Wyndham, Reginald – Had a Grantham park named after him

Capt Reginald Wyndham (1876-1914)

CAPTAIN the Hon William Reginald Wyndham was the eldest son of Henry Wyndham, the 2nd Lord Leconfield and Lady Constance Evelyn Primrose. He was born at Petworth, Sussex.

He served in the South African (Boer) War receiving the Queen’s medal with three clasps.  He retired from the Army in 1903 owing to a riding accident and then farmed in East Africa after which he moved to the Rocky Mountains in North America.

He later returned home and became well known in racing circles as a winning racehorse owner and as a member of the Jockey Club to which he was elected in 1912.

Among the many horses he owned were The White Knight which won two Ascot Gold Cups, the Goodwood Cup, the Coronation Cup and the Newbury Cup and Son of Desmond for which he paid £10,000 for a half share although he later had to pay more than that to purchase the remaining half share.

He spent his winters in Grantham where he lived at North House, North Parade, and rode with a number of the local hunts.

On the outbreak of the First World War he was gazetted as a Captain in the Lincolnshire Yeomanry and was later attached to 1st Life Guards in which his father and two of his brothers had previously served.

He arrived in France on 8th October 1914.  On 6th November, during the desperate fighting of what became known as the 1st Battle of Ypres, the Germans broke though the French lines south of Zillebeke in three places.

They penetrated the gap with great numbers of troop as far as Zwarteleen, only two miles from Ypres itself.  With no reserves available in the front line the 7th Cavalry Brigade, then at Zillebeke, galloped forward and 1st and 2nd Life Guards dismounted and bayonet charged the advancing Germans through a thickly wooded landscape regaining the lost positions at the cost of Capt Wyndham, one corporal and two troopers killed and twenty one others wounded.

In his will William left unsettled property of £325,341 (gross), £303,955 (net).  He left £3000 to the officers of 17th Lancers for the promotion of sport in the regiment and his collection of stuffed hunting trophies to the Borough of Grantham.

Lady Constance donated £1,000 towards a new park in Grantham to be opened as a war memorial. It was named Wyndham Park in his honour.

Compiled with assistance of Malcolm Baxter