Brigadier-General Mainwaring Ravell WALSH, C.B., C.M.G., M.C.

Commanded the 4th Battalion Worcestershire Regiment from 1920 to 1921.

Brig.-Gen. Mainwaring Ravell Walsh was first commissioned to the Royal Berkshire Regiment in 1896.

In 1901 he was specially promoted to a captaincy in the 3rd Battalion Worcestershire Regiment for "marked ability to command in the field."

After the South African War he was appointed Instructor at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, and just before the 1914-1918 War graduated to the Staff College.

Throughout the First World War he rendered invaluable services both at the War Office and at G.H.Q. in France, finishing as Assistant Adjutant General G.H.Q. Rhine Army. This post he relinquished to command the 4th Battalion of the Worcestershire Regiment in 1920.

After further service in India, he returned to England to take command of the West Riding Infantry Brigade, Territorial Army, and in 1930 was appointed Brigadier in charge of Administration, Scottish Command.

Brig.-Gen. Mainwaring Ravell Walsh died whilst on active service in 1941.

A member of the Worcestershire Regiment writes:
There are some whose qualities of mind and character are stamped upon the memory of those who knew them, when their military achievement—considerable though it be—has become a catalogue of promotions, honours and awards.

Brig.-Gen. M. R. Walsh

Of these was Brigadier-General Walsh, the measure of whose loss to the Regiment and his friends it is not easy to assess.

Brigadier-General Walsh's career began in the Royal Berks. Regiment, and in its later stages senior staff appointments, rather than regimental duties, claimed his services. But his pride and affections were ever centred in the Regiment, whose interests and welfare were his close and chief concern, and whose devoted servant he was. When the Fourth Battalion joined the Army of Occupation after the last War, Brigadier-General Walsh held the appointment of "Q" Brigadier-General at Rhine Army Headquarters. At his own request, he vacated that post and relinquished his rank, in order to command a Battalion of the Regiment, which he loved. A similar devotion to the Regiment inspired him during his years of retirement.

The present War found him actively re-employed until he died, as he would have wished, at duty.
Brigadier-General Walsh's infinite kindness and helpfulness to those who served under him will never be forgotten. His readiness to advise in the personal difficulties, as well as the official problems of his subordinates, endeared him to all who sought his good offices. He was quick to associate himself to the full with any scheme for the benefit of the Regiment; and equally quick to resent and resist any attempt to tamper with its dignity and tradition.

His private interests were many, and he could never bear to be idle. A delightful host, it was his great pleasure to welcome his brother officers, young and not so young, to savour the past and to enjoy the present.

Truly in Brigadier-General Walsh has passed a Regimental figure, outstanding in achievement, and in character and in humanity.

 

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