Brigadier Brigadier ( ) is a military rank, the seniority of which depends on the country. In some countries, it is a senior rank above colonel, equivalent to a brigadier general or commodore (rank), commodore, typically commanding a brigade of several t ...

Martin Hotine CMG CBE (17 June 1898 – 12 November 1968) was the head of the Trigonometrical and

Levelling Levelling or leveling (American English; see spelling differences) is a branch of surveying, the object of which is to establish or verify or measure the height of specified points relative to a datum. It is widely used in geodesy and cartogra ...

Division of the

Ordnance Survey The Ordnance Survey (OS) is the national mapping agency for Great Britain. The agency's name indicates its original military purpose (see Artillery, ordnance and surveying), which was to map Scotland in the wake of the Jacobite rising of ...

responsible for the 26-year-long

retriangulation of Great Britain The Retriangulation of Great Britain was a triangulation (surveying), triangulation project carried out between 1935 and 1962 that sought to improve the accuracy of maps of Great Britain. Data gathered from the retriangulation replaced data gat ...

(1936–1962) and was the first Director General of the

Directorate of Overseas Surveys The Ordnance Survey International or Ordnance Survey Overseas Directorate its predecessors built an archive of air photography, map and survey records for the United Kingdom from 1946 to 1999. The Ordnance Survey International Collection (formerly ...

(1946–1955). He served on the North-West Frontier during the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

and later in the

Persia Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

n and

Mesopotamia Mesopotamia is a historical region of West Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the Fertile Crescent. Today, Mesopotamia is known as present-day Iraq and forms the eastern geographic boundary of ...

n campaigns. He has been described as "decisive, ingenious and tough".

Cartography

Hotine was responsible for the design of the triangulation pillars constructed during the Geodetic resurvey of Britain. 6,173 of these were built. They provided a solid base for the

theodolite A theodolite () is a precision optical instrument for measuring angles between designated visible points in the horizontal and vertical planes. The traditional use has been for land surveying, but it is also used extensively for building and ...

s used by the survey teams during the survey, thereby improving the accuracy of the readings obtained. They are sometimes referred to as "Hotine Pillars". In the 1940s, Hotine developed a map projection for the

Malay Peninsula The Malay Peninsula is located in Mainland Southeast Asia. The landmass runs approximately north–south, and at its terminus, it is the southernmost point of the Asian continental mainland. The area contains Peninsular Malaysia, Southern Tha ...

and

Borneo Borneo () is the List of islands by area, third-largest island in the world, with an area of , and population of 23,053,723 (2020 national censuses). Situated at the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, it is one of the Greater Sunda ...

that is known as the Hotine oblique Mercator projection.

Personal life

Hotine was married to Kate Amelia Hotine (née Pearson)(1895–1987) whose nickname to family and friends was 'Ajax'.

Honours

*1947

Royal Geographical Society The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers), often shortened to RGS, is a learned society and professional body for geography based in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1830 for the advancement of geographical scien ...

Founder's Medal The Founder's Medal is a medal awarded annually by the Royal Geographical Society, upon approval of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom, to individuals for "the encouragement and promotion of geographical science and discovery". Foundation From ...

"For research work in Air Survey ... and for his cartographic work." *1955 Photogrammetric Society's first President's Medal *1964 The Institution of Royal Engineers' Gold Medal

Publications

* * *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hotine, Martin 1898 births 1968 deaths Royal Engineers officers British Army personnel of World War II British Army personnel of World War I English surveyors People educated at Southend High School for Boys Companions of the Order of St Michael and St George Commanders of the Order of the British Empire