military biographies

The gallery below will collate all of the blogs I write as military biographies for members of my family, ranging in date from the 17th century to the Second World War. I'll explain their family connection in the blogs, but anyone interested in the wider picture go to the family history page (where these blogs also appear under the surname headings). Blogs related to my grandfather Captain Lawrance Wilfred Gibbins and his grandfather Colonel Walter Andrew Gale's service in the 1879 Rumpa Rebellion in India are collated on separate pages. I have a particular interest in 19th century British officers in India, and will be adding more of these when I find time - including my four times great-grandfather Lieutenant-Colonel John Gale, his brother Captain Curwen Gale and another ancestor's brother, Lieutenant-General George Hunter, all of the Bengal Army, together representing many of the East India Company's wars from the Napoleonic period to the Indian Mutiny. 

The soldier pictured opposite is my five-times great-uncle General John Lawrenson, who entered the British army in 1818 and commanded the cavalry in the Crimean War. The banner image shows the charge of the 16th (Queen's Own) Lancers at the Battle of Aliwal, January 1846, during the Punjab War (coloured aquatint by J. Harris, National Army Museum), in which John's brother George was Mentioned in Despatches as an officer of the Bengal Horse Artillery. To find out more about their lives, see the blog below.