Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Birdwood, Herbert Mills
BIRDWOOD, HERBERT MILLS (1837–1907), Anglo-Indian judge, born at Belgaum, Western India, on 29 May 1837, was third son of fourteen children of General Christopher Birdwood, deputy commissary general of the Bombay army (of an old Devonshire family), by his wife Lydia, eldest daughter of the Rev. Joseph Taylor, agent of the London Missionary Society in the southern Mahratta country. His great-grandfather, Richard Birdwood, mayor of Plymouth in 1796, and his grandfather, Peter Birdwood, were both agents at Plymouth of the East India Company. His eldest brother is Sir George Birdwood (b. 1832).
Educated successively at the Plymouth new grammar school and at Mount Radford school, Exeter, he matriculated at Edinburgh University in 1851, and distinguished himself in mathematics. In October 1854 he entered Peterhouse, Cambridge, and graduated B.A. in 1858 as twenty-third wrangler in the mathematical tripos and with a second class in the natural science tripos. At once elected to a fellowship at his college, he took eighteenth place in the Indian civil service examination. He proceeded M.A. in 1861, LL.M. in 1878, and LL.D. in 1889, when he was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn. In Oct. 1901 he was elected an honorary fellow of Peterhouse.
Arriving in Bombay on 26 Jan. 1859, he served successively in Thana, Broach, Surat and Ahmedabad as assistant collector. In 1863 he became under-secretary in the judicial, political and educational departments and secretary to the Bombay legislative council. In June 1866 he went to Kathiawar as first political assistant, but in 1867 returned to Bombay as acting registrar of the high court. In Dec. 1871 he was appointed judge of the Ratnagiri district, being subsequently transferred to Thana and then to Surat. In Ratnagiri he won a reputation for independence, by deciding against the government cases challenging the legality of the operations of the revenue survey department.
In February 1881 Birdwood went to Karachi as judicial commissioner and judge of the Sadr court in Sind. He effected steady improvement in the work of the subordinate courts in the province. He also laid out on a new design the Karachi public gardens, some forty acres in extent, establishing there a fine zoological collection. He stimulated the volunteer movement by serving in the local corps. From Jan. 1885 to April 1892 he was judge of the Bombay-high court, and from April 1892 to April 1897 was judicial and political member of the Bombay council. His term of office coincided with the outbreak of the plague epidemic, the great famine of 1897, and the political unrest leading to murderous outrage at Poona. In June 1893 he was created a C.S.I. He was acting governor of the presidency in the brief interval between Lord Harris's departure and Lord Sandhurst's arrival (16 to 18 Feb. 1895). While efficiently performing his judicial and political duties he actively interested himself in educational and scientific movements. He had been a fellow of the Bombay University since 1863 and dean in arts in 1868, 1880, and 1888. He was vice-chancellor in 1891-2. He was president of the botanical section of the Bombay Natural History Society, and compiled for its 'Journal' (1886, vols. i. and ii.) a comprehensive catalogue of the flora of the Matheran and Mahabaleshwar hill-stations (reprinted separately, Bombay, 1897). He was for many years president of the Agri-Horticultural Society of Western India. Between 1871 and 1890 Birdwood ably edited, either solely or in collaboration with Mr. Justice Henry J. Parsons, vols. iv. to xi. of the Acts and Regulations in force in the Bombay presidency, commonly known as West's code.
After his return to England in April 1897 he collaborated with Mr. Justice Wood Renton and E. G. Phillimore in a revised edition of Burge's 'Commentaries on Colonial and Foreign Laws' (1907; vol. i.), editing the Indian portion. He practised before the privy council on Indian appeals, and in the important case of the Taluka of Kota Sangani v. the State of Gondal (No. 58 of 1904) he, with Sir Edward Clarke as his leader, obtained a judgment upholding the sovereignty of the Kathiawar chiefs, and sustained the contention that their courts are outside the appellate jurisdiction of the British courts. To the 'Journal of the Royal Society of Arts' he contributed (1898) valuable sketches of the history of plague in western India. At Twickenham, where he finally settled, he was active in local affairs and did much philanthropic work. He died of pneumonia at his residence, Dalkeith House, Twickenham, on 21 Feb. 1907, and was buried at Twickenham cemetery. He married on 29 Jan. 1861 Edith Marion Sidonie, eldest daughter of Surgeon-major Elijah G. H. Impey of the Bombay horse artillery and postmaster-General of the Bombay presidency; by her he had a daughter, wife of General R. C. O. Stuart, inspector-general of ordnance in India, and five sons, all of whom served in the army in India; the eldest son, Capt. H. C. T. Birdwood, R.E., died at Umballa in 1894 and the second son, Brigadier-general William Riddel Birdwood (b. 1865), was military secretary to Lord Kitchener while commander-in-chief in India (1905-10). An engraved portrait by Walton & Co. is in Mrs. Birdwood's possession.
[Representative Men of India, Bombay, 1889; India List; The Times, 23 Feb. 1907; personal knowledge; information kindly supplied by Sir George Birdwood.]