Wikipedia:Portal:Portal/Selected biography/5

Gerald Herbert Portal (1858–1894) was a British diplomat, the Consul General for British East Africa and British Special Commissioner to Uganda. Educated at Eton, he joined the diplomatic service as an attaché in 1879, and was posted to the Egyptian Agency the same year. In 1886 he became Acting Agent and Consul General, and the following year he was sent to Ethiopia. In 1889 he was appointed to Zanzibar as the Consul General for British East Africa.

In 1892 Portal was appointed British Special Commissioner to Uganda to report to the British Government on setting up a British Protectorate to replace the East Africa Company, which was becoming increasingly ineffective amidst conflicts between rival factions, including the Kabaka (King) of Buganda, French Catholic, and British Protestant missionaries.

Portal established a settlement between the French and British Missionaries in Uganda, and on May 29, 1893 he signed a treaty with Kabaka Mwanga of Buganda. On April 1, 1893, he hauled down the flag of the British East Africa Company and hoisted the Union Jack. He returned to Britain and recommended the declaration of Uganda as a protectorate.

Portal was made Companion of the Order of the Bath in 1886, and Knights Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1893. He died from typhoid fever in London on January 25, 1894, three months before his advice was acted upon. The town of Fort Portal in western Uganda, where Portal had his base, is named after him.