Brig. The Hon. Richard Gustavus HAMILTON-RUSSELL

  General Notes:

BRIGADIER
THE HON RICHARD
HAMILTON-RUSSELL
Brigadier the Hon Richard Hamilton-Russell, DSO and Bar, MVO, wartime tank commander, died on March 2 aged 90. He was born on
February 4, 1909.
A CAVALRY officer who mastered mechanisation and led his regiment in North Africa and Italy, Dick Hamilton-Russell had an exceptional career as a fighting soldier in the Second World War. Commissioned into the l7th/2lst Lancers in 19Z9. he had been destined for the Brigade of Guards, but the commanding officer of the 17th/2lst, impressed by his excellent horsemanship which won him the Saddle at Sandhurst, persuaded him, that his talent would find more scope in the cavalry. The regiment, mechanised in India in 1938, arrived home too late to take part in the field until the Torch invasion of North Africa in 1942, by which time Hamilton-Russell had risen to command. He led the
1,
in which
he was twice decorated - included the Battle of Thala, where the regiment stopped Rommel's thrust at the supply lines of the 1st Army. In a long and hard-fought day and night action Hamilton-Russell had three tanks. shot under him. The Battle of Fondouk was the Balaclava of the war for the l7th/2lst and the Thth/5th - now united as the Queen's Royal Lancers. There the armour was compelled to force the pass, heavily mined and guarded by anti-tank guns, when the infantry were unable to clear the high ground . Here Hamilton-Russell received hi first DSO for (in the words of the official citation) "his coolness and tenacity … although himself slightly wounded, he quietly maintained the morale of the regiment which had fairly heavy casualties and finally won through in the face of difficulties which at one time appeared insuperable".
In the final stages of the North African campaign the regiment was involved in the Battle of El Hourzia. This was an attack on a prominent feature designed to draw off and exhaust the German armoured reserves. The plan was successful, and opened the gate to the final pursuit and surrender of the enemy in the Cap Bou peninsula.
The last great battle in which he was involved was in Italy, the breaking of the Gustav Line at Cassino, where he won the Bar to his DSO. In this engagement the two tank troops guarding the flank of the action were knocked out, and he himself with the four tanks of regimental headquarters "guarded the flank for four hours during which two self-propelled and at least one static anti-tank guns were endeavouring to knock him out, so that they could get at the right flank of the attack. Lieutenant-Colonel Hamilton- Russell's tenacity and very fine example to his other tanks alone prevented the enemy from interfering with 78th Division".
After Cassino, HamiltonRussell was appointed second- in-command of 21st Army Tank Brigade. When the war ended he was sent to Austria to command the regiment for the second time, and later commanded it for the third time, when it was acting as a training regiment in Yorkshire. He retired from the Army in 1954 after instructing at the Staff College, Camberley, and was Colonel of the Regiment 1957-65. He was a member of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen at Arms,
1956-79.
Born the second son of the 9th Viscount Boyne, the Hon Richard Gustavus Hamilton- Russell was the only one of four brothers to survive the war. Educated at Eton and Sandhurst, he joined his regiment on the eve of embarkation for Egypt and India.
In 1956 he and his wife, the Hon Pamela Cayzer, settled in Yorkshire, where he farmed 300 acres. He hunted with the Bedale, did duty as High Sheriff and Deputy Lieutenant, and was prominent in charitable causes, particularly the Red Cross. His wife died in 1987. He leaves a daughter and two sons, both of whom served in the regiment.

Richard married Hon. Pamela Penelope CAYZER, daughter of Col. Herbert Robin CAYZER 1st Baron Rotherwick and Freda Penelope RATHBORNE, on 17 Jul 1939. (Hon. Pamela Penelope CAYZER died in 1987.)