Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Middlemore, George
MIDDLEMORE, GEORGE (d. 1850), lieutenant-general, received a commission in the 86th foot (now 2nd royal Irish rifles) when that corps was raised as ‘General Cuyler's Shropshire Volunteers’ in 1793. He was a lieutenant in the regiment in February 1794, and became captain 15 Oct. the same year. He commanded a company in the 86th, and embarked as marines in the Brunswick, 74 guns, Captain Lord Charles Fitzgerald, which served in the Channel with Admiral Cornwallis in 1795, and afterwards with Lord Duncan in the North Sea. He subsequently served with his regiment at the Cape, Madras (it was not at the capture of Seringapatam as sometimes stated), Ceylon, and Bombay, and he accompanied the expedition up the Red Sea to Egypt, where he commanded the grenadier company. With Colonel Ramsay he went on a mission to the Turkish capitan pacha relative to the plots against the Mamelukes. After the return of his regiment to India he served at Madras as aide-de-camp to Sir David Baird [q. v.], with whom he came home. On 14 Sept. 1804 he was promoted to a majority in the 48th foot (now 1st Northampton regiment) at Gibraltar. He served with it in Portugal in 1809, and at the battle of Talavera, when Colonel Donellan was mortally wounded, he commanded it during the greater part of its famous advance to the rescue of the guards (see Napier, rev. ed. ii. 176–7), which ‘tended so much to the success of the action’ (Gurwood, iii. 370). On that occasion the regiment won its badge of the Star of Brunswick, or ‘Coldstream Star.’ Wellington recommended him for promotion in the strongest terms: ‘He is an excellent officer, and if his conduct then did not, I may say, demand promotion, his good conduct and attention to his duty would warrant it’ (ib.) Middlemore received the brevet of lieutenant-colonel and a gold medal, and was created C.B., 4 June 1815. He was promoted to lieutenant-colonel 12th garrison battalion, and was subsequently on half-pay thereof through ill-health. He was appointed assistant-quartermaster-general in the Severn district in 1813, and in 1814 inspecting field-officer at Nottingham. He afterwards held a like post at Cork. He became a major-general in 1830, and for five years commanded the troops in the West Indies. In 1836 he was made governor of the island of St. Helena, and held that post at the time of the removal of the remains of Napoleon I in 1840. He was made a lieutenant-general in 1841 and was colonel in succession of the 76th and 48th foot. He died at Tunbridge Wells, 18 Nov. 1850. His son, Lieutenant-colonel R. F. Middlemore (captain, half-pay, 91st foot), was his aide-de-camp at St. Helena.
[Cannon's Hist. Rec. 86th Royal County Down Regt. and Muster-rolls of the same; Napier's Peninsular War, rev. ed., account of Talavera in vol. ii.; Gurwood's Wellington Desp. vol. iii.; Gent. Mag. 1851, pt. i. p. 95. Some letters and memoranda of General Middlemore are printed in Theodore Hook's Life of Sir David Baird, vol. i.]