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Surname

Forename

Rank

Notes

Unit

French

S C

1st Battalion
Source: QSA and KSA medal rolls

Gloucestershire Regiment

French

S C

2510

Lance Corporal

Discharged 12 Mar 01 time expired
Source: Nominal roll in WO127

South African Light Horse

French

S G

Captain

1st Battalion
Demise: Killed in action 12 Feb 1900
Place: Crocodile Pools
Source: In Memoriam by S Watt

Royal Irish Regiment

French

S G

Lieutenant

BSACM Rhodesia 1896 (0).
Source: BSACM rolls

Royal Irish Regiment

French

S W

1st Battalion
Source: QSA and KSA medal rolls

Northumberland Fusiliers

French

Sampson G

Captain

Source: Nominal roll in WO127

Rhodesia Regiment

French

Sampson Gough

Captain

He was killed in action at Gaberones, about eighty miles north of Mafeking, February 12th, 1900. He was born January 1870, educated at Winchester, and entered the Royal Irish Regiment March 1891, being promoted Lieutenant February 1892, and Captain October 1899. He had previously served in the operations in South Africa 1896, with the Mounted Infantry and was wounded. Captain French was employed on special service from September 1899, in the Mafeking Relief Force under Colonel Plumer.
Source: Donner

Royal Irish Regiment

French

Somerset Richard

Somerset Richard French was born in 1848, the son of the late Robert French. After being educated at a private school, he entered the Money Order Department of the General Post Office in London in 1866, but was transferred to the Secretary's Department in 1869, and in the next year assisted in the transfer of telegraphs to the State. He was in charge of the Intelligence and Special Arrangements Branch of the Telegraph Service from 1870 to 1880, and in 1878 he went to Cyprus with an expeditionary force under Lieutenant-General Sir Garnet Wolseley to organize a postal and telegraph service in that island. He was appointed Secretary and Accountant-General of the Post Office of Cape Colony in 1880, Controller of the Savings Bank in 1884, and Postmaster-General of the Colony in 1892. Whilst acting as Secretary, he introduced the Postal Savings Bank system in the Colony. His next appointment was Postmaster-General of British Bechuanaland, and from 1893-97 he was manager of the Rhodesian Telegraph Service, and of the African Trans-Continental Telegraph Company. He was awarded the CMG in 1896 in recognition of these services. He represented the Cape Colony, Natal, and Rhodesia at the Universal Postal Union Congresses at Washington in 1897, and Rome in 1906, and was largely responsible for the introduction of the Imperial Penny Postage scheme. He supervised the Military and Postal Telegraph Services in the Cape Colony during the South African War, in connection with which he received the special thanks of the Imperial Government and Field-Marshal Lord Roberts, and was created KCMG in 1901, in recognition of these services. In 1907 Sir Thomas Fuller retired from the post of Agent-General for Cape Colony in London, and Sir Somerset French succeeded him. He married in 1893, Josephine, only daughter of Beauval Murphy, RN. There were two children, a daughter who died during the early part of the War, and a son, who was killed in action in 1918. Sir Somerset French died in Sussex on 11 May 1929.
QSA (0) (Sir S French KCMG GPO Staff). DNW Jun 00. £1,500.
Source: List of KCMG recipients. Various sources

Unknown

French

Somerst

Cape Governmentt Postal / Telegraph Service. MID LG: 19 April 1901, page: 2709. Source: Field Marshal Roberts. 2 April 1901. Re: General mentions
This page contains all the London Gazette pages for the Boer War

Unknown

French

2939

Private

5th Battalion
Demise: Died of disease 29 May 1902
Place: Bulawayo
Source: In Memoriam by S Watt

(Duke of Cambridge's Own) Middlesex Regiment

French

Source: WO100/281

Vallentin's Heidelberg Volunteers

French

2939

Private