Orders, Decorations and Medals

General Sir Richard Nugent O’Connor, K.T., G.C.B., D.S.O., M.C., Commander of the Western Desert Corps, 1940-41
Photograph of the General with Bedouin Arabs and others, signed, ‘R N O’Connor, general in Comd. Western Desert Force’; together with a leather wallet/notebook cover, inscribed, ‘Dick’, photo with fold mark, notebook cover in good condition (3) £50-70

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Ribbons from the Collection of the late Judge Henry Pownall.

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Richard Nugent O’Connor was born in 1889. Educated at Wellington College and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. He served in the Great War being mentioned in despatches on nine occasions, and was awarded the D.S.O. and Bar. M.C. and Italian Al Valor Militare in silver. Between the wars he was GSO 2nd Grade, War Office, 1932-34; Commander of the Peshawar Brigade, India, 1936-38 and Military Governor of Jerusalem, 1938-39. In the Second World War he commanded the Western Desert Corps in the successful Libyan campaign, 1940-41. O’Connor was captured by the Germans on 7 April 1941 and spent two years as a prisoner-of-war of the Italians until he escaped in 1943. He then commanded VIII Corps in Normandy and in Operation Market Garden. For his wartime services he was mentioned in despatches, awarded the C.B. in 1940; and K.C.B. in 1941. He was further honoured with the G.C.B. in 1947 and K.T. in 1971. Post-war he was A.D.C. to the King, 1946; Commandant of the Army Cadet Force, Scotland, 1948-59; Colonel of the Cameronians, 1951-54; and Lord Lieutenant for the County of Ross and Cromarty, 1955-64. General Sir Richard O’Connor died in 1981.

With a letter hand-written by General O’Connor to a Mr Woodcock:

‘Dear Mr Woodcock, I am afraid I have not got anything of the things you want. And the best I can do is first a photograph taken in the Western Desert of Bedouin Arabs. And secondly a note book I carried part of the War & partly in peace. It is a personal one which I hope you wont mind’ (signed) ‘R. N. O’Connor’.