Thomas Haddon

Brigadier Thomas Haddon (19 February 1913 – 12 April 1993) was a British Army officer who served with the airborne forces during the Second World War, most notably during Operation Market Garden in September 1944. Following the war he raised the Singapore Military Forces and served as Chief of Staff of Hong Kong Land Forces. Early life and military career The son of Major J. T. Haddon of the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles), Thomas Haddon was born in Farnham, Surrey, England, on 19 February 1913. He was educated at Hamilton Academy, described by the Cambridge University Press as "one of the finest schools in Scotland", and then at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. He passed out from Sandhurst where he was commissioned as a second lieutenant into the Border Regiment on 2 February 1933. He served initially with the 1st Battalion, Border Regiment, in Northern Ireland, until 1935 when he was sent to the 2nd Battalion of the regiment, where he served in India, seeing active service on the North-West Frontier in 1937. While there he received a promotion to lieutenant on 2 February 1936. He remained with the battalion until the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939. In the same year he married Clodagh, the youngest daughter of Lieutenant Colonel Bertrand Russell; they had three sons. Second World War Shortly after war began, Haddon, who on 3 September was promoted to the acting rank of captain, transferred to the 1st Battalion, Borders, then serving in England as part of Brigadier Noel Irwin's 6th Infantry Brigade, itself one of three brigades forming Major General Charles Loyd's 2nd Infantry Division, and was made Officer Commanding (OC) "B" Company. Along with the rest of the division, Haddon's battalion was sent to France in late September where it became part of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF). His rank of captain being made temporary on 3 December, in February 1940 he was made adjutant of his battalion, which in May was transferred to the 125th Brigade, part of the 42nd (East Lancashire) Infantry Division, a Territorial Army (TA) formation, which had only recently arrived in France.