Edward James Gardiner (11 October 1845 - 15 February 1908) was an architect, surveyor, volunteer officer and local politician. Born in Bloomsbury, he was the only son of William James Gardiner, a surveyor, of Great Russell Street and Worcester Park, in 1869 he married Laura Statham at St. George's Church, Bloomsbury. He was an officer in the 1st Middlesex Engineers, a unit of the Volunteer Force, he was granted the honorary rank of lieutenant-colonel in March 1886.