'Officers, 25th Punjabis, with the Regiment at the Delhi Durbar 1911'

Photograph, Delhi, 1911.

A group of named British officers of the 25th Punjabis.

Rear row (from left to right) Captain Cecil Herbert Tyrrell (1882-1964); Major William Constantine Paleologus (2nd in Command); Captain Geoffrey Willoughby Atkins; Captain Charle Brook Riley; Captain Robert Geoffrey Gardner; Captain De Lacy Woolrich Passy (1878-1915).

Middle row (left to right): Lieutenant (later Colonel) Norman George Rogers Coats; Major Frank Martin; Colonel Reginald Edward Dyer (1864-1927); Captain Henry Richard Hunt, and Captain Kennedy, Indian Medical Service.

Front row, seated (left to right): Adjutant Hugh Reginald Walker and Quarter Master Cyril Nisbet Steel (1884-1972).

Captain De Lacy Woolrich Passy died of wounds received at Suvla Bay, Gallipoli, in 1915. Colonel Reginald Dyer, a veteran of the North West Frontier, gained notoriety for his involvement in the Amritsar Massacre in 1919.

The Delhi Durbar was held for the formal purpose of enabling King George V as Emperor of India to announce his coronation to his subjects in India, and to receive homage from the Viceroy, Lord Hardinge of Penshurst (1858-1944), and his officers, and from the Indian ruling princes. The Emperor and Empress, Queen Mary, sat on a covered dais in an arena composed of two amphitheatres. The total number of participants and spectators was estimated at 100,000, including over 30,000 British and Indian soldiers.

From an album of photographs compiled by Lieutenant Colonel Cyril Nisbet Steel, 25th Punjabis, 1904-1921. Steel left the Indian Army in 1933 and joined the Royal Air Force.