The recent death at the MP Shah Hospital of 48-year-old Tom Cholmondeley, the great grandson of Lord Delamere, refocused attention on one of Kenya’s most famous white settler families.
Cholmondeley’s great grandpa, the third Baron Delamere, left a vast estate in Chesire England for Kenya in 1897, and arrived here with a caravan of 200 camels and 100 porters to engage in game hunting. The rest is history of the Delameres and their Sh5 billion Soysambu Ranch, which is being divided among heirs.
Lord Delamere: Known as D’ to his friends, Hugh Cholmondeley, was the most powerful, most respected and was the largest land owner starting with 100,000 acres in 1903 to another 145,000 acres later. He settled at Soysambu Ranch in Naivasha with first wife, Lady Florence and their son, Thomas. Soysambu is Maasai for ‘place of striated rock.’
The man who had a bronze statue along Delamere Avenue (now Kenyatta Avenue) and still has the Delamere Terrace at the Norfolk named in his honour, invested heavily in agriculture, founding Delamere Estates, of which Delamere Diaries is part,while rearing Kenya’s best Boran cattle. He was instrumental in the formation of Kenya Cooperative Creameries, but died in near bankruptcy at 61 in November 1931.
Gwladys Delamere: The second wife of Lord Delamere and 30 years his junior, came to Kenya in 1928, and went on to become Nairobi’s first woman mayor for two years to 1940. She was awarded a CBE in 1941 for “public service in Kenya” two years before her death and burial at Soysambu. She donated her Loresho home to the Kenya Red Cross.
READ MORE
Thomas Delamere: The thrice-married son of Hugh Cholmondeley and fourth Lord Delamere died in 1979. He was succeeded by Lord Hugh Cholmondeley, his eldest son from his first wife, Phyllis.
Lord Hugh Cholmondeley: The fifth Lord Delamere and husband of Lady Ann Delamere, the daughter of Sir Patrick Renison, Governor of colonial Kenya between 1959 and 1962. Lady Ann Delamere School stands in her honour. They had one child, the late Tom Cholmondeley.
Tom Cholmondeley: The alumnus of Gilgil’s Pembroke House School and Eton College, England where he was expelled for wanting behaviour, was a rancher overseeing operations of Soysambu Conservancy and the Soysambu ranch- home to Sh215 million worth of livestock.
The one-time chair of Nakuru Wildlife Conservancy was instrumental in among others; Naivasha’s Buffalo Mall, leisure facilities Mawe Mbili, Mbweha and Delamere Camps inside Soysambu ranch. The pilot and motor sport fan had two sons with Dr Sally Brewerton. They divorced in 2010, and Sally Dudmesh, a high end jeweller became his new squeeze.
