Charles Blackadder

Major-General Charles Guinand Blackadder CB DSO (20 September 1869 – 2 April 1921)http://uk.geocities.com/st_martins_leicester/george1.htm] was a soldier in the British Army, nicknamed "Old Black"http://www.rhs.ac.uk/bibl/wwwopac.exe?&database=dcatalo&rf=200701211&SUCCESS=false&SRT2=ti&SEQ2=ascending] .

He joined the 1st Battalion, the Leicestershire Regiment as a Second Lieutenant in 1888 and by 1890 was a Lieutenant. In the late 1890s he was seconded to the West African Frontier Force, and was a Major by 1904. In 1910 he was the senior Major in the 1st Battalion, and then was the commanding officer of the 2nd Battalion from 1912 to 1914.

In 1916, Blackadder (now a general) was president of the courts-martial that followed the Easter Rising. Speaking at dinner after the trial of Patrick Pearse, he said "I have just performed one of the hardest tasks I ever had to do. Condemned to death one of the finest characters I ever came across. A man named Pearse. Must be something very wrong in the state of things, must there not, that makes a man like that a rebel?" [http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/t/taylor-mask.html] [http://www.hoganstand.com/general/Identity/extras/gaels/stories/pearse.htm]

In July 1916 [http://www.1914-1918.net/38div.htm] he was appointed to command the 38th (Welsh) Infantry Division leading it through the Battle of the Somme, the Third Battle of Ypres and during the Spring Offensive, until going sick in May 1918.http://www.uclhistory.co.uk/ArchiveBlackadder2003.htm]

There is a memorial to General Blackadder in the regimental chapel in Leicester Cathedral.

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