William Martin Leake

Colonel William Martin Leake, FRS (14 January 1777 – 6 January 1860) was a British Army officer, spy, topographer, diplomat, antiquarian and writer who served in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. He spent much of his career in the British army in the Mediterranean seaports. Leake developed an interest in geography and culture of the regions visited, and authored a number of works, mainly about Greece.

Life

Leake was born in London to John Martin Leake and Mary Calvert Leake. Following a family tradition, he was commissioned into the British Army's Royal Artillery as an officer; he completed his training at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich in 1794 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant. Having spent four years in the West Indies as lieutenant of marine artillery, he was promoted to captain, and was sent in 1799 by the government to Constantinople to train the forces of the Ottoman Empire in the use of artillery. The British Empire had decided to support the Ottoman in its defence against Napoleonic France. A journey through Asia Minor in 1800 to join the British fleet at Cyprus inspired him with an interest in antiquarian topography. In 1801, after travelling across the desert with the Ottoman army to Egypt, he was, on the expulsion of the French, employed in surveying the Nile valley as far as the cataracts; but having sailed with the ship engaged to convey the Elgin Marbles from Athens to England, he lost all his maps and observations when the vessel foundered off Cerigo in Greece.

For much of the first decade of the nineteenth century, Leake was employed by the Foreign Office to spy in Greece in the guise of a wandering tourist, with the intent of gathering topographical information which would be useful in the case of a French invasion.