Ronald Wingate - Early Life

Early Life

Wingate was the son of Reginald Wingate, a British general who held important positions in Egypt and Sudan, and his wife Catherine Wingate. Wingate was also a cousin of Lawrence of Arabia and Orde Wingate. Wingate spent his early childhood in Cairo with his family, but in 1889 he was sent to live in England and enter school. From a very young age, he hoped to follow his father into military service, and he began his education at Bradfield College planning to join the British Navy. While at Bradfield; however, Wingate discovered that he could not pass the Navy's medical exam because he was severely near-sighted and decided to instead pursue a civil service career.

Wingate left Bradfield and entered Balliol College, Oxford, where he went to receive an MA. While at Oxford, Wingate hoped for a career in the Foreign Office, but his father convinced him that a posting abroad would be more favorable financially. Thus, in 1912, Wingate passed the civil service examinations and entered the Indian Civil Service (ICS). He was immediately sent back to Oxford, where he spent a year studying Urdu and Persian. During the Christmas holiday of his year at Oxford, Wingate visited his father in Khartoum and met May Harpoth, the daughter of Paul Vinogradoff, a prominent scholar at the University of Oxford. In his memoirs, Wingate described their encounter as "love at first sight", and the two were engaged six months later before Wingate left for his first posting in India.

In 1913, Wingate began his ICS career as an Assistant Commissioner in Punjab, posted in Sialkot. Wingate "worked ceaselessly" at the various tasks of administration during the period, but enjoyed his duties. In 1916, Harpoth visited Wingate in India and the two were married in Lahore. After a honeymoon in the Kangra Valley, Wingate returned to work, becoming an aide de camp and assistant private secretary for the Governor of Punjab, and then the city magistrate of Delhi.