Major E C T Wilson VC, East Surrey Regiment, 1943 (c)

Photograph, 1943 (c).

Eric Charles Twelves Wilson (1912-2008), educated at Marlborough School and the Royal Military Academy, Sandhust, was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the East Surrey Regiment in 1933. Wilson was seconded to the King's African Rifles in 1937 and the Somaliland Camel Corps in 1939. In August 1940 the Somaliland Camel Corps fought in a desperate stand against Italian forces invading British Somaliland. Commanding a group of Vickers machine gun teams at Tug Argan, Wilson kept the guns in action in spite of the heavy artillery fire brought to bear on their positions. Thought to have been killed in action Wilson was awarded the Victoria Cross posthumously. However, wounded and suffering from malaria, Wilson was actually captured and held as a prisoner of war. He was released in 1941 and went on to serve with the Long Range Desert Group in North Africa and the King's African Rifles in Burma. Wilson rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel and left the Army in 1949; he died in 2008.

From collection of photographs associated with the King's African Rifles during World War Two (1939-1945).