Ridley Pakenham-Walsh


Ridley Pakenham Pakenham-Walsh CB MC was a senior British Army officer who became General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland District.

Military career

Pakenham-Walsh was commissioned into the Royal Engineers in 1908. He became an instructor at the Royal Military College, Duntroon in Australia in 1914.
He served in World War I in the Dardanelles and in France and Belgium. After the War he became British Representative at the International Commission in Teschen in Poland before becoming an instructor in Tactics at the Royal School of Military Engineering in 1923. He was appointed a General Staff Officer and then Assistant Adjutant General at the War Office before becoming a Brigadier on the General Staff of Eastern Command in 1935. In 1939 he returned to the Royal School of Military Engineering as Commandant.
He served in World War II as Engineer-in-Chief for the British Expeditionary Force in France and Belgium before becoming General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland District in 1940. He was appointed Commander of IX Corps in 1941 and Commander of Salisbury Plain District in 1942. His last appointment was as Controller General for Army Provision in 1943. He retired in 1946.
His name appears on a War Memorial in Rathmichael Church in Shankill in County Dublin.