Lieutenant Christopher George Williams

A carte-de-visite portrait of Lieutenant Christopher George Williams (1850-1876).

Christopher George Williams was born in 1850 at Bangor in Wales, the fourth son of county magistrate and banker John Vincent Hawksley Williams, later a Deputy Lieutenant of Caernarvon, and his wife Phoebe Susannah Williams.

Educated at the Royal Naval College in Greenwich, he had a promising career in the Royal Navy ahead of him but died, aged only 26, on 9 May 1876 at the Royal Navy hospital in Gosport, Hampshire.

A short report on his death appeared in The Times (20 May 1876): ‘It is with regret that we announce the sudden death of promising young officer, Lieut. Christopher George Williams, of Her Majesty’s ship Excellent. It seems that he had been removed to the hospital at Haslar, where it was found he was suffering from typhoid fever, and that in his delirium he jumped from a window in one of the upper stories. When picked up he was found to have been fatally injured, and death ensued shortly afterwards. Lieut. Williams won the chief scholarship at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich, at the last general examination, which is worth £100 a year for three years, and had just received his appointment as Junior Staff Officer of the Excellent after completing his gunnery course.’

Photographed on 1 June 1874 by Jabez Hughes of Ryde on the Isle of Wight.