1. In Egypt, Henry McMahon was best known for the Henry McMahon-Hussein Correspondence with Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca, and the Declaration to the Seven in response to a memorandum written by seven notable Syrians.
19 Facts About Henry McMahon
1. 2.
Henry McMahon was educated in England at Haileybury College, the recently-founded successor of the East India Company College.
3.
Henry McMahon then proceeded to the Royal Military College, Sandhurst.
4.
Henry McMahon's own family had settled in the Downpatrick area of County Down before his great-grandfather, Arthur McMahon, moved to Kilrea, where he was minister of the local Presbyterian congregation between 1789 and 1794: a prominent Irish Republican, Arthur McMahon was a member of the National Directory of the Society of United Irishmen and one of their colonels in Ulster during the Irish Rebellion of 1798.
5.
Henry McMahon apparently fought at the battles of Saintfield and Ballynahinch.
6.
Henry McMahon was commissioned as a lieutenant into the King's Regiment on 10 March 1883.
7.
Henry McMahon transferred to the Indian Staff Corps in 1885, joining the 1st Sikh Infantry in the Punjab Frontier Force.
8.
Henry McMahon transferred to the Indian Political Department in 1890, serving in it till 1915.
9.
Henry McMahon received the temporary rank of colonel while employed on special duty on the Sistan frontier in 1903.
10.
Henry McMahon spoke Persian, Pashto, and Hindustani, and his aptitude for languages led him to learn Arabic.
11.
In 1915, Henry McMahon was sent to replace Sir Milne Cheetham, briefly acting for Lord Kitchener, who had become War Secretary in London, in the post of High Commissioner in the Sultanate of Egypt.
12.
Henry McMahon was made a Knight of Grace of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem.
13.
Henry McMahon promised Husayn an independent area under Arab governance that was to include what was then the Mutasarrifate of Jerusalem, in exchange for Arab support in Britain's conflict against the Ottoman Turks in what came to be known as the Great Arab Revolt against the Ottomans.
14.
Henry McMahon sat on the plan to use the Sharif to support British for six months.
15.
Henry McMahon despatched the oriental secretary, Storrs, to London with a team of intelligence experts.
16.
In 1920, Henry McMahon was awarded the Order of El Nahda, 1st Class, by Husayn, the new King of the Hejaz.
17.
Henry McMahon was one of the founders of the Imperial College Masonic Lodge in 1923, at which time he was a member of the governing body of Imperial College.
18.
On 19 October 1886, in Bombay, McMahon married Mary E Bland, a daughter of FC Bland of Derriquin Castle, County Kerry.
19.
Henry McMahon died on 29 December 1949 at the Cadogan Hotel in Sloane Street, Chelsea, where he had been living.