Lieut.-Colonel Edwin Francis Stanley VERSFELD (13888)

Commanded the 7th Battalion Worcestershire Regiment from November 1942 to March 1944.

Edwin Francis Stanley Versfeld was born on the 1st March 1899.

He was commissioned into The Worcestershire Regiment from Sandhurst on 24th April, 1918, and thus had six months' service in First World War, with the 1st Battalion, in France and Belgium.

He was a member of the Colour Party which came home in 1918 to take the Colours back to the Battalion from the Worcester Cathedral. After the First World War he went to India with the 1st Battalion.

On the 24th October 1919 he was promoted to rank of Lieutenant.

He was Adjutant of the 7th Battalion Worcestershire Regiment from 1st March 1931 to 1934, and later went out to the 2nd Battalion in Sialkot, India.

On the 17th November 1933 he was promoted to the rank of Captain.

On the 4th January 1936 he sailed from Liverpool on s.s. Ulysses for the Cape, South Africa.

On the 1st August 1938 he was promoted to the rank of Major.

He commanded the Infantry Weapons Wing, Saugor, India, in 1940, and in November, 1942, he was appointed Commanding Officer of 7th Battalion The Worcestershire Regiment (T.A.) in 2nd Infantry Division at Ahmednagar, and he continued in command of that Battalion until March, 1944.

He was then appointed one of the permanent Presidents of Courts Martial in SEAC.

Major Versfeld retired from the army on the 2nd December 1946, and given the honorary rank of Lieut.-Colonel. He and his wife Sheila then went to live in South Africa, where he owned a large fruit farm. They had two daughters.

Lieut.-Colonel E. F. S. Versfeld

Lieut.-Colonel Edwin Francis Stanley Versfeld died on the 3rd September, 1970 (aged 71), following a fall a few days previously, at his home, Norton Dingle, Constantia, Cape Province, South Africa.

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