Major General Sir George Pomeroy Colley, KCSI, CB, CMG (1 November 1835 – 27 February 1881) was a British Army officer who became Governor and Commander-in-Chief of Natal and High Commissioner for South Eastern Africa.

[1] Raised in Rathangan, County Kildare, he was educated at Cheam, Surrey, where his headmaster, Dr Mayo, described him as "swift to take offence, prompt and vigorous in resenting it".

[2] He was educated at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where he was first in general merit and good conduct at the examinations in May 1852, and was appointed at the age of sixteen to an ensigncy without purchase in the 2nd or Queen's foot.

The features possessed the strongly moulded type noticeable in several branches of the Colley race; the brown hair fell upon a forehead already suggesting intellectual power.

His chief interests at this time were the artistic and literary pursuits which always held their own, notwithstanding an arduous professional life, until in the stress of the last few years they were necessarily laid aside.

'[2] After two years' service with the depot, he was promoted to a lieutenancy without purchase, and joined the headquarters of his regiment, then on the eastern frontier of Cape Colony.

When the Queen's were ordered to China, Colley rejoined his regiment, in which he obtained his company on 12 June 1860, and was present with it at the capture of the Taku forts, the actions of 12–14 August and 18–21 September 1860, and the advance on Peking.

After serving for some years as major of brigade at Plymouth, the headquarters of the western district, he was appointed professor of military administration and law at the Staff College.

The last portion of the manuscript was sent in a few days before the author, now a lieutenant-colonel, set off for the Gold Coast to join the Ashanti expedition under Sir Garnet Wolseley.

Arriving at a time when the failure of the transport was causing serious apprehension, Colley infused new life into that service; and the administrative skill and energy which he displayed contributed largely to the success of the expedition.

[1] He was still holding the office of private secretary to the viceroy when Sir Garnet Wolseley, on being ordered from Cyprus to Natal, after the disasters in Zululand, asked that Colley might join him, to which Lord Lytton consented.

Colley accordingly served as chief of the staff to Wolseley in Zululand and the Transvaal, until the murder of Sir Louis Cavagnari at Kabul, and the outbreak of the second Afghan war caused his recall to India, when he resumed his post of private secretary to the viceroy.

[clarification needed] The Liberal Government was in disarray: while left-leaning MPs called on the cabinet and colonial office to withdraw from the Transvaal and 'end the war', the Queen's Speech indicated that Her Majesty required imperial authority be restored.

Yet within the new year, Colley found himself compelled to take immediate measures for the relief of the small garrisons of British troops scattered throughout that territory, and those already besieged.