Early Service
MacMichael was graduated with a first from Magdalene College, Cambridge. After passing his civil service exam, he entered the service of the British Empire in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. He then served in the Blue Nile province until 1915 when he became a senior inspector of Khartoum province, rising to the position of civil secretary in 1926. In 1933 he became Governor of Tanganyika until 1937.
The next year he became High Commissioner of the British Mandate of Palestine and was blamed for sending the 768 Jewish refugees aboard the SS Struma to their deaths. Seven unsuccessful attempts, mainly by Lehi, were undertaken to assassinate him during his sojourn in Palestine. In the last, both he and his wife narrowly escaped death in an ambush Lehi mounted on 8 August, 1944 on the eve of his replacement as High Commissioner.
MacMichael also served a stint as High Commissioner of Malta.
Read more about this topic: Harold MacMichael
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or service:
“Very early in our children’s lives we will be forced to realize that the “perfect” untroubled life we’d like for them is just a fantasy. In daily living, tears and fights and doing things we don’t want to do are all part of our human ways of developing into adults.”
—Fred Rogers (20th century)
“The ability to think straight, some knowledge of the past, some vision of the future, some skill to do useful service, some urge to fit that service into the well-being of the community,—these are the most vital things education must try to produce.”
—Virginia Crocheron Gildersleeve (1877–1965)