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The Great War (1914-1918) Forum

Remembered Today:

"Relinquishes his commission"


Granite-Yorkie

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I'm just flicking through various London Gazettes, and I keep on finding "...relinquishes his commission. Dated xxx". For example: -

12th Battalion —

Temporary Captain George Marsden,

D.S.O., relinquishes his commission. Dated

14th May, 1915.

I'm just wondering what exactly this would mean. Any ideas?

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I'm glad I am not the only one who does not know the distinction between resigned and relinquished. My uncle relinquished his commission in WW2 and I am not able to ask him what it meant.

I do hope that some one out there will tell us.

Andy

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I've just been digging around- I'm guessing that officers holding temporary commissions could not resign their commissions per se, so instead they relinquished their commissions.

I've come across the case of Alfred E. Swann, late Natal Police, who served with the Yorkshire Light Infantry- who "relinquished his commission" after receiving an adverse report from his Commanding Officer. A more interesting case, referred to in passing in the memoirs of Basil Liddell-Hart, was that of George Robertson Lightbound- who relinquished his commission in the Yorkshire Light Infantry on 11th September 1916, shortly before being sent to prison for embezzling the battalion mess-funds (Liddell-Hart refers to the 11th's 2i/c- not by name, but it happened to be Lightbound- being a "foul-mouthed bully, later sent to gaol for embezzling embezzling mess funds": Memoirs, p.12). Lightbound was also jailed for fraud in the 1930s, the magistrate who sent him down happened to be Frank Powell, who had served as a 2nd Lieutenant with Lightbound after being gassed at Loos (Powell was in the 9th Battalion).

I may just have answered my own question.

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