Lieutenant Colonel Pietro R. Quayle

 

 

Lieutenant Colonel Pietro R. Quayle

 1890-1964

 Mess Kit, c. 1926

 

A graduate of the Royal Military College at Sandhurst, Quayle became a second lieutenant in 1909 and joined with the 127th Baluch Light Infantry of the Indian Army on the 5th of December, 1910. He advanced to lieutenant in 1911. At the onset of the Great War, Quayle arrived in France in October of 1914 as an interpreter with the Sialkot Cavalry Brigade, I.E.F.A. He was advanced to captain in 1915 and remained with the Sialkot Cavalry Brigade until that December when he was assigned to the 1st Battalion of the 4th Gurkha Rifles in Egypt in early 1916. Quayle took command of a depot on the 5th of May, 1918, as an acting major. The 2nd Battalion of the 127th Baluch Light Infantry was raised in 1918 and served in Palestine. Quayle, now with the 2nd Battalion, became second in command as acting major in July of 1919. The 2nd Battalion was disbanded in 1921, and the 127th Baluch Light Infantry was grouped with five other Baluch battalions to form the 10th Baluch Regiment. With the 5th Battalion of the 10th Baluch Regiment, Quayle participated in the Waziristan campaign of 1921-24. He was made major in 1925, in which capacity he participated in the North-West Frontier campaign of 1930-31, and advanced to lieutenant colonel in 1934. Quayle retired on the 8th of September, 1938. He then became a Flight Lieutenant (Honorary Squadron Leader) on the 3rd of April, 1939, in the Royal Air Force Reserve. He remained in the service until August of 1944 when he aged out of the Reserve.

 

‘Bandnight’ (1911), a pen and ink sketch by Lt. P. R. Quayle of the 127th Baluch Light Infantry, then stationed in Poona, India.