{{Short description|British politician, barrister, administrator, journalist, historian and writer}} {{EngvarB|date=May 2015}} {{Use dmy dates|date=August 2021}} {{Infobox person | name = Harry Evan Auguste Cotton | image = HEA Cotton.jpg | caption = | birth_date = 27 May 1868 | birth_place = Midnapore, Bengal Presidency, British Raj | death_date = {{death date and age|1939|3|7|1868|5|27|df=y}} | death_place = Eastbourne, England | occupation = Historian, author | spouse = Nora Grimley }} '''Harry Evan Auguste Cotton''' {{post-nominals|country=GBR|CIE}} (27 May 1868 – 7 March 1939),<ref name = "CottonWhoWho">{{Who's Who | id= U207926 | title=Cotton, Sir (Harry) Evan (Auguste) }}</ref> better known as '''Sir Evan Cotton''' or '''H. E. A. Cotton''', was a Liberal politician, barrister, administrator, journalist, historian and writer.<ref name = "Ray">Ray, Nisith Ranjan Ray, Editor's Note in the book ''Calcutta Old and New'', 1909/1980, pp. 1–4, General Printers and Publishers Pvt. Ltd. {{PD-notice}}</ref>
==Formative years== Cotton was born in Midnapore, the son of Sir Henry Cotton,<ref name = "halhed" /> who presided over the 1904 session of the Indian National Congress, and the Irish-born Mary Ryan. The family had worked in India from the 1760s. He received his early schooling at Mount Liban School, Pau and then at Sherborne School.<ref name = "Ray"/>
He held an open scholarship at Jesus College, Oxford, where he obtained a second class in Classics Honour Mods, followed by second class degrees in history and jurisprudence. He was called to the bar by Lincoln's Inn.{{Citation needed|date= May 2022}}
==Life and work== Cotton practised at Calcutta High Court from 1893 to 1908. He served as a member of Calcutta Municipal Corporation.<ref name = "Ray"/> He covered the Delhi Durbar of 1903 as a correspondent of the ''Manchester Guardian''. He subsequently served as the Kolkata correspondent of the ''Daily News''. He undertook the editorship of ''India'', the weekly organ of the British Committee of the Indian National Congress. He served as President of the Bengal Legislative Council from 1922 to 1925.<ref>{{cite web | url = http://legislativebodiesinindia.gov.in/STATISTICAL%5Cwbengal.html | title = West Bengal Legislative Assembly | access-date = 29 July 2007 | publisher = legislativebodiesinindia.gov.in | archive-date = 26 June 2007 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070626110846/http://legislativebodiesinindia.gov.in/STATISTICAL%5Cwbengal.html | url-status = dead }}</ref> He was an active member of the Indian Historical Records Commission and was chairman from 1923 to 1925.{{Citation needed|date= May 2022}}
In all his activities, his primary concern was for India, a country served by four generations in the family.{{Citation needed|date= May 2022}} He provided strong support to the Montagu–Chelmsford Reforms and served on an advisory committee at the India Office in connection with the 1919 Act.{{Citation needed|date= May 2022}} He was pivot of a small group that supported reforms. However, the changing political environment dampened his spirits. He later became a severe critic of the constitutional changes that led to the Round Table Conference.<ref name = "Times">Obituary in ''The Times'', 8 March 1939, p. 18</ref>
In 1896, he married Nora, daughter of William H. Grimley of Bengal ICS. They had a daughter.
