British political reformer, civil servant, and naturalist (1829–1912)
Allan Octavian Hume
Allan Octavian Hume (1829–1912) (scanned from a Woodburytype)
Founder of Indian National Congress
In office 1885–1887
Personal details
Born
(1829-06-04)4 June 1829 London, England
Died
31 July 1912(1912-07-31) (aged 83) London, England
Spouse
Mary Anne Grindall
(m. 1853)
Children
Maria Jane "Minnie" Burnley
Parent(s)
Joseph Hume (father) Maria Burnley (mother)
Alma mater
University College Hospital East India Company College
Occupation
Political reformer
ornithologist
biologist
administrator
Known for
Founding of Indian National Congress Father of Indian Ornithology Founding the South London Botanical Institute
Signature
Allan Octavian Hume, CB ICS (4 June 1829[1] – 31 July 1912[2]) was a British political reformer, ornithologist, civil servant and botanist who worked in British India, who founded the party Indian National Congress. He supported the idea of self-governance by Indians.[3] A notable ornithologist, Hume has been called "the Father of Indian Ornithology" and, by those who found him dogmatic, "the Pope of Indian Ornithology".[4]
As an administrator of Etawah, he saw the Indian Rebellion of 1857 as a result of misgovernance and made great efforts to improve the lives of the common people. The district of Etawah was among the first to be returned to normalcy and over the next few years Hume's reforms led to the district being considered a model of development. Hume rose in the ranks of the Indian Civil Service but like his father Joseph Hume, a radical member of parliament, he was bold and outspoken in questioning British policies in India. He rose in 1871 to the position of secretary to the Department of Revenue, Agriculture, and Commerce under Lord Mayo who was assassinated a year later. He did not get along as well with subsequent viceroys, and his criticism of Lord Lytton's policies led to his removal from the Secretariat in 1879.
He founded the journal Stray Feathers in which he and his subscribers recorded notes on birds from across India. He built up a vast collection of bird specimens at his home in Shimla by making collection expeditions and obtaining specimens through his network of correspondents.
Following the loss of manuscripts that he had long worked on in the hope of producing a magnum opus on the birds of India, he abandoned ornithology and gifted his collection to the Natural History Museum in London, where it continues to be the single largest collection of Indian bird skins. He was briefly a follower of the theosophical movement founded by Madame Blavatsky. He worked for Indian self-governance through the Indian National Congress that he founded. He left India in 1894 to live in London from where he continued to take an interest in the Indian National Congress. He maintained an interest in English botany and founded the South London Botanical Institute towards the end of his life.
^Cite error: The named reference birdingasia2012 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Cite error: The named reference DNB was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^Kataria, Kanta (2013). "A.O. Hume: His life and contribution to the regeneration of India". The Indian Journal of Political Science. 74 (2): 245–252. JSTOR 24701107.
^Ali, S. (1979). Bird study in India: Its history and its importance. Azad Memorial lecture for 1978. Indian Council for Cultural Relations. New Delhi.
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AllanOctavianHume, CB ICS (4 June 1829 – 31 July 1912) was a British political reformer, ornithologist, civil servant and botanist who worked in British...
collected birds in the Punjab and the Himalayas, and sent these to AllanOctavianHume. He was the brother of George Frederick Leycester Marshall, with...
Mudaliar, S. Subramania Iyer, and Romesh Chunder Dutt. The Englishman AllanOctavianHume, a former British civil servant, was one of the founding members...
Ocyceros is a genus of birds in the family Bucerotidae. Established by AllanOctavianHume in 1873, it contains several species that are limited to the Indian...
information. Heteroglaux blewitti was the scientific name proposed by AllanOctavianHume in 1873 who described a female owlet that had been shot near Basna...
Lanka bay owl was described by the English politician and naturalist AllanOctavianHume in 1873 but it was only in 1877 that he introduced the binomial name...
pan-Indian organization for nationalist political influence. In 1883, AllanOctavianHume, a retired British Civil Servant also known for his pro-Indian activities...
The ground tit, Tibetan ground-tit or Hume's ground-tit (Pseudopodoces humilis) is a bird of the Tibetan plateau north of the Himalayas. The peculiar appearance...
particularly stands of tall grass. It was first collected and described by AllanOctavianHume on an ornithological expedition to Manipur in 1881. P. manipurensis...
Bombay high court. This led him to retire early in 1887. Along with AllanOctavianHume he was a founder of the Indian National Congress and served as its...
Indian National Congress INC Centre to Centre-left 28 December 1885 AllanOctavianHume K. Selvaperunthagai 8 / 39 1 / 18 17 / 234 National People's Party...
four daughters: the children included AllanOctavianHume and Mary Catherine Hume-Rothery. Joseph Huntley Hume, eldest son, died in 1871 aged 52. Maria...
History Museum in part directly and also through the collections of AllanOctavianHume, Lord Rothschild and others. "Edward Arthur Butler". Ibis. 58 (4):...
eyes. The owl was first described in 1873 by British Ornithologist AllanOctavianHume. The Andaman Scops Owl has no sightings outside of the Andaman Islands...
than, the nominate subspecies. A. n. melaschistos was described by AllanOctavianHume in 1869. It breeds in mountains from Afghanistan through the Himalayas...
inadequate official response to the Great Famine of 1876–1878, led AllanOctavianHume and William Wedderburn in 1883 to found the Indian National Congress...
of the Caucasus and Taurus Mountains. Capra blythi (proposed by AllanOctavianHume in 1874) was given to wild goat horns found from Sindh. The following...
Indian National Congress Centre to Centre-left 28 December 1885 AllanOctavianHume K. Sudhakaran UDF 15 / 20 1 / 9 21 / 140 Bharatiya Janata Party Right-wing...
destroy furlongs at a time and necessitated constant maintenance. AllanOctavianHume, Commissioner of Inland Customs from 1867 to 1870, estimated that...
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