President Sheares Died
Tuesday, 12th May 1981
The late President Sheares, GCB (1907 ~ 1981), was the second President of Singapore. Sheares was also the first Chancellor of the National University of Singapore. Sheares was given a State Funeral and buried at Kranji State Cemetery.
Benjamin Henry Sheares was born the second of six children in Singapore to a Eurasian family with an English lineage. His father Edwin H. Sheares, a technical supervisor of the Public Works Department, was born in England and raised in India. Edwin later migrated to Penang and married Singapore-born Lilian Gómez, of Chinese Singaporean and Spanish descent, and had six children - the first died in infancy. Life was hard for the Sheares family with the meagre pay that Edwin received from his post.