In the 1920s his savings were depleted by the economic depression and he wrote to Allahabad lawyer Tej Bahadur Sapru that he had "''given up my house and with my wife and daughter am living in a cheap Bayswater boarding house. My books are all stored, I have resigned my club, and beyond tobacco deny myself every luxury. Even so I am obliged to borrow to pay my income tax. . . . I am in the best of health and feel that I am being wasted. All my interest lies in India and I am anxious to put at her disposal the fruits of my fourteen years here of public life. . . . Men are being brought out to India who are wholly ignorant of the country and its people and its problems. . . . I want so much to be of use to her just now: but no one seems to think of me''." In 1922 Victor Bulwer-Lytton, 2nd Earl of Lytton, invited Cotton to work as a President of the Legislative Council in Bengal. The Bengal Swaraj movement under Chitta Ranjan Das however walked out of meetings and the nationalist press called him "the unworthy son of Sir Henry Cotton". The Swaraj Party forced him out in 1925 in favour of a Bengali and Cotton returned to England embittered. He was subsequently an opponent of all constitutional advance for India until his death.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Broomfield |first=J. H. |date=1971 |title=Four lives: History as biography |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00856407108730654 |journal=South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies |language=en |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=74–90 |doi=10.1080/00856407108730654 |issn=0085-6401|url-access=subscription }}</ref>
=== Politics === Evan returned to England in 1906 and joined the Liberal Party. His father was himself a Liberal MP who sat for Nottingham East from 1906 to 1910. In January 1910, Evan contested the General Election at the Conservative seat of Dulwich; right|thumb|200px|Dulwich in the London area, showing boundaries used in 1910 {{Election box begin | |title=General Election January 1910: Dulwich Electorate 16,478}} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Conservative Party (UK) |candidate = Bonar Law |votes = 8,472 |percentage = 58.3 |change = +3.0 }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Liberal Party (UK) |candidate = '''Harry Evan Auguste Cotton''' |votes = 6,054 |percentage = 41.7 |change = -3.0 }} {{Election box majority| |votes = 2,418 |percentage = 16.6 |change = +6.0 }} {{Election box turnout| |votes = |percentage = 88.2 |change = }} {{Election box hold with party link| |winner = Conservative Party (UK) |swing = +3.0 }} {{Election box end}} In March 1910 he was elected as a Progressive Councillor to the London County Council representing Finsbury East; right|thumb|200px|Finsbury East in the London area, showing boundaries used 1885–1918 {{Election box begin | |title=London County Council election, 1910: Finsbury East<ref name="London Municipal Notes, 1913">London Municipal Notes, 1913</ref> Electorate }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Progressive Party (London) |candidate = {{Y}} '''Henry Evan Auguste Cotton''' |votes = 2,026 |percentage =27.9 |change = }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Progressive Party (London) |candidate = {{Y}} George Masterman Gillett |votes = 2,020 |percentage = 27.8 |change = }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Municipal Reform Party |candidate = Lord Hardwicke |votes = 1,616 |percentage = 22.3 |change = }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Municipal Reform Party |candidate = Rev. J Lewthwaite |votes =1,592 |percentage =21.9 |change = }} {{Election box majority| |votes = |percentage = |change = }} {{Election box gain with party link| |winner = Progressive Party (London) |loser = Municipal Reform Party |swing = }} {{Election box end}} The Progressives were the local government arm of the Liberal Party. In March 1913 he was re-elected to the LCC;{{Citation needed|date= May 2022}} {{Election box begin | |title=London County Council election, 1913: Finsbury East<ref name="London Municipal Notes, 1913"/> Electorate 6,498 }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Progressive Party (London) |candidate = {{Y}} '''George Masterman Gillett''' |votes = 2,037 |percentage = 26.2 |change =-1.6 }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Progressive Party (London) |candidate = {{Y}} '''Henry Evan Auguste Cotton''' |votes = 2,026 |percentage =26.1 |change =-1.8 }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Municipal Reform Party |candidate = Eustace