Charles St. George Cleverley or Cleverly (Chinese: 基化厘 or 急庇利; 8 July 1819 – 14 August 1897) was the second Surveyor General in Hong Kong. He worked under the Colonial Secretary and was responsible for public infrastructure, town planning and land auction.
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/04/Charles_Saint_George_Cleverly.jpg)
Career
Cleverly is famous for the construction of Government House. The construction began in October 1851 and finished in October 1855.[1]
His name was often registered in the Hong Kong Government Gazette in relation to the public auction of crown land and buildings.
Family
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8c/Name_of_Charles_St_George_Cleverly.jpg/220px-Name_of_Charles_St_George_Cleverly.jpg)
Cleverly was born in Bloomsbury, London, one of five sons of the physician Samuel Cleverley, doctor to the Duke of Kent and Duke of Cambridge. His grandfather William Cleverley owned a shipyard beside the River Thames in London. He built many large ships for the British East India Company.[2]
He married Ah Gow Li (died 1847), with whom he had a daughter, Augusta Cleverly (1846–1930). He married secondly Mary Pope (1818–1875), with whom he had a son, Charles Frederick Moore Cleverly (1852–1921), who was the father of Sir Osmund Somers Cleverly, the Principal Private Secretary of Prime Ministers Stanley Baldwin, and Neville Chamberlain.[3]
He died at his home in Great Malvern, Worcester.[4]
Memory
Cleverly Street in Sheung Wan, Hong Kong, is named after him.[5][6]