British Army officer (1866–1952)
Major General Sir John Ponsonby, KCB, CMG, DSO (25 March 1866 – 26 March 1952) was a British Army officer who commanded the 5th Division during the last year of the First World War.
Military career
Born the son of Sir Henry Ponsonby and educated at Eton College, Ponsonby was commissioned as a lieutenant into the 3rd (Militia) Battalion of the Sherwood Foresters in March 1886.[3] After transferring to the Royal Irish Rifles (later the Royal Ulster Rifles) in November 1887,[4] he was transferred into the Coldstream Guards, and the Regular Army, in August 1888.[5][6]
He served in Uganda from 1898 and was seconded for service in the Second Boer War in South Africa in March 1900, and attached to the Rhodesian Field Force.[7] By now a captain, having been promoted to that rank in July 1901,[8] he was again sent to South Africa in February 1902.[9][6]
Ponsonby fought in the First World War, initially, after receiving a promotion to the temporary rank of brigadier general in August 1915,[10] as commander of the 2nd Guards Brigade, part of the Guards Division, and then, after being promoted to temporary major general in September 1917,[11][12] as general officer commanding (GOC) 40th Division, leading his division at the Battle of Cambrai later that year.[13] His permanent rank was advanced to colonel in November 1917.[14] In July 1918 he went on to become GOC 5th Division, remaining in that role until the end of the war.[13] He had been appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George earlier in the war, in February 1915.[15]
After the war Ponsonby, whose rank of major general was made permanent in January 1919,[16] became GOC Madras District of India.[13] He retired from the army in June 1927.[17][18]
Family
In 1935 Ponsonby married Mary (Mollie) Robley; they had no children.[13] He lived at Haile Hall near Beckermet in Cumbria.[13]
References
