MAJOR-GENERAL FRANCIS HARPER TREHERNE KCMG FRCS Ed

Born in 1858 - Died 30th January 1955

 

He was the son of an audit clerk at Somerset House born in 1858. He was educated at Godolphin School and received his medical training at St Bartholemew's Hospital, London, qualifying in medicine in 1881. Three years later he took the F.R.C.S.Ed and in 1887 the D.P.H. of Cambridge. He immediately adopted the Army as a career. In 1884 he was serving with the Egyptian Expeditionary Force and in the following year in the Sudan Expedition. In each case his services were recognized by mention in dispatches and decorations. The year 1893 saw him in India, now a Major, in what a few years later, became the R.A.M.C., and for five years he was surgeon to the Commander-in-Chief.

Then came the South African War during the whole of which he served with the British Forces and won campaign medals and further mention in dispatches. Later on, in 1908, he saw service on the North-West Frontier of India. In 1912 he was honourary surgeon to the Viceroy (Lord Hardinge of Penshurst), and for three years Assistant Director of Medical Services in India. When the first world war broke out in 1914 he was Deputy Director of Medical Services of the Indian Corps which formed part of the British Expeditionary Force, and during the later years of the war he served as Director of Medical Services of the Third Army. His services in France in 1914-1916 received mention three times in dispatches, and afterwards he was sent to Mesopotamia and was in the actions at Kut and Diala and at the capture of Bagdad. Later he was Deputy Director of Medical Services in the London district and Inspector of hospitals at the Southern command. His last period of service was as Inspector of Medical Services stationed at the War Office. Appointed CMG in 1915 and KCMG in 1917, he retired in 1919 with the rank of Major-General and went to live in Woodbridge, Suffolk. He married twice, one of his sons by his first marriage, Captain Claud Treherne RAMC, died of wounds in the first world war.

He married Nona, daughter of General Sir Frank Turner KCB and they had children:

A daughter, Cecil Bisset Treherne, married Lieutenant-General Sir Ian Jacob. They lived after Sir Francis's death at the Red House in Woodbridge.

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