He came first in the passing out examination, for which he was awarded the Anson Memorial Sword, and he received the King's Medal for the cadet best qualified in military subjects. The RTR was a popular choice, and it required officers to be one of the top ten graduates, and to have an allowance from their family of £150 (equivalent to £10,000 in 2021) per annum. Each cadet made three selections of regiments that he wished to join, and was then interviewed by officers from those regiments to assess his suitability. In his third term at Sandhurst Belchem was an under officer, in charge of a platoon of fifty of his colleagues. During the summer holiday, he worked as a garage mechanic. He also knew from his father that the RTR encouraged officers to attend various military schools, which was not the case in some infantry regiments. He considered that tanks would become more important in the future, and the likely consequent expansion of the RTR would offer good prospects for advancement in a post-war army in which promotion was slow. Each cadet could chose an optional subject to study, and he chose mechanical science, as he set his sights on joining the Royal Tank Regiment (RTR). Belchem participated in boxing as a middleweight, and he earned the nickname 'David' after he defeated a much larger opponent in a bout. David Niven was the under officer in charge of the junior term cadets in his company. In August 1929 entered Belchem Royal Military College, Sandhurst, having passed the entrance examination ranked. He graduated from the Royal Grammar School, Guildford, where he served in the school Officers' Training Corps, becoming a company sergeant major. He was interested in automotive engineering, and took evening classes in the subject.

He had a Russian nanny, and attended a French lycée and an Italian school in Florence, becoming fluent in Russian, French and Italian. His father was wounded in the Great War, and four of his uncles were killed. His mother, Louise née Morris, was the daughter of an Army medical officer. Belchem, a British Army officer, was stationed at the time. Ronald Frederick King Belchem was born in Gibraltar on 21 January 1911, where his father, O. Between these appointments, he served as chief of staff to Field Marshal Lord Montgomery in his role as chairman of the Committee for Western Union Defence Organisation. He was considered the deputy chief of staff, and acted as chief of staff for a month in 1945.Īfter the war, Belchem commanded the 6th (Highland) Infantry Brigade and later the 33rd Armoured Brigade in Germany. In January 1944 he joined the staff of the 21st Army Group as the BGS (operations). He returned to the staff of the Eighth Army as its GSO1 (Operations) until the end of the Sicilian operation, when he became the Brigadier General Staff (BGS) (Operations and Plans).

He participated in the Western Desert campaign, and in January 1943, was appointed to command the 1st Royal Tank Regiment, which he led in the Tunisian campaign, earning an immediate award of the Distinguished Service Order. In December 1941 he became the General Staff Officer Grade 1 (GSO1) (Staff Duties) of the newly-formed Eighth Army. He participated in the Battle of Greece, and the chaotic evacuation. In February 1941, he became the General Staff Officer Grade 2 (GSO2) in the headquarters (HQ) of W Force, an expeditionary force being sent to Greece.

He passed the entrance examinations and was accepted into the Staff College, Camberley, but due to the outbreak of the Second World War he attended a truncated course at the new staff college in Haifa instead. He commanded a detachment of six Vickers Mark III light tanks, in Mandatory Palestine, for which he was mentioned in despatches. Fluent in French, Russian and Italian, he qualified as an Army interpreter in Russian and Italian, and served on exchange with an Italian armoured unit. Major-General Ronald Frederick King Belchem CB CBE DSO (21 January 1911 – 19 July 1981) was a senior British Army officer who saw service in the Second World War.Ī graduate of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where he was awarded the Anson Memorial Sword for passing out first and the King's Medal for the cadet best qualified in military subjects, Belchem was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Royal Tank Regiment in 1931. Commander of the Order of the White Lion (Czechoslovakia).Knight Commander of the Order of Orange-Nassau with Swords (Netherlands).

Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

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