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The Blessing of Plaques in memory of Neville, the Lord Wigram,
and his brother Captain Francis Wigram
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George Neville Clive Wigram
1915 – 2017 |
Francis Clive Wigram
1920 - 1943 |
On 14th February 2018, a large gathering of the Wigram family, their friends and Grenadiers, attended a Blessing of two Household Division Plaques in the Cloister of the Guards’ Chapel. Major General Roly Walker, Regimental Lieutenant Colonel Grenadier Guards, was represented by Major Grant Baker, Regimental Adjutant. The service was led by the Reverend Stephen Dunwoody, Chaplain to the Household Division.
One of the Plaques is in memory of Captain Francis Wigram, 6th Battalion Grenadier Guards, who was killed aged 23, by mortar fire near Salerno on 12th September 1943, within three days of the initial landings. He is buried in the Salerno War Cemetery at Battipaglia in Italy. The other Plaque is in memory of his elder brother Neville, the Lord Wigram, who died aged 101 on 23rd May 2017 and served with distinction in the Grenadier Guards in the Second World War. At Dunkirk in June 1940, he was hit by shrapnel from a German bomb. He returned to France with 2nd Armoured Battalion in 1944 during the Battle for Normandy before leading his squadron of tanks in the advance across Europe. At Aalten in Holland in July 1945, he was awarded the Military Cross ‘in recognition of gallant and distinguished service in North West Europe’. In peacetime he commanded the 1st Battalion (1955-1957). In 1957 he was invalided out of the Army as a result of an accident.
Both brothers were Old Wykehamists and regarded among their fellow officers as highly efficient and inspiring leaders of men. A reception was held after the Blessing in the Guards Museum.
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