Captain Ernest Philip Beresford
The man on the left is probably Captain Beresford. This photo taken at Cairo, marked on reverse "W. B. Smyth & friend, 1914-1918 War". The other man is Lieutenant William Bates Smyth of the North Irish Horse.
Ernest Philip Beresford was born in Londonderry on 23 August 1878. Educated at the Coleraine Academical Institution and on the HMS Worcester training ship, he later became a planter in Kingston, Jamaica.
He was appointed as a 2nd lieutenant on 25 August 1915 and was posted to the North Irish Horse at Antrim. He was promoted to lieutenant on 16 January 1916.
On 15 July that year he was seconded for duty as a temporary captain in the 4th Battalion, British West Indies Regiment, joining them in France. Following an attack of influenza he returned to England in May 1917, rejoining the North Irish Horse Reserve at Antrim in July.
On 19 January 1918 Beresford embarked for Egypt with another officer, Lieutenant William Bates Smyth, in charge of a draft of North Irish Horseman ordered to join the Staffordshire and Nottinghamshire Yeomanry regiments. Beresford was attached to the 1/1 Nottinghamshire Yeomanry (Sherwood Rangers). He served with that unit and the Royal Gloucestershire Hussars until August, when he was hospitalised at Alexandria suffering from a recurrence of malaria and ‘debility’. He sailed for England on 11 February 1919.
Beresford was demobilized on 9 October 1919.