Gerald Lathbury

Infobox Military Person
name= Gerald Lathbury
lived= 1906 - 1978
placeofbirth=Britain
placeofdeath=Alicante (Spain)


caption=
nickname= Legs
allegiance=
serviceyears=
rank= General
commands= 1st Parachute Brigade
3rd Parachute Brigade
unit= Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry
The Parachute Regiment
battles= Operation Market Garden
Operation Pegasus
awards=
laterwork= Governor of Gibraltar 1965 - 1969

Sir Gerald William Lathbury, GCB, DSO, MBE (July 14, 1906 – May 16, 1978) was a British Army officer during the Second World War and later became Governor of Gibraltar . [http://www.unithistories.com/officers/1AirbDiv_officersL.htm]

Lathbury was born into a military family. His father was Col. O. Lathbury. Lathbury joined the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry before raising the 3rd Parachute Battalion in 1941 and the 3rd Parachute Brigade in 1943 before taking command of the 1st Parachute Brigade in North Africa. Lathbury took part in the landings in Sicily tasked with the capture of the Primasole Bridge where he was wounded in the back and both thighs, although he remained in command until reinforcement arrived. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for this action. The citation reads:

Lathbury was still in command of the 1st Parachute Brigade during the Battle of Arnhem, part of Operation Market Garden in Holland. On 18 September 1944 he was cut off from his command while in the company of Major-General Roy Urquhart when he was badly wounded in the left leg and his spine was chipped, leaving him temporarily paralysed. Lathbury was left in the care of a local Dutch family and became a prisoner of war. He concealed his rank, pretending to be a Lance Corporal. He escaped by simply walking out of the main doors of the hospital in which he was held. The Dutch resistance put him in touch with other hiding British soldiers. Lathbury, along with Lieut. Col. David Dobie and Major Allison Digby Tatham-Warner, organised an escape across the Rhine. Lathbury and Dobie crossed the Rhine on 22nd October with one hundred and thirty-seven men linking up with Easy Company, 506th Airborne Infantry Regiment of the U.S. 101st Airborne Division (see Operation Pegasus).

He remained in the military after the war, later accepting the post of Governor of Gibraltar in 1965.

He died in 1978.

External links

* [http://fixedreference.org/en/20040424/wikipedia/Governor_of_Gibraltar Governors of Gibraltar]
* [http://www.pegasusarchive.org/arnhem/gerald_lathbury.htm Pegasus Archive]