The British Empire was created by public officers who were despatched to carve out an empire. The majority of administrators expanded the Empire with little thought about the welfare of the colonised. This biography tells of an exception to this rule, Howard Noel Nankivell, who was born in Jamaica to a British family. As a public official in the Caribbean, he sought to balance the capitalist urge for the holy profit with a genuine concern for the workers' welfare. This is the story of a maverick senior public officer who dared to let conscience be his guide.