Edward Northey

Major General Sir Edward Northey (28 May 1868 – 25 December 1953) was a senior British Army officer of the First World War who commanded a brigade on the Western Front until wounded in 1915. Returning to service in 1916, Northey took command of a colonial force in Nyasaland in the East African campaign, later becoming Governor of Kenya. He later served as a general of Territorial forces and retired in 1926. Birth and early career Edward Northey was born in 1868 at Cockerham, Lancashire, and educated at Eton College and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, being commissioned into the King's Royal Rifle Corps as a second lieutenant on 7 March 1888. He was promoted to lieutenant on 7 May 1890, and served in expeditions to Hazara and the Miranzai Valley in 1891 and one to Isazai the following year. Promotion to captain followed on 1 July 1895. From late 1899, Northey took part in the Second Boer War, remaining in South Africa until 1902. On his return, he was appointed adjutant of a volunteer battalion, the 1st Middlesex Rifles (Victoria and St. George′s). First World War When the First World War broke out in 1914, Northey was a lieutenant colonel in the King's Royal Rifle Corps and served with the regiment, commanding the regiment's 1st Battalion, on the Western Front during the first year of the war. In March 1915, Northey was promoted to brigadier-general and took over the 15th Infantry Brigade but was seriously wounded during the Second Battle of Ypres. The date is unclear, but Northey was reportedly surveying the site of a new communication trench when he was struck in the thigh by shrapnel.