Widdrington Morrison-Bell |votes = 1,866 |percentage = 24.0 |change =+1.7 }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Municipal Reform Party |candidate = William George Perring |votes =1,837 |percentage =23.7 |change =+1.8 }} {{Election box majority| |votes = |percentage = |change = }} {{Election box hold with party link| |winner = Progressive Party (London) |swing = }} {{Election box hold with party link| |winner = Progressive Party (London) |swing = }} {{Election box end}} In July 1918, when a vacancy occurred due to the death of a Liberal MP, for the parliamentary seat of Finsbury East. Cotton was an obvious candidate to defend the seat for the Liberal Party. Due to the wartime electoral truce, he did not face an official Unionist Party opponent and was comfortably elected;{{Citation needed|date= May 2022}}
{{Election box begin | |title=1918 Finsbury East by-election: 16 July 1918 }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Liberal Party (UK) |candidate = Harry Evan Auguste Cotton |votes = 1,156 |percentage = 59.9 |change = +8.3 }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Independent (politician) |candidate = Capt. H.S. Spencer |votes = 576 |percentage = 29.8 |change = n/a }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Independent (politician) |candidate = A.S. Belsher |votes = 199 |percentage = 10.3 |change = n/a }} {{Election box majority| |votes = 580 |percentage = 30.1 |change = }} {{Election box turnout| |votes = |percentage = 38.7 |change = }} {{Election box hold with party link| |winner = Liberal Party (UK) |swing = N/A }} {{Election box end}} Following boundary changes, Evan's Finsbury East seat was merged with the Unionist seat of Finsbury Central to form a new Finsbury constituency. The Coalition Government chose to publicly endorse the Unionist candidate who was the sitting MP for the old Central seat. This endorsement made Evan's prospects difficult and after only 5 months as an MP he was defeated;{{Citation needed|date= May 2022}} right|thumb|200px|Finsbury in the County of London, showing boundaries used in 1918 {{Election box begin | |title=General Election 1918: Finsbury Electorate 34,873}} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Coalition Conservative |candidate = Martin Archer-Shee |votes = 8,782 |percentage = 63.8 |change = n/a }} {{Election box candidate with party link| |party = Liberal Party (UK) |candidate = '''Harry Evan Auguste Cotton''' |votes = 4,981 |percentage = 36.2 |change = n/a }} {{Election box majority| |votes = 3,801 |percentage = 27.6 |change = n/a }} {{Election box turnout| |votes = 13,763 |percentage = 39.5 |change = n/a }} {{Election box win |winner = Coalition Conservative |swing = n/a }} {{Election box end}} In 1919 he did not defend his Finsbury East seat on the London County Council as after the election he was appointed as an Alderman.{{Citation needed|date= May 2022}}
== Works == {{wikisource|works=or}} ''Calcutta: Old and New'', ''The Century in India 1800–1900'', ''Hartly House, Calcutta'', ''Murray's Handbook of India, Burma and Ceylon'' (13th and 14th editions)
==See also== * List of United Kingdom MPs with the shortest service
==References== <references>
<ref name="halhed">{{cite web|url=http://www.halhed.com/t4r/getperson.php?personID=I3072&tree=tree1|work=Halhed genealogy & family trees|title=Henry John Stedman Cotton 1845 – 1915|access-date=19 February 2011|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111007180636/http://www.halhed.com/t4r/getperson.php?personID=I3072&tree=tree1|archive-date=7 October 2011|df=dmy-all}}</ref>
</references>
==Sources== *''Who's Who of British members of parliament, Volume II 1886–1918'', edited by M. Stenton and S. Lees (Harvester Press: 1978)
{{s-start}} {{s-par|uk}} {{s-bef | before = Joseph Allen Baker }} {{s-ttl | title = Member of Parliament for East Finsbury | years = 1918 Finsbury East by-election – 1918 General Election }} {{s-non | reason = constituency abolished }} {{s-end}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Cotton, Evan}} Category:1868 births Category:1939 deaths Category:People educated at Sherborne School Category:Alumni of Jesus College, Oxford Category:British barristers Category:Companions of the Order of the Indian Empire Category:Indian National Congress Category:Liberal Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies Category:Politicians from Kolkata Category:UK MPs 1910–1918 Category:Members of London County Council Category:Progressive Party (London) politicians Category:People from Paschim Medinipur district Evan Category:British people in British India