Frank Hugh Nigel Parry (H. Nigel Parry in his youth and Hugh Parry thereafter) was born in Johannesburg on 26 Aug 1911, the only child of Charles Frank Parry and Lilian Maud (née Powell). He attended Cheltenham College from 1919 to 1928 and, after spending two years travelling through Europe, entered London University to read biology and geology in 1931. (His step-father, R. Murray-Hughes, was a noted geologist.) After eighteen months, he left to join the newly formed Mines Department in Kenya, from which he resigned in 1934 to return to England and prepare a 30000-word dissertation on the international economy, which was accepted by Balliol College, Oxford. From 1935 to 1938, Parry read PPE (specialising in economics) and one of his letters to the press written at this time received praise from J.M. Keynes. After graduating, he obtained the Oxford Diploma in Colonial Administration (1939) and took up his first posting with the Colonial Administrative Service in Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) weeks before the outbreak of war. Despite his best endeavours, he was not released for military service.

Having served as a District Officer in Broken Hill (Kabwe) and Fort Jameson (Chipata), he became District Commissioner at Lundazi (1944). There followed two years in the Secretariat at Lusaka, part of the time as Assistant Information Officer, during which he wrote New Land for Old (illustrated by his own photographs), a pamphlet to encourage settlement and various other works (see MSS. Afr. s. 2163/3, folders 6-7). In 1945, he married Ann Maureen Forshaw, a Northern Rhodesian (Zambian), who was to bear him two daughters.

The Central African Council (CAC) was established in 1945 to coordinate various of the activities of the territorial governments of the two Rhodesias (Zambia and Zimbabwe) and Nyasaland (Malawi) (whether as a first step to closer association or as a means of deflecting pressure for amalgamation has never been quite clear). Parry was appointed Deputy Secretary in Sep 1947, and became acting Chief Secretary from May 1948 to Apr 1949. He created such a favourable impression that an attempt by the Colonial Office to promote him to the post of Financial Secretary, Somaliland (1949), was abandoned in the face of opposition from the Central African governments. They made strong representations that Parry be appointed Chief Secretary of the CAC in succession to A.E.T. Benson in 1951. Parry continued as Chief Secretary until the CAC was abolished upon the creation of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland (Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Malawi) in the autumn of 1953.

Parry had been involved in the conferences of officials concerned with closer association in Central Africa and carried out the organisational arrangements for the Victoria Falls Conference of Sep 1951. He became Deputy Chairman of the Joint Preparatory Committee, charged with planning the establishment of the Federal Government. He thus stepped easily into the new office of Secretary, Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet Office (i.e. Cabinet Secretary) for the Federation (Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Malawi). External affairs were added to his remit at the end of 1956 as part of the reorganisation of personnel and functions carried out by the new Federal Prime Minister, Sir Roy Welensky. Parry remained Secretary, Office of the Prime Minister and External Affairs, until the demise of the Federation (Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Malawi) at the end of 1963. He was the principal official adviser to the Federal Prime Minister at the various Commonwealth Prime Ministers' meetings of 1958-1962. Parry also became a Federal member of the Joint Dissolution Committee.

There was no place for Parry in the civil services of the successor states - for many, a close association with the Federal Government was anything but the key to future success in public service in Central Africa - and he sought alternative employment. His directorship of Rhodesia Television was prematurely terminated at the end of 1964 with the sudden nationalisation of the company by Mr I.D. Smith's government. At the end of 1963, Parry had still been optimistic of a future in Rhodesia (Zimbabwe); by Oct 1964, he believed that a Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) was almost certain and he was quite certain that he wanted nothing to do with it. The Parrys left Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) in 1965, and he joined the Ministry of Overseas Development, from which he retired in Oct 1971, having spent his last two years in Beirut as Acting Head, Middle East Development Division.

During his retirement in Norfolk, he maintained his interest in African affairs and in the saga of negotiations for a settlement to the Rhodesian (Zimbabwean) question. His health had never been robust and latterly he was all but immobilised by spinal problems (a grievous fate for one whose recreations included motoring and sailing). He died on 19 Apr 1992.

Parry was awarded the CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in 1954 and became a knight bachelor in the Federation's Dissolution Honours List of Jan 1964. In the small society that was Rhodesia, it is not surprising to find that one of Parry's brothers-in-law was a Federal MP (F.B. Robertson, United Federal Party) and one of his cousins a leading businessman (Sir Keith Acutt of Charter Consolidated, etc.).