Reverend Richard Boys MA (23 May 1783 - 13 February 1866) was a Church of England clergyman and author, most notable for his tenure as Chaplain on St. Helena at the time of Napoleon Bonaparte's exile there.

[1] He was educated at The King's School, Canterbury, afterward joining the Royal Engineers[1] but later renewed his studies, going on to get an MA at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge.

In 1821 the minutes recall an incident when Boys publicly accused a shopkeeper of being a liar and a spy, calling after him in the street: "Blenkens, when is the green bag to be given out?"

Boys took umbrage to the behaviour of Rear admiral Plampin, one of Lowe's most erstwhile supporters, who was living "in sin" with a lady who was not his wife.

Lowe's correspondence to Britain frequently described his frustration at being unable to act given the chaplain's standing among the residents of the island and the uproar the clergyman would create if banished back to the UK.

[2] Boys further aggravated the island's military by his insistence on completing the record of the births of illegitimate children of slave women with the names of the fathers in bold characters, including the titles and positions of the sires, some of whom were the highest and most trusted of Lowe's lieutenants.

When Cipriani, Napoleon's major-domo died, Boys and his junior chaplain buried the man, a Catholic, according to the rites of the Protestant Church.

A snuffbox was purchased in Jamestown and offered to Boys, but was refused owing to the severe penalties attached to any acceptance of gifts from the exile.

[8] This caused a great deal of consternation as although the story of Buridge making a mask didn't tally with any other accounts, Boys was universally accepted to have been an honest individual.

On returning to England he held several parishes, initially at All Saints' Church, Tudeley (1830-1832), and finally settling at Loose, in Kent, in 1854.