MAJOR VICTOR REGINALD BROOKE, DSO
9TH (QUEEN'S ROYAL) LANCERS
29TH AUGUST 1914 AGE 41
BURIED: ANNEL COMMUNAL CEMETERY, FRANCE
Following a distinguished military career in South Africa and India, Victor Brooke went to France at the beginning of August 1914 with the General Headquarters Staff where, as a fluent French speaker, he was the liaison officer with General Sardet's Cavalry Corps. On 24 August, he took part in the 9th Lancers' cavalry charge at Audregnies. According to an eye witness, as the Germans advanced in good order and in great numbers, General de Lisle ordered the 9th Lancers to charge and stem their advance.
"At the word of command, [they] mounted their horses and rode steadily at the enemy. It was Balaclava over again. The squadrons rode to death, and the colonel, so we were told, said that he never expected a single lancer to return. In the face of a torrent of shot and shell from guns and rifles, they dashed on until they found themselves against two lines of barbed wire, where men and horses fell over in all directions. This ended the charge."
The regiment lost heavily, out of the four hundred that had ridden out over a quarter never returned. Victor Brooke was wounded and died five days later in Chateau d' Annel. Among the many words of tribute, Lord Kitchener, whose ADC Brooke had been in South Africa, wrote that Victor Brooke had been one the best staff officers he had ever had. And Lady Minto, that Brooke had been an ideal military secretary to her husband, Lord Minto: "An indefatigable worker himself, he had that rare gift of getting the best out of others
His brother, Alan Francis Brooke, later Field Marshal Viscount Alanbrooke, chose his inscription from Tennyson's long poem 'In Memoriam A.H.H.', which was dedicated to Tennyson's friend Arthur Hallam. The full verse reads:
And doubtless unto thee is given
A life that bears immortal fruit
In those great offices that suit
The full-grown energies of heaven.