1. Edgar Whitehead had a long and varied political career, serving as a longstanding member of the Southern Rhodesian Legislative Assembly and in a variety of minister posts over the course of nearly three decades.
16 Facts About Edgar Whitehead
1. 2.
Edgar Whitehead's work was frequently interrupted by recurring health problems; he suffered from poor eyesight and later experienced deafness whilst in office.
3.
Edgar Whitehead's government was defeated in the 1962 general election by the Rhodesian Front.
4.
Whitehead was born in the British Embassy in Berlin, where his father Sir James Beethom Whitehead was a diplomat.
5.
Edgar Whitehead was educated at Shrewsbury School and University College, Oxford, and moved to the colony of Southern Rhodesia in 1928 for health reasons.
6.
Edgar Whitehead became a member of the Southern Rhodesian Legislative Assembly in 1939, but his service was interrupted by the Second World War.
7.
Edgar Whitehead served as Acting High Commissioner for Southern Rhodesia in London from 1945 to 1946, before returning to Salisbury as Minister of Finance and Minister of Posts and Telegraphs from September 1946 to March 1947.
8.
Edgar Whitehead then called general elections and entered parliament as member for the Salisbury North constituency, becoming Prime Minister and Minister for Native Affairs.
9.
Edgar Whitehead was crucial in the negotiation of the 1961 constitution, which increased black representation in the Southern Rhodesian parliament.
10.
The policies of Edgar Whitehead's government caused alarm among the white population, while the blacks remained dissatisfied with the advances they had made.
11.
Edgar Whitehead was Leader of the Opposition in Parliament from 1962 until February 1965.
12.
Edgar Whitehead later lost his seat in the May 1965 election when the Rhodesian Front took all the white seats in Parliament.
13.
Alec Douglas-Home in his memoir 'The Way the Wind Blows' noted his view of Edgar Whitehead as being very deaf, very blind and able to consume 13 beers in an evening without leaving the room.
14.
Edgar Whitehead was a bachelor and was seen by former Federation Minister Julian Greenfield in his memoirs as having even less charisma than Edward Heath with voters, whether male or female.
15.
Edgar Whitehead died of cancer of the oesophagus and lung in a nursing home in Hamstead Marshall near Newbury in September 1971.
16.
Edgar Whitehead's papers, including an unpublished autobiography, are in the Rhodes House Library, Oxford.