Have You a Tiger In Your Family?

Rank : Brigadier

Army Number : 4293

Unit : 1st Bn, 2nd Bn, 6th Bn

Biography :

Educated at Wellington College and RMC Sandhurst, Harold Pinder was commissioned into The Leicestershire Regiment in 1908. 1908-12 served in 1st Bn in Shorncliffe, Aldershot and Ireland (promoted Lieutenant 7.6.1911). In 1910 he attended the inaugural course of Mountain Reconnaisance, in North Wales. From 1913 to 1923 he served in East Africa with The King's African Rifles (mostly 4th Bn) and Somaliland Camel Corps. He was involved in campaigns in Turkhana and Uganda in 1913-14, and in British, German and Portuguese East Africa, Nyasaland and Northern Rhodesia from 1914-18. He was awarded the M.C. in 1918 as 2IC of 1/4 KAR ("No 2 Company was the Advance Guard on 5 July 1917 when a German field company was encountered at noon on a rocky hillock a few kilometres before Mwembe. A sharp fight took place over three hours before the enemy withdrew, the rocky ground hindering rapid deployment by the KAR Askari. For gallantry displayed in attacking an enemy outpost, during which he was wounded twice..."), and was awarded a Bar to the MC the following year, and Mentioned in Dispatches in 1917 and 1919. From 1919 to 1923 he served in the Somaliland Camel Corps including the campaign against the Mad Mullah in 1920, and he commanded it for a time.
In 1924, he worked in the Directorate of Military Operations for a year, before being posted to 2nd Bn and then becoming a student at the Army Staff College. Thereafter he was Staff Captain in HQ 3 Div at Bulford and SO2 at HQ 50 (Northumbrian) Div (TA). In 1933 he became SO2 Jamaica.
He commanded the 1st Bn in India from 1935-39, including the first four months of the Battalion‘s year of active service on the North West Frontier in Waziristan 1938-39. He retired from the Army that year on reaching the age of 50.
On the outbreak of the Second World War he rejoined for duty in the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He was a DA & QMG in the BEF in France 1939/40 for which he was appointed O.B.E. A fortnight after the evacuation from Dunkirk, he was among the 6,000 escapees of the BEF who embarked on the SS Lancastria at St Nazaire, which was sunk and half its passengers drowned. He was then successively DA & QMG HQ Eastern Command and then HQ 18 Div, before commanding 6th Leicesters in the Midlands in 1940-41. He was Commander of the Algiers Base for the 1st Army‘s landing and subsequent operations in North Africa for which he was appointed C.B.E. in 1943. He became Commander of 8 Base Sub-Area of 21st Army Group in 1944, first at Ostend in Belgium, and later in Hamburg until September 1945; awarded Mention in Despatches (L.G. 9.8.1945). He then retired from the Army for the second time.
He was Colonel of The Regiment from 1948-54, and died in 1974, aged 85.
There is a brass memorial plaque to his memory in the Regimental Chapel in Leicester Cathedral. His medals are in the collection of the Leicester Arts & Museum Service.

This page was last edited on 11.6.2019.

Date of Birth : 21.4.1889

Date of Death : 20.12.1974

Place of Death : Newbury, Berkshire

Period of Service : 1908-1945

Conflicts : WW1, Somaliland, and WW2

Places Served : England, Ireland, East Africa, Jamaica, India, France, Algeria, Belgium, Germany