; 2 July 1871 – 25 March 1959) was a British civil servant and Chinese customs commissioner, serving as Inspector-General of the Chinese Maritime Customs Service from 1929 to 1943.
Sir Frederick William Maze in 1937 /note that he is wearing Chinese order of the Brilliant Jade, Grand Blue Cordon/.
Maze was born on 2 July 1871 at 11 Abercorn Terrace in Belfast, the younger son of James Maze, a linen merchant, of Ballinderry, and Mary Hart, one of two daughters of Henry Hart of Lisburn. He was educated at Wesley College, Dublin and later followed his uncle, Sir Robert Hart, into the Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs Service in 1891 and was appointed in 1899 as acting audit secretary at the inspectorate-general in Beijing. By the time of the Boxer uprising in 1900, he was acting commissioner at Yichang. Appointed Deputy Commissioner at Fuzhou in 1901, and at Canton two years later. In 1904 he opened a new Customs House at Kongmoon, serving as commissioner there until 1906. Then he was appointed Commissioner to the town of Tengyue which was the site of a British consulate close to the frontier with Burma, serving until 1908. On 3 June 1909 the Chinese government awarded him with the Order of the Double Dragon, Third Class. The significant rate of Maze's ascension within the customs service did not go without comment however, especially given his familial ties (Hart's successor as acting Inspector-General in 1909, Sir Robert Bredon, was also Maze's mother's and Hart's brother-in-law). Times Beijing correspondent G. E. Morrison in particular made no secret of his abhorrence for the "half-witted" Maze and the nepotism he saw working against more experienced candidates within the service, and at one point noted the lack of promotion for his friend, ornithologist and Customs Deputy Commissioner John La Touche, "who, 35 years in China with world wide reputation, is still Deputy Commissioner under a nonentity named Maze who has been 21 years in China, for 10 of which he has been full commissioner. Such is justice!".
In 1911 Maze was appointed to the senior post of Commissioner in Canton. On 28 March 1914 Maze laid the foundation stone for the new Customs House in Canton and served as commissioner there until 1915, when he was presented with the Order of the Golden Grain, 3rd class, which was upgraded to the 2nd class in 1919. He was made commissioner in Tianjin (1915–1920), which was then followed by a posting in Hankou (1921–1925). In 1920 Emperor Taishō of Japan presented Maze with the Order of the Sacred Treasure, Third Class. In May 1922 he was awarded the 2nd of the Order of the Precious Brilliant Golden Grain by President Xu Shichang. This was upgraded to the 2nd Class in 1923. In 1924 Maze was awarded the 1st class of the Conservancy Medal. In 1925 he was made Commissioner in Shanghai, then one of the most prestigious posts in the service.
When Inspector-General Sir Francis Aglen was dismissed by the Beiyang Government in late 1927, he ensured his deputy A. H. F. Edwardes was made 'Officiating' Inspector-General in his place. Edwardes was set to become the next Inspector-General until but with the rise of the Kuomintang (KMT) to be the predominant political force in China, capturing Shanghai in early 1927, Edwardes position was much less certain and Maze, then Shanghai Commissioner, announced his candidacy for Inspector-General. The KMT distrusted Edwardes, seeing him as too connected to the Beiyang government in Beijing, while Maze had had good relations with the KMT and Sun Yat-Sen during his posting in Canton. The KMT, in the process of deposing the internationally recognised Beiyang warlords in Beijing, offered Maze the position of 'Inspector-General' in the south three times in 1927, but he refused. Maze was awarded the 2nd class of the Order of the Striped Tiger in 1927. In 1928 he accepted an appointment as an adviser to the national board of reconstruction, and in October 1928 Edwardes appointed Maze as Deputy Inspector-General.
Feeling a lack of support, particularly from the new KMT government in Nanjing from 1928, Edwardes resigned from the Customs Service on 31 December 1928 and Maze was chosen to be the new Inspector-General. Taking up his appointment in Shanghai on 10 January 1929, Maze took his oath to the KMT and bowed to Sun Yat-Sen's portrait in a ceremony that the foreign community of Shanghai described as an "Unfortunate precedent". As the new Inspector-General Maze moved the headquarters of the Customs Service to Shanghai and Nanjing and decreed that no new foreigners would be employed in the service, except where a specific or technical qualification was required. Maze was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) in the 1932 New Years Honours. Maze was also made a Commander of the Order of Leopold (Belgium; 12 February 1930), a Commander of the Military Order of Christ (Portugal; 5 March 1932), a Commander of the Order of St. Olav (Norway; 12 July 1933), a Commander First Class of the Order of the Dannebrog (Denmark; 17 June 1935), the German Red Cross Decoration (Germany; 29 July 1937) and a Commander of the Légion d'honneur (France; 28 July 1937). Maze was appointed by the Chinese Government as a Counselor to accompany Dr. H. H. Kung as part of the Chinese delegation to the Coronation of King George VI in May 1937.For the coronation Maze commissioned Ede and Ravenscroft to make his Chinese Diplomatic uniform, consisting of a long coat embroidered with corn sheaves in gold with gilt buttons engraved with the letters RC ("Republique Chinoise") in the centre surrounded by the Chinese motif symbolising five blessings, a black ostrich feather bicorne hat cocked with the colours of the KMT, and a gold and pearl-hilt court sword (On Maze's retirement he donated his uniform to the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich). In February 1938 Maze was awarded the Grand Blue Cordon of the Order of Brilliant Jade by the president Lin Sen "In recognition of valuable services rendered by him in the employment of the Chinese Government".
During Second World War Sir Frederick and his wife Lady Maze elected to remain in Shanghai. Their home was seized by the Japanese and Maze himself was for a time one of 200 British and American citizens held captive at the ‘Bridgehouse’ Kempeitai prison. Although himself released in June 1942, Maze returned to China as soon as possible to support members of his staff who were still imprisoned. Following his retirement, Sir Frederick and Lady Maze lived firstly in Cape Town before settling in Victoria, British Columbia.
