Henry Leach

Brigadier-General Henry Edmund Burleigh Leach (18 July 1870 – 16 August 1936) was a British Army officer. Early life and career The son of Major-General Sir Edmund Leach of Corston House, Pembrokeshire, he was educated at Uppingham School and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where he won the Sword of Honour. His brother, William, was a Royal Navy officer and first-class cricketer. He was commissioned into the Northumberland Fusiliers as a second lieutenant on 2 May 1891, and was promoted to lieutenant on 8 February 1893. He was adjutant of the 4th (Volunteer) Battalion Yorkshire Regiment from 1 May 1899. He was promoted to captain on 27 January 1900, and served with distinction as a Special Service Officer for Mounted Infantry in the Second Boer War in South Africa. Following the end of that war in June 1902, he left Cape Town on the SS Canada returning to Southampton in late July, and was back in a regular commission with his regiment three months later. He was promoted to major in 1904, and served as Military Secretary to the Governor of Gibraltar from 1905 to 1910. In 1908 he transferred to the South Wales Borderers and in 1912 he took command of the 2nd Battalion, being promoted lieutenant-colonel the following year.