23 Facts About Philip Neame

Philip Neame received his education at Cheltenham College, and the British Army's Royal Military Academy at Woolwich, Kent.

Philip Neame was promoted to lieutenant in August 1910, whilst serving with the 15th Field Company.

Philip Neame joined the British Expeditionary Force on the Western Front in October 1914.

Philip Neame was 26 years old when the following deed took place, for which he received the Victoria Cross :.

At this Philip Neame went further up the trench to the contact point to talk to one of the surviving bombers there, and discovered that the problem was that he wasn't able use the bombs because there were no fuzee matches left.

Philip Neame was promoted to the rank of captain in 1915, and was mentioned in despatches in February 1915, and again in January 1916.

Philip Neame was awarded the Distinguished Service Order in January 1916.

Philip Neame was promoted to brevet major in the 1917 New Year honours list.

Philip Neame received further mentions in despatches in January and December 1917.

Philip Neame was honoured for his war service in France with the Legion of Honour in January 1919, and the Croix de guerre in July.

Philip Neame was a member of Great Britain's 1924 Olympic Running Deer team at Paris and is the only Victoria Cross recipient who has won an Olympic gold medal.

In June 1932 Philip Neame was promoted full colonel and became a General Staff Officer 1 in the Waziristan District in India.

Philip Neame was admitted to a hospital, Lady Minto Nursing Association, in Bareilly where he was nursed to health by Harriet Alberta Drew.

Philip Neame married the nurse, taking leave from India towards the end of 1933 whereupon he was on half pay without appointment until May 1934.

In July 1934 Philip Neame was given temporary brigadier rank to take up an appointment as Brigadier General Staff with Eastern Command in India.

Philip Neame was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath in January 1939.

Philip Neame organised defences and planned for the campaign, but in February 1940 he was posted to Egypt to command the 4th Indian Infantry Division.

Whilst being responsible for a large area of ground, Philip Neame's command had been stripped of many of its battle-hardened units, which had been withdrawn towards Cairo either for re-fitting, or to take part in the Battle of Greece, and he was left with little air support from the constrained Royal Air Force units available in North Africa at this time.

Philip Neame's Headquarters lacked accurate intelligence information from its senior command echelon, and had no warning about the nature or scale of the massed attack that it was about to be hit with, in a theatre scenario which was thought to be dormant at that time through Italian massed defeat and tactical acquiescence, and he was further hampered by an over-extended line of supply stretching back over many hundreds of miles to Alexandria and Cairo.

Philip Neame held the honorary posts of Colonel Commandant of the Corps of Royal Engineers from February 1945 to 1955 and Colonel 131 Engineer Regiment from January 1948.

Philip Neame was knighted as a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in June 1946, and made a knight of the charitable Order of St John in the same year.

Philip Neame died at Selling in Kent on 28 April 1978, in his eighty-ninth year.

Philip Neame's body was buried in the graveyard of St Mary the Virgin Church, in Selling.