b. 28/05/1835 Garendon Park, Coleorton, Leicestershire. d. 17/09/1857 Delhi, India.
Everard Aloysius Lisle-Phillipps (1835-1857) was born on 28th May 1835 at Garendon Park, Corleorton, Leicestershire. He was the second son of Ambrose Lisle March Phillipps de Lisle, JP, Deputy Lieutenant of Leicestershire and owner of Garendon Park and Gracedieu Manor. His mother was Laura Mary, daughter of the Honourable Thomas Clifford and his wife, Baroness Philipina von Lutzow. Thomas Clifford was the fourth son of Hugh, 4th Lord Clifford of Chudleigh, which connects Everard to the family of another VC, Henry Clifford. Everard was one of nine brothers and seven sisters born to Ambrose and Laura.
Everard A L Phillipps VC
Everard was educated at St Edmund’s College, Old Hall Green, near Ware, and at Oscott College, near Birmingham, and having learned Hindustani in Paris, joined the Company’s Army (11th Regiment, Bengal Infantry) in India in 1855. He reached Meerut on 4th May 1857, and on the 10th May was present when the Mutiny broke out and his Regiment joined it. Colonel Finnis was killed next to Everard, but he remained unhurt, though he had been called upon to read the address to the men because he could read and speak Hindustani. Riding boldly forward while the bullets whistled round him, he began to read the proclamation, but before he got to the end of the first sentence his horse was shot from under him, and he fell to the ground, himself wounded by a stray bullet. Undeterred, he sprang to his feet and read through the whole proclamation from beginning to end before taking cover.
He was given a commission in the Royal Army, in the 60th Rifles, as a reward for his gallantry. This was done on the application of Colonel Jones, who made him an orderly officer. Everard spent the summer of 1857 fighting with the Queen’s Forces in the Mutiny. He was part of the fighting on the streets of Delhi during the Siege. Everard was killed in action on the 18th September 1857 on the last day of the Siege, and under the Royal Warrant of the Victoria Cross at the time, could not be awarded the medal for his gallantry during the fighting at Delhi as posthumous awards were not permitted at the time.
The London Gazette of 21st October 1859 contained a notice about Everard, stating that he would have been recommended for the Victoria Cross had he survived, for the numerous acts of gallantry he had performed during the Siege of Delhi, during which he was wounded three times. At the assault of that city he captured the Water Bastion, with a small party of men.
The Victoria Cross would eventually be awarded posthumously to Everard following the decision by King Edward VII in 1907 to change the Royal Warrant to permit posthumous awards. Everard’s award of the posthumous VC appeared in the London Gazette on 15th January 1907, and the medal was presented to the elder of his two living brothers at the time, Edwin de Lisle Phillipps, FSA, exactly 50 years after his brother’s death. Everard had been buried in an unmarked grave in the Old Military Cemetery in Delhi. His medal and its case are now part of the Ashcroft Gallery, Imperial War Museum, London.
LOCATION OF MEDAL: LORD ASHCROFT GALLERY, IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUM, LONDON.
BURIAL PLACE: OLD DELHI MILITARY CEMETERY, DELHI, INDIA. (UNMARKED GRAVE)
Acknowledgement:
Terry Hissey – Image of the framed citation at ATR, Winchester.