Charles Octavius Head

Lieutenant–Colonel Charles Octavius Head, DSO (30 May 1869 – 16 October 1952) was an Irish colonel in the British Army, and author of four books including his autobiography, No Great Shakes. His mansion, Derrylahan, was burned during the Irish War of Independence. Head later moved his family to Hinton Hall, Pontesbury in Shropshire. His home near Pontesbury was also destroyed by fire, this time accidentally, when much of his library was incinerated, making his written works rare. Early life and family Charles Octavius Head was born on 30 May 1869 at Derrylahan Park, Walshpark, Rathcabbin, County Tipperary, the eighth of eleven children of William Henry Head (1809–1888) and his wife, Isabella Biddulph (1840–1911). Both of his parents were born into Anglo-Irish Protestant landowning families long resident in the Irish Midlands. He had three brothers, William Edward, John Henry, and Michael Ravenscroft, and four surviving sisters, Elizabeth, Georgiana, Isabella, and Anna. He attended boarding school in Bray, County Wicklow before enrolling in the Royal Military Academy in Woolwich, London in 1885. An accomplished horseman, he won the academy's Riding Cup, graduated in 1887, and joined the Royal Horse Artillery. Head married Alice Margaret Threlfall of Tilstone Lodge, Tarporley, in Cheshire in 1908, they had three children, Elizabeth, Isabel Grace, and Michael.