Many of our members will remember Stephen Mullaly, a former HR director at BP. However, what you may not know is that before a successful BP career, Stephen fought as a Gurkha officer during the Second World War in Burma and played a leading part in the post-war Gurkha presence in Vietnam prior to the hand-back to the French. Indeed, on leaving BP, Elaine Bush tells me that Stephen presented the society with a kukri (a traditional Gurkha knife with a distinctive curved blade). Suffice to say, this is in the safe hands of the bp archive.
The Mullahy family’s association with the Gurkhas goes back many years. Stephen’s great-grandfather, Major-General Sir Herbert Mullaly KCMG, CB, CSI (1860-1932) had four sons, all of whom served as Gurkha officers; three of them, when still young men, died during the First World War.
On leaving the military, Stephen was a keen supporter of the Gurkha Welfare Trust for the rest of his life and that association continues today with his grandsons, William and Alex Mullahy. Wishing to do their part, they ran the London Marathon on 23 April to raise funds for the Trust. William kindly emailed Elaine Bush who was also at the event – just to be clear, Elaine was singing with the Rock Choir along the route rather than actually running it!
Interestingly, your editor noted a report that the last remaining Gurkha recipient of the Victoria Cross, Rambahadur Limbu, died in Nepal aged 83 on 22 April – the day before the marathon. He was awarded Britain’s highest military decoration for gallantry during an attack on Indonesian troops on the island of Borneo in 1965 during which he rescued two fellow soldiers. The attack was part of the three-year ‘konfrotasi’ conflict triggered by Indonesia’s opposition to the formation of Malaysia.
Captain Rambahadur Limbu VC MVO had served with the 10th Princess Mary’s Own Gurkha
Rifles. Coincidentally, the one surviving son of Major-General Sir Herbert Mullaly, Brian Reginald Mullaly (1892-1965), rose to the rank of Colonel in the 10th Gurkha Rifles and in retirement wrote the story of the 10th Princess Mary’s Own Gurkha Rifles entitled ‘Bugle and Kukri’.