Colonial Despatches

Frederic Rogers, Baron Blachford, was born at Marylebone on 31 January 1811. He attended Eton and Oriel College, Oxford, where he was elected to a fellowship in 1833. He was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn on 26 January 1837 but returned to Oxford in 1838. He became a registrar of joint-stock companies, then a commissioner of lands and emigration.1

From 19 May 1846 to 9 January 1847 he served as assistant undersecretary in the Colonial Office. In 1857, Rogers became assistant commissioner for the sale of encumbered estates in the West Indies, after which he went on a special mission to Paris in 1858 and 1859. He returned in 1860 to become permanent undersecretary of state for the colonies, remaining in that office until 1871.2

Rogers succeeded his father as baronet in 1851, received a KCMG in 1869 and a GCMG in 1883, and was raised to the peerage as Baron Blachford in 1871. He died at Blachford on 21 November 1889.3

• 1. H. C. G. Matthew, Rogers, Frederic, Baron Blachford, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
• 2. Ibid.
• 3. Ibid.