of his government. Douglas became a lieutenant-general in 1837, and in 1841 was made colonel of the 99th foot, in succession to Sir Hugh Gough. He was transferred to the 15th foot in 1851, in which year he became a general. He was returned for Liverpool in 1842 as a supporter of Sir Robert Peel, obtaining the seat vacated by Sir Cresswell Cresswell. He was a frequent and very moderate and judicious speaker on service questions. He voted against his party on the measure for the repeal of the corn laws, and at the dissolution of 1846 withdrew from parliamentary life. During the remainder of his life he took an active interest in professional subjects, and was often consulted by the ministers on service matters, as by Sir Robert Peel in 1848 respecting the introduction of iron ships into the navy; by Lord Aberdeen in 1854 respecting the descent on the Crimea, which Douglas opposed on the grounds that the season was too far advanced and the army insufficiently provided; by Lord Panmure in 1855 on the subject of army education, Douglas having called attention to the decline of military education in the army; and by Sir John Pakington on the question of ship-armour, which was under discussion at the time of his death, and which Douglas strongly opposed, maintaining that artillery power would in the end always prove superior to any armour that could be carried. His published works exhibit the wide scope and reach of his scientific attainments, and it has been well said that the value of his labours lay in his peculiar capacity for grafting new discoveries on old experience and hitting the wants of the generation which had sprung up since his own youth (Gent. Mag. 3rd ser. xii. 91–2). Douglas died at Tunbridge Wells on 9 Nov. 1861, in the eighty-sixth year of his age, and was buried beside his wife at Boldre, near Lymington, Hampshire. An engraved portrait of him, from a photograph taken not long before his death, forms the frontispiece to Fullom's biography. By his will (personalty sworn under 16,000l.) Douglas left all his scientific papers to his second surviving son, Admiral Henry John Douglas, who died 18 May 1871.

Douglas was a F.R.S. of 1812. He was one of the fellows of the Royal Geographical Society when first formed. A notice of his election as an associate of the Institute of