Edwin Flavell

Edwin William Conquest Flavell
Flavell (third left) with fellow Brigadiers James Hill and Nigel Poett talking to Field Marshal Montgomery during the Battle of the Bulge, January 1945.
Born	22 February 1898 15 Stansfield Road, Stockwell, London
Died	29 November 1993 (aged 95) Eastbourne Belmont Retirement Home, Pevensey Bay Road, Eastbourne, East Sussex
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service/branch	British Army
Years of service	1914–1918 1939–1945
Rank	Brigadier
Unit	East Surrey Regiment Machine Gun Corps
Commands held	2nd Parachute Battalion 1st Parachute Brigade 6th Airlanding Brigade
Battles/wars	World War I World War II British airborne operations in North Africa Operation Tonga Battle of the Bulge
Awards	Distinguished Service Order Military Cross & Two Bars Legion of Merit (United States)
Other work	Deputy Lieutenant for Middlesex (first appointed 1960). Provincial Grand Master of Berkshire (1967–85).

Brigadier Edwin William Conquest Flavell DSO, MC & Two Bars (22 February 1898 – 29 November 1993) was a British Army officer who served in both World War I and World War II, commanding the 1st Parachute Brigade and the 6th Airlanding Brigade in the latter conflict before becoming Deputy Chief of Staff HQ First Allied Airborne Army.

Flavell was born on 22 February 1898 at 15 Stansfield Road, Stockwell, London. He was educated at King's College School in Wimbledon, London. Flavell died on 29 November 1993 aged 95. Some sources give 8 November or 1 December 1993 as the date of death.

Son of Edwin George Flavell, and Emily Eliza Flavell (née Conquest), His father was a commercial clerk and his mother a cashier in a drapery store or manufacturing outlet. He had an older sister, Constance Lillian Flavell, born 1895.

He married in 1920 to Nora Cooper, having two sons and a daughter with her. He married for a second time, to Kathleen Fenton,an accomplished concert pianist. One son, James Sydney Channel Flavell, served in the Middlesex Regiment and the other in the RAF. Flavell, and both sons, were at Arnhem in 1944.

In the Ickenham Lodge No. 5770 (Middlesex) Members' Record Book, at the Consecration of the Lodge on 27 February 1939, it is noted that his occupation was "company director", then living at his Hampstead address.

In 1914, during World War I, at the age of 17, he enlisted in the East Surrey Regiment and was commissioned as a second lieutenant five months later. In 1916 he transferred to the newly formed Machine Gun Corps, and in 1917 he was believed to be the youngest major serving in the Flanders area at the age of 20. He was wounded during the Battle of Cambrai in the same year, and by the end of the conflict had been awarded the Military Cross a total of three times (referred to as the Military Cross and two Bars). The first was awarded for taking command of an infantry company that had lost all of its officers; by his leadership the unit was able to continue advancing. The second (his first bar) was for conducting several personal reconnaissances of enemy positions. In mid-March 1918, Flavell was transferred from the 19th (Western) Division to the 42nd (East Lancashire) Division, where he took command of the 126th Machine Gun Company; one of the officers in the company was his future commanding officer, Lieutenant (later general) Richard Nelson Gale.