Length: 12.7cm (5in)
Silver. Presentation letter opener modelled as a L1A3 bayonet fighting knife, the blade inscribed ‘BRIGADIER C.A.R.NEVILL C.B.E.,D.S.O. FROM THE OFFICERS H.Q 6INF BDE & WUPPERTAL GRN. OCT.1954’, Maker’s mark of Garrard & Co. Ltd., 112 Regent Street, Hallmarked London 1954. Cased.
Major General Cosmo Alexander Richard Nevill, CB, CBE, DSO, (1907- 2002) was educated at Harrow and Sandhurst. He was commissioned into the Royal Fusiliers in 1927 and then served in India from 1932. He fought in the Second World War in Burma and then took part in the Normandy landings as Commanding Officer of 2nd Battalion Devonshire Regiment. His battalion captured the Longues-sur-Mer battery and took 120 prisoners, earning him the Distinguished Service Order. After the War he served on the General Staff of the Military Staff Committee at the United Nations in New York.[2] He became Commanding Officer of 1st Bn Royal Fusiliers in Germany in 1950, Commander of 6th Infantry Brigade at Münster and Wuppertal in 1951 and Commandant of the School of Infantry at Warminster in 1954. His last appointment was as General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the 2nd Infantry Division at Hilden in 1956.
