The Times/1916/Obituary/Robert Hamilton Vetch

Colonel Robert Hamilton Vetch, C.B., late R.E., died at his residence at Richmond on Friday, aged 75.

The eldest surviving son of Captain James Vetch, R.E., F.R.S., Conservator of Harbours at the Admiralty, he was gazetted to the Royal Engineers in 1857, and after employment on defences at Bermuda, the Bristol Channel, and Malta, he was for some years secretary of the Royal Engineers' Institute at Chatham. He was for a time Deputy Inspector-General of Fortifications, and afterwards Chief Engineer in Ireland, retiring in 1898 with a distinguished service pension. But he will be chiefly remembers as a military historian and biographer. He wrote a history of Gordon's campaign in China, the Lives of Sir Gerald Graham, V.C., and of General Sir Andrew Clarke, and edited the professional papers of the Royal Engineers between the 1877 and 1884. He also contributed many military articles to the Encyclopædia Britannica and the Dictionary of National Biography.