Charles Edmund Wilkinson


Charles Edmund Wilkinson was a British army officer who rose to the rank of Major-General and served as acting Governor of British Ceylon.

Life

He was the only son of the naturalist Jacob Wilkinson and his first wife Olivia Maria Cranke Stephen.
Pursuing a military career in the Royal Engineers, he rose to captain in 1846, lieutenant-colonel in 1854, brevet-colonel in 1858, and in 1859 was promoted to full colonel.
On 30 July 1860 he was appointed acting Governor of British Ceylon, a post he held until 22 October 1860 when he was succeeded by Charles Justin MacCarthy.
In 1866 he achieved his final promotion to major-general and died on 3 June 1870 at his London home, his will being proved in London on 24 June 1870 and in Dublin on 22 August 1870 with effects valued at under 30,000 pounds.

Family

On 12 July 1837 he married Mary Drought Armstrong, daughter of an Irish landowner John Warneford Armstrong and his wife Anne Turner, and they had six children, two of whom married:
Lora left a diary of her time in Ceylon in 1860, excerpts from which can be read here.