Leslie Rundle


Sir Henry Macleod Leslie Rundle, was a British Army general during the Second Boer War and the First World War.

Military career

Born in Newton Abbot, Devon, to Captain Joseph Sparkhall Rundle, a Royal Navy officer, and his wife Renira Cathrine, Leslie Rundle was commissioned into the Royal Artillery in 1876. He fought in the Zulu War in 1879, the First Boer War of 1881 and the Anglo-Egyptian War of 1882. He was involved in the Nile expedition between 1884 and 1885 and served in the Sudan Frontier Field Force from 1885 to 1887. In 1889 he went to the Sudan Frontier, and he was involved in the Khartoum expedition in 1898. He led a column up the Blue Nile to relieve Gedaref that year.
Rundle became General Officer Commanding South-Eastern District on 29 December 1898.
After the escalation of the Second Boer War in late 1899, Rundle was in January 1900 appointed to the command of the 8th Division of the South African Field Force, with the temporary and local rank of lieutenant general. The appointment was described as "the most remarkable instance of advancement to high military office which has occurred in the recent history of Army" by a contemporary issue of The Times. He left Southampton in the SS Moor in March 1900 with the staff of the 8th division and 600 men of militia regiments, and arrived in Cape Town the following month. He served as commander until early March 1902, when he returned to the United Kingdom on board the SS Carisbrook Castle. For his service in the war, he was mentioned in despatches and appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George .
Following his return, he was in May 1902 back as General Officer Commanding South-Eastern District, based in Dover, and was on 14 May 1902 appointed in command of the 5th Division, stationed there.
He became General Officer Commanding North Eastern District in November 1903, General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of Northern Command in 1905 and Governor and Commander-in-Chief of Malta in 1909. He went on to be General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of Eastern Command in 1915 and retired in 1916.
Rundle was presented with the Freedom of the borough of Dover on 29 October 1902, while living there as General Officer Commanding South-Eastern district.

Family

Rundle married in 1887 Eleanor Georgina Campbell, daughter of Captain H. J. M. Campbell, Royal Artillery, but they had no children.