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1895 Jun 30. Born Putney, Surrey as "Hereward Yorke". (Comes from his personal file at TNA) He seems to have changed his name to "Knight" around 1911. And served in both world wars as "Hereward Knight"
1901 census at 13, Gledhow Terrace, Kensington
1911 census at 10 Grosvenor Road Chiswick W. Still Hereward Yorke
1911 Dec 19. He has a part in the Comedy Theatre.
1914 Feb 6. Arrives in Canada with a group of touring Actors. He is an Actor.
Returned to UK and joined the Artists Rifles
1915 May 9 .Landed in France
1915 Aug 30. Commissioned 2nd Lt in 2nd Linc. Regt. Private H. Knight, from 9th (County of London) Battalion, The London Regiment (Queen Victoria's Rifles
Spent most of the war in the near east.
1918 married a young Armenian girl in order to get her out of Turkey. There was an army marriage registered between a Hereward Knight and Mery E Hovnanian in Constantinople. The marriage was annulled.
1921 Jan 5. Joined ADRIC with service no. 1434. Posted to Depot
1921 Mar 28. Posted to P Coy
Numeric register says DI3, but no date, and Alphabetic register does not give him with a grade. I don't think he was a DI3
1922 Jan 24. Discharged on demobilisation of ADRIC
1923. He was in a number of plays by the Royal Shakespeare Company.
He appears to have moved to Greece soon after this. He ran an English School for students coming to England and was a journalist.
1926 Sep He sent photos of street rioting in Athens to London Illustrated News
1931/1935. There was British Consular Marriage 1931-1935 in Athens between a Hereward Knight and Renee A Parrazi (or Morton?). Renee already had a daughter Kathleen who came to England to ‘finish’ her education. Renee had been twice previously divorced when she married Hereward
1939. Main SOE operative in Athens, Greece at the time was 'DH15'. 'DH15' was legitimately employed by Ingersoll Rand, and appears to travel a lot between Belgrade, Turkey and Athens while on Ingersoll Rand Business. 'DH15' made provisional arrangements for Hereward Knight to become his assistant. Hereward had resided in Greece for the previous 15years and was a long standing personal friend of 'DH15's. Apparently Knight did not get good enough references ( 'possibly not so discreet as could of been desired for such a job') and was sidelined .
1940 Mar 10. - Caesar & D/H Section take up the matter with 'DH15', to suggest the disposal of Hereward's services at the earliest opportunity (to cause the least unpleasantness). When the Germans invaded Greece, Hereward evacuated to Cyprus. He rejoined the British Army and was British liaison officer with the Greece forces in North Africa.
1940 Sep 1. Cyprus Regt . Lt . Hereward KNIGHT (159776 ) to be Lt . E British Instructional Team - British Military Mission Greece. He was a member of D/H Section of SOE . D/H Section was the SOE Cairo Section that worked into the Balkans.
1943 Mar 12. He was with the 210 British Military Mission attached 1st Greek Brigade MEF between March 12th '43 & Sept 4th '43, as an English teacher. There is a lot of information on this Forum Link
1945 Jan 1. Captain Hereward Knight (159776) of the Cyprus Regt. was recommended for the Greek Military Decoration the 'Silver Cross of the Order of the Phoenix', along with 5 NCO's of the AEC (Army Education Corps) "For the interest they have shown and the satisfactory results obtained while being employed as teachers of the ENGLISH language at General Training Centre (S?) and GROTCI" (??)
After the war he returned to Athens. In the 1950s he visited London several times.
1947 Aug 25. He was also one of ten recommended, for the Greek Distinguished Conduct (or it might be Distinguished service) Medal
"their hard work, energy, devotion to duty and valuable services for their organisation of the Greek Army and their help for preserving the order after the liberation of Greece"
1948 Jun 17. He was demobbed from the Cyprus Regiment with the honorary rank of Major.
1969 Aug 9. Hereward Knight's death was registered to the British Consul in Athens with his Age as being 74 at time of death. This would mean his year of birth being 1895. He died in Red Cross Hospital, Athens. He is recorded as being a 'Teacher of English' and lived No 31 Solonos St, Athens