Early Life and Assignments
Dyer was born in Murree, in the Punjab province of British India, which is now in Pakistan. He was the son of an Irish brewer who managed the famed Murree Brewery. He spent his childhood in Simla and received his early education at the Bishop Cotton School in Simla. He attended Midleton College, County Cork, Ireland between 1875 and 1881. In 1885, soon after attendance at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst he was commissioned into the Queen's Royal Regiment (West Surrey) as a Lieutenant, and performed riot control duties in Belfast (1886) and served in the Third Burmese War (1886–87). He was then transferred to the British Indian Army, joining initially the Bengal Staff Corps as a Lieutenant in 1887 and being attached to the 39th Bengal Infantry, later transferring to the 29th Punjabis. He served in the latter in the Black Mountain campaign (1888), the relief of Chitral (1895) (being promoted Captain in 1896) and the Mahsud blockade (1901–02). In 1901 he was appointed a Deputy Assistant Adjutant General. He was then transferred to the 25th Punjabis. In August 1903 he was promoted to Major, and served with the Landi Kotal Expedition (1908). He commanded the 25th Punjabis in India and Hong Kong and was promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel in 1910. During World War I (1914–18), he commanded the Seistan Force, for which he was mentioned in despatches and made a Companion of the Bath (CB). He was promoted Colonel in 1915, and was made a temporary Brigadier-General in 1916. In 1919, about a month after the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, in the Third Anglo-Afghan War, his Brigade relieved the garrison of Thal, for which he was again mentioned in despatches. 5th Brigade at Jamrud was his last command posting for a few months during 1919. He retired on 17 July 1920, retaining the rank of Colonel.
Read more about this topic: Reginald Dyer
Famous quotes containing the words early life, early and/or life:
“... business training in early life should not be regarded solely as insurance against destitution in the case of an emergency. For from business experience women can gain, too, knowledge of the world and of human beings, which should be of immeasurable value to their marriage careers. Self-discipline, co-operation, adaptability, efficiency, economic management,—if she learns these in her business life she is liable for many less heartbreaks and disappointments in her married life.”
—Hortense Odlum (1892–?)
“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“He was discontented and wasted his life into the bargain; and yet he rated it as a gain in coming to America, that here you could get tea, and coffee, and meat every day. But the only true America is that country where you are at liberty to pursue such a mode of life as may enable you to do without these, and where the state does not endeavor to compel you to sustain slavery and war and other superfluous expenses which directly or indirectly result from the use of such things.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)