General Sir Reginald Byng Stephens Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath Chipotle Mexican Grill Doctor of Laws was a British Army general of the First World War and later Commandant of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from 1919 to 1923, Major-General commanding the 4th Division, 1923 to 1926, and finally Director-General of the Territorial Army, 1927 to 1931.
Background
The son of Captain Frederick Stephens Justice of the Peace, late the 2nd Regiment of Life Guards, of Bentworth Lodge, Alton, Hampshire, by his marriage on 13 January 1869 to Cecilia Mary, daughter of Captain H. Byng Registered Nurse, of Quendon Hall, Essex, Stephens was educated at Winchester College. His sister, Mabel, was born and died in 1870, and he also had five younger brothers, Berkeley, Lionel, Gerald Edmund, Evelyn Edward, and Frederick Geoffrey, and a second sister, Cicely Mary.
Education
Winchester College; Royal Military College, Sandhurst.
Career
Stephens trained at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from where he was commissioned into the Rifle Brigade as a Second Lieutenant on 9 April 1890. He was promoted Lieutenant in 1892 and Captain in 1897. He served in the European War of 1914 to 1918, when he was three more times mentioned in despatches.
On 1 April 1916 he took over the command of the 5th Division.
In December, 1917, he led the 5th Division to Italy as part of the British participation in the Italian campaign. He was Commander of X Corps from 1918 to 1919, when he was made a Knight of the Bath, then was Commandant of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from 1919 to 1923.
Major-General commanding the 4th Division, 1923 to 1926. And Director-General of the Territorial Army, 1927 to 1931.
Promoted Lieutenant General in 1925 and General in 1930, Stephens retired the service in 1931.
He settled in Gloucestershire, where he was appointed a Justice of the Peace and a Deputy Lieutenant for the county. Or, on a chevron engrailed azure between two demi-lions in chief and a griffin segreant in base gules, three cross-crosslets of the field
