Gen Sir John Winthrop Hackett, GCB, CBE, DSO & Bar, MC

Gen. Sir John (Shan) Hackett GCB; KCB; CB; CBE; MBE; DSO; MC Gen. Sir John (Shan) Hackett was the son of the Australian Deborah Vernon Drake-Brockman and Sir John Winthrop Hackett. He was born on 5 November 1910 at Perth, and although he grew up and was educated at Geelong Grammar in Australia, he left to continue his university studies at Oxford. He attended New College at Oxford, where he read both greats and modern history under Richard Crossman, almost exhausting him with his relentless flow of questions. By the time he left, he had established himself as a formidable scholar who was later awarded a B.Lit for his thesis on Saladin's campaign in the Third Crusade. He also qualified as an interpreter in French, German and Italian. These skills were crucial after he was commissioned in 1931 as an officer in the 8th King's Royal Irish Hussars. In Palestine, in 1936, he was mentioned in dispatches and was then seconded to the Trans-Jordan Frontier Force from 1937-41, where he was mentioned in dispatches twice. In 1941 he was wounded in Syria and again in the Western Desert, after he had formed and commanded the 4th Parachute Brigade. He was wounded yet again in Italy, in 1943, and once more in 1944, when he took part in the disastrous parachute landing on Arnhem in Holland, where the Germans were waiting. He remained in the British Army after WW2 and went on become one of that country's most famous Army generals. His most senior role included being the Deputy Chief of the General Staff, Commander-in-Chief of the British Army of the Rhine. He lived in England until his death at Cheltenham, Gloucestershire on 9 September 1997. His autobiography was captured in a book titled Shan Hackett: The Pursuit of Exactitude written by Roy Fullick and published in 2003. This book is an account of his life in the military as well as his career as an academic and author following his retirement from the Army. His ashes were returned to Australia to be placed on the grave where his father was buried and where his mother's ashes were also placed.