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Colonel McRae was living at Kenwardston (1) on Exmouth Road (now 1 Lansdowne Road) from about 1933 up until his death in December 1962. He was born on the 10th November 1878 in the military cantonment at Mian Mir outside Lahore, (now in Pakistan). This was an Indian military cantonment named after a prominent Sufi saint and it features in Kipling's work. His father was Colonel Henry Napier McRae and mother Ellen Louisa (nee Murray). By 1891 his father had become a widower and was back in London temporarily living in Islington with his children Henry and Jessie who were both at school. His father remarried in Barton Regis on 10th July 1895 to Mildred Elizabeth Kate Harrison.   In January 1899 young Henry joined the Army as a Lieutenant in the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Irish Regiment, who were serving in India at Mhow, Bombay (2). After the obligatory period in a British Regiment he transferred to the Indian Army and joined the 45th Sikhs at Multan in September 1900.

As Henry was to spend much of his time in India on the North West Frontier it is pertinent to include some idea of the situation in that region. From 1901 a system devised by Lord Curzon was in operation up to the time of the 3rd Afghan War in 1919. Curzon devised this mainly to reduce the amount of money spent on fighting on the North West Frontier. The frontier tribes were so independent that subduing them was impossible. There was a political border - the Durand Line – and behind that was the administrative border of British India – essentially the settled districts along the Indus River, which were the principal concern of the British administration.

Curzon’s strategy was to ensure the security of British India, particularly against the Russians, and to manage the frontier in a way which did not unduly antagonize the Amir of Afghanistan and met some of the aspirations of the frontier tribes for quasi-independence. To reduce costs of British military expeditions or garrisons he withdrew regular Army troops out of the tribal areas (but keep them in reserve) and enlisted selected tribesmen into local militias officered by British and Indian Army officers on secondment. A separate district The North West Frontier Province was set up and administered directly by the Viceroy’s Department and he recruited an elite of political officers, expert in the languages and customs of the frontier tribes.

In 1902 Henry served with the regiment on the North West Frontier bordering Afghanistan during operations against the Darwesh Khel Waziris and the regiment was involved in several actions and suffered many casualties. His father was in command of the regiment during this campaign.

After the campaign the regiment seems to have had a more routine time with its headquarters at Nasiribad in Rajastan for most of the time till 1914. However they were sent on assignments most years (3); in October 1904 the regiment marched to Nowshera in Kashmir, and in January and November of 1905 they marched to Rawalpindi to take part in Reviews in honour of the Amir of Afghanistan and HRH the Prince of Wales (later George V) respectively. Also in May 1905 (4) and again in 1906 they marched to Chakdarra with the moveable column for the Chitral Reliefs. (Chitral was on the extreme North West Frontier and its occupation was considered to be essential as a bulwark against possible Russian invasion. Chitral was sent biennial relief columns under escort to protect them from hostile tribesmen and keep the Chitral Road open).

In 1907 Lieutenant McRae was sent to Africa to take command of a double company of Sikhs in the Indian Contingent in the Central African protectorate (Nyasaland). He was given the temporary rank of Captain (5). British Indian soldiers (mainly Sikhs) had been employed as the nucleus of an armed force for many years. The native population was apparently well disposed towards European rule and they comprised the principal contingent of the armed force with which the British government endeavoured to oppose Arab, Zulu or Awemba aggression (6). His appointment to Captain was confirmed in January 1908.

By 1911 he was back in India as a double company officer with his Regiment, which was stationed at Multan in the Punjab.  The Army List of 1912 shows that he had been sent for training at the Staff College in Quetta and he had been successful in the examination and by October 1914 was a Staff Captain at Headquarters. While in Quetta he joined the local Lodge of Freemasons.

1914 was another important year for him because in March of that year he married Esme Harrison in Bengal. After the outbreak of World War 1 the 45th Sikhs were sent to Mesopotamia to fight the Turks but Henry, although still a member of the Regiment, was not with them. According to his WW1 medal card he was attached to Force E which was sent to Egypt to protect the Suez Canal. I suspect he was on the headquarters staff. His wife must have accompanied him to Egypt because their first daughter Elizabeth Stella was born on 19 November 1915 in Cairo. In September he had been  promoted to acting Major.

