Harry Hands

Sir Harry Hands KBE (18 September 1860 – 17 March 1948) was a British colonial politician.

The eldest son of Josiah (postmaster, church warden, registrar, bootmaker & cordwainer^[1]) and Selina Hands of Kings Norton, Worcestershire, he was educated at King Edward School in Birmingham. He married Aletta Catharina Myburgh (later OBE) in Worcestershire on 6 October 1886. Aletta was the daughter of Philip Albert Myburgh, a member of the Cape Legislative Assembly and a prominent member of society.^[2]

Harry himself was a member of the Legislative Assembly of the Cape Colony from 1912 to 1913 and in 1915–1918 he served as mayor of Cape Town.^[3][4] During his term as mayor, he was also an incorporated accountant of the firm Hands and Shore in Cape Town.

Following the "Conference of War Recruiting Committees of the Union of South Africa" in February 1918, a special recruiting drive was begun, inaugurated by church services throughout the city and suburbs in April. Twelve days later, on 20 April 1918, he received a telegram informing him and Aletta that their eldest son, Captain Reginald Harry Myburgh Hands, had died of wounds received fighting on the Western front. Pondering this devastating news, Mayor Hands and his friend and fekkiw councillor Robert Brydon came up with the idea of the Two-minute Silence.^[5]

He was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1919 Birthday Honours^[6] for his sterling service to recruiting in South Africa and, as noted in the ‘South African Lady’s Pictorial’(July 1919, p5), “for his services as chairman of the Recruiting Committee, he did splendid work and it is due to him that the impressive Mid-day Pause was introduced.”

Sir Harry's 3 sons, Reginald, Phillip Hands and Kenneth were all Rhodes Scholar who excelled at cricket and rugby. Philip and Kenneth also fought in WW1, but returned home safely, married and had children. His daughter, Doris, married Dr Errington Atkinson of Leeds.

Sir Harry died on 17 March 1948 in Cape Town and is buried in Maitland Cemetery, along with his wife.^[7]

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