Brigadier Robert Adolphus George Tilney CBE, DSO

Distinguished Service Order

The Distinguished Service Order is a military decoration of the United Kingdom, and formerly of other parts of the British Commonwealth and Empire, awarded for meritorious or distinguished service by officers of the armed forces during wartime, typically in actual combat.Instituted on 6 September...

, TD was British Army

British Army

The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...

 officer who served during the Second World War.

Brigadier Robert Tilney was a Territorial Army officer formerly of the Leicestershire Yeomanry

Leicestershire Yeomanry

The Leicestershire Yeomanry was a yeomanry regiment of the British Army, first raised in 1794 and again in 1803, which provided cavalry and mounted infantry in the South African War and First World War and provided two field artillery regiments of the Royal Artillery in the Second World War,...

. On November 5, 1943 Tilney was appointed to command the British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 forces on the Greek

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

 island of Leros

Leros

Leros is a Greek island and municipality in the Dodecanese in the southern Aegean Sea. It lies 317 km from Athens's port of Piraeus, from which it can be reached by an 11-hour ferry ride . Leros is part of the Kalymnos peripheral unit...

, replacing Major-General Brittorus. He had under his command the 234th Infantry Brigade

234th Infantry Brigade (United Kingdom)

-History:The 234th Infantry Brigade was a British Army Infantry Brigade created on 1 April 1943 from the 4th Infantry Brigade, which had garrisoned the island during its siege by air and sea by the Axis powers. The unit was formed as the main British military force of the operation to capture the...

 and an assortment of RAF

Royal Air Force

The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...

 and Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 Army troops. The island of Leros was invaded by German forces

Battle of Leros

The Battle of Leros was the central event of the Dodecanese Campaign of the Second World War, and is widely used as an alternate name for the whole campaign. Leros was occupied by British forces on 15 September 1943...

 on November 12, 1943 and Tilney surrendered on November 16. Tilney spent the rest of the war as a POW

Prisoner of war

A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...

.