Roos was born in the
Park Lane area of London, the son of Gustaf Ehrenreich Roos, a Swedish merchant in England, and his wife, Elizabeth Annie Roffey, daughter of George Roffey of
Twickenham. He changed his surname in 1890, to Roos-Keppel, at the request of his Dutch-Swedish grandmother. He was educated at
United Services College, Westward Ho!, abroad, and at the
Royal Military College, Sandhurst. George Roos was commissioned a
lieutenant in the
Royal Scots Fusiliers on 25 August 1886, and was promoted to
captain on 1 September 1895. He transferred to the
Indian Staff Corps on 19 September 1897. He was Political Officer in the Khyber when in March 1900 he was appointed to the temporary command of the
Khyber Rifles, a frontier corps. For his service on the North West Frontier of India, he was appointed a Companion of the
Order of the Indian Empire (CIE) in the
1900 New Year Honours list. Promoted to the
brevet rank of
major in 1902, he received the substantive rank of major in 1904 and promotion to Brevet
lieutenant-colonel in 1907. In 1908, he was knighted with the KCIE and was promoted to full Lieutenant-Colonel in 1912. In 1913, Roos-Keppel, along with Nawab Sir
Sahibzada Abdul Qayyum established
Islamia College (Peshawar), which was inaugurated by
Haji Sahib Turangzai. Roos-Keppel was also president of Central Committee of Examiners in
Pashto. He is credited with foreseeing the genius in the young
Cambridge graduate
Inayatullah Khan by appointing him, at the age of 24, the Vice Principal of
Islamia College (Peshawar) in 1913, and then the Principal in 1917. He was appointed a KCSI in 1915 and a GCIE in 1917. He formally retired from the Indian Army in 1920 and died on 11 December of the following year, aged 55. == Academic contributions ==