In 1916 the ANZAC forces that retreated from the Gallipoli campaign were sent to Egypt to recover and reorganise and needed reinforcements. It would appear that around February Henry became a general Staff Officer grade 2 with this newly formed force – the 4th Australian Division. It is likely that other soldiers from the 45th Sikhs were attached to the same force (although the main part of the regiment stayed in Iraq). The 4th Division was initially stationed on the Suez Canal but in June 1916 moved to near Armentieres in France, however it soon moved to the Somme. Although Henry doesn’t appear to have been directly involved in fighting in France he was mentioned in dispatches three times during the war (3); in one citation dated 8th March 1917 he was described as “hard working and a capable staff officer. His work has been excellent throughout” (7). In the New Year’s Honours list in January 1917 he had been awarded a D.S.O. for his work in France.

In 1918 Henry may have been temporarily back in England because his second daughter Esme Jean was born in Canterbury in the second quarter of that year. The family returned to India and in 1919 he was involved in the 3rd Afghan War which resulted in reaffirmation of the Durand Line as the political boundary between British India and the Emirate of Afghanistan and the Afghans agreed not to foment trouble on the British side. The 1920 Army Listing for the 45th Sikhs records him as being an Acting Lieutenant Colonel with the 1st battalion 124th Infantry; these I believe were the 124th Duchess of Connaught's Own Baluchistan Infantry, the 1st Battalion of which served in the Third Afghan War.

In May 1922 Lieutenant Colonel Henry McCrae took over command of the 45th Sikhs. This coincided with a reorganisation of the Indian Army which changed from being single battalion regiments to multi battalion regiments. The 45th Sikhs became the 3rd Battalion of what was now the 11th Sikh Regiment.

In 1924 the whole family returned to London to Manson Place, South Kensington. McRae returned to India but I wonder whether his wife and 2 daughters remained in England so that the girls could go to an English school.

He became a Colonel in 1927 with seniority backdated to April 1926; at some stage before this announcement in the London Gazette in October 1927 he had received an O.B.E.  Between December 1928 and February 1929 he was involved with the organisation of the air evacuation of British and a number of European diplomatic staff and their families conducted by the Royal Air Force from Kabul. In May 1930 he retired from the Army.

When exactly the family settled in Budleigh Salterton is not clear but may have been as early as 1932, or even before, because in November 1934 the Western Times reported on the 3rd Armistice Day parade of the Salterton, East Budleigh and Otterton Branch of the British Legion. Colonel McRae was listed as the Chairman and it is unlikely he would have been such if he was a new-comer to the town in view of all the ex-military men who lived locally.

McRae seems to have spent his last years in the service consulting the archives of the 45th Sikhs because in 1933 he published a book on the regiment (8).

He was obviously keen to get involved with local affairs and in 1934 he stood as a candidate in the local council election (9).

By 1939 he was President of the Salterton Branch of the British Legion and had an unfortunate accident near Woodbury when returning by car from an ARP Warden’s meeting. According to the Western Times he: "did not observe a turn in the road, with the result that the car went into a ditch”, and he fractured his clavicle (10).

A more recent owner of Kenwardston was Peter Silvester and, although he moved to Budleigh well after Colonel McRae’s death, he knew Henry’s daughter Elizabeth (Betty Campbell) who lived in Cliff Terrace and therefore learned several things about McRae. Apparently he was considered a bit eccentric locally. He devised a set of pulleys so that he could open his chicken house in the morning without having to get out of bed. He also didn’t believe in heating the house. The daughters went every day by horse and cart to a private school in Exmouth on the site of what later became Rolle College in 1946.

Both daughters married within a year of each other, Elizabeth to John Campbell in 1943 and Esme to Henry Garton in 1944.

Henry died on 28th December 1962 leaving £6582. In his Will he left £100 to the Budleigh Salterton Branch of the British Legion and £50 to Frank Pinney of Upalong in Knowle; Kenwardston was not to be sold during his wife’s widowhood without her written consent, and his estate was to be held in trust to provide an income for her. The daughters would receive equal shares of the estate after her death.

Researched by Roger Lendon, © June 2017

(1) An Arts & Crafts style house built in 1927 by Palmers to a design by W F Dickinson, Victoria Street, Westminster
(2) London Gazette.
(3) Regimental History of the 45th Ratteray’s Sikhs during the Great War and after. Lieut. Colonel R.H. Anderson.
(4) Edinburgh Evening News 27 May 1905.
(5) London Gazette 1907.
(6) Encyclopaedia Britannica 1911.
(7) https://www.awm.gov.au/people/rolls/R1594108
(8) Regimental History of the 45th Rattray's Sikhs Volume 1 1856-1914 by H. St. G. M. McRae, Published privately, Robert Maclehose and Co. 1933
(9) 27 March 1936 - Western Times
(10) Western Times 24 November 1939

BS-B-00081 Biography