John Rawling Todd
Quick Facts
Biography
John Rawling Todd, CVO, OBE, JP (February 1929 – 18 July 2002) was a British colonial civil servant. He was the Secretary for Housing of Hong Kong from 1986 to 1988.
Biography
Todd was born on 15 February 1929 to William Rawling Todd and Isabella May Shearer. He was educated at the Durham University (BSc) and completed his National Service in the Royal Artillery in 1952. After his military service, Todd joined the colonial civil service as an Administrator Officer in the Gambia in 1955. He was assigned to New Hebrides in 1962 and was Administrator of the British Indian Ocean Territory from 1967 to 1975. In 1970, he became the Deputy Governor of the Seychelles in 1970 and was seconded to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 1974.
He was sent to Hong Kong as the District Officer for Tsuen Wan in 1976. He subsequently became Deputy Secretary of Lands and then Director of Lands from April 1982 to April 1986. He became Senior British Representative of the Sino-British Land Commission from 1984 to 1988 after the Sino-British Joint Declaration was signed. In 1986, he was appointed Secretary for Housing. In 1991, he became Chairman of the Special Committee on Compensation & Betterment. For his public services, he was appointed CVO in 1972 and Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1985.
Todd retired to Crudwell, Wiltshire. He married Ingrid von Rothermann in 1960, by whom he had one son, Martin, and one daughter, Clare.