[2][4] Additional Biographical Details Published in 'The Royal Engineers Journal' Vol III, No3, March 1906 pp, 192,193
After the usual time under instruction at Chatham, he went out to India in October 1862, and in May, 1863, joined the Indian Public Works Department, wherein he soon made his mark.
His sick leaves to Europe led, however, to his seeing a varied service, both in the field and otherwise, in parts of the world not usually open to the old Indian Engineer.
Thus he was Assistant Field Engineer with the Abyssinian Expedition (i86-6S), was mentioned in despatches for "excellent service” and obtained the medal.
with the Nile Expedition ( 1884–85 ) with which he advanced as far as Dongola being subsequently mentioned in despatches arid receiving the medal with clasp and star.
After some years travel abroad he settled down on the small property of Dilkusha, of about 100 acres at Sestri Levante in Liguria, favourable to the growth of the olive, vine, orange, fig etc., :and busied himself thereafter in the improvement of their cultivation.
Clarke was rather short of stature, and of a genial, though somewhat combative disposition; a warm friend, and a good hitter-out (especially in writing) at an adversary.
After dinner was over (and the seniors had all left the table) there arose a call among the juniors present that Clarke should take the chair and deliver a speech (he being a good raconteur, and a humorous after-dinner speaker); as he was about to take his seat, the chair disappeared, and the would-be occupant subsided on the floor to find himself smothered in a shower of rose leaves.
This transcription was done by because the original PDF is not as easily located on the web as the Wikipedia entries for Lt Colonel Clarke are.> He married Florence Lucy Hurt Sitwell in 1872 at St James's Church, Westminster, London. Anna's parents were Quakers and pacifists so conversations with their son-in-law, a retired Lieutenant Colonel of the Bengal Engineers, may have been rigorous. Wilberforce Clarke was the author of a critical translation of The Dīvān of Hafez, printed at his expense at the Central Press of the Government of India, Calcutta (1889–1891) The work (1891) was presented as follows: Translated for the first time out of the Persian into English prose, with critical and explanatory remarks, with an introductory preface, with a note on Sūfī, ism, and with a life of the author, The book was dedicated to his uncle Henry M. Clarke, Bengal Civil Service (1826), winner of a gold medal for Persian at Haileybury, In 1974 a facsimile edition of Clarke's translation was published by The Octagon Press.