Baron Bliss

Baron Bliss
The tomb of Baron Bliss in Belize City
Born	Henry Edward Ernest Victor Bliss February 16, 1869 England, United Kingdom
Died	March 9, 1926(1926-03-09) (aged 57) British Honduras, Belize City
Occupation	Philanthropist

Henry Edward Ernest Victor Bliss, 4th Baron Bliss, commonly known as Baron Bliss (16 February 1869 – 9 March 1926), was a British-born traveller who willed nearly two million Belize dollars to a trust fund for the benefit of the citizens of what was then the colony of British Honduras, now Belize.

He was born Henry Edward Ernest Victor de Barreto and lived in Marlow, Buckinghamshire, England, as a youth. He was an engineer by trade and on the death of his father in 1890, inherited the title 4th Baron de Barreto of the Kingdom of Portugal. (His father had inherited lands in Spain and Portugal from an uncle, Colonel Carlo Antonio Barreto, on the condition that he change his name). However during the First World War he reverted to his family name of Bliss, and was known afterwards as Baron Bliss. He was apparently successful in his career, but it is not known how he obtained his fortune, whether due to business acumen or inheritance, or a combination thereof.

Bliss became paralysed from the waist down in 1911 at the age of 42, likely due to polio, and was confined to a wheelchair. Despite this, he remained active. He was apparently an avid sailor, but had his yacht confiscated for war purposes during the First World War. When the war ended, he was wealthy enough to retire to a lifetime of fishing and leisure, so to that end he ordered a new 120 ft twin screw yacht from the famous Scottish yacht designer Alfred Mylne, which he christened Sea King II. In 1920, he sailed the yacht to the Bahamas, where he stayed for five years. Meanwhile, his wife Baroness Ethel Alice Bliss stayed in England, living off a portion of his fortune. The couple had no children.

Although he had some property there, he eventually grew tired of Bahamanian society and decided to move on. Leaving the Bahamas behind, he sailed to Trinidad and was there for a short while when he came down with a serious bout of food poisoning. Deciding to accept a previous invitation from his friend Willoughby Bullock, who was then Attorney General of British Honduras, he sailed westward, stopping briefly in Jamaica likely for medical attention, and arriving in the Belize City harbour on 14 January 1926.