General A general officer is an Officer (armed forces), officer of highest military ranks, high rank in the army, armies, and in some nations' air forces, space forces, and marines or naval infantry. In some usages the term "general officer" refers t ...

Sir William Stirling (4 August 1835 – 11 April 1906) was a

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

officer who served as Governor of the

Royal Military Academy, Woolwich The Royal Military Academy (RMA) at Woolwich, in south-east London, was a British Army military academy for the training of commissioned officers of the Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers. It later also trained officers of the Royal Corps of Sig ...

and

Lieutenant of the Tower of London The Lieutenant of the Tower of London serves directly under the Constable of the Tower. The office has been appointed at least since the 13th century. There were formerly many privileges, immunities and perquisites attached to the office. Like the ...

Military career

Stirling was born in 1835 to Charles Stirling (1789-1867), a wealthy cotton merchant, and his wife Charlotte Dorothea Stirling (1800-1862). His parents were first cousins, being both grandchildren of Captain Sir Walter Stirling. They were also more distantly related through their shared patrilineal descent from John Stirling (1640-1709), a Merchant Burgess of Glasgow, whose descendants were prominent in business and in the Navy: his father was a younger brother of Admiral Sir James Stirling, while his mother was a daughter of Vice-Admiral Charles Stirling. His father had bought an estate at Muiravonside and he had twelve children including William who was the third son. Educated at

Edinburgh Academy The Edinburgh Academy is an Independent school (United Kingdom), independent day school in Edinburgh, Scotland, which was opened in 1824. The original building, on Henderson Row in the city's New Town, Edinburgh, New Town, is now part of the Se ...

and the

, Stirling was commissioned into the

Royal Artillery The Royal Regiment of Artillery, commonly referred to as the Royal Artillery (RA) and colloquially known as "The Gunners", is one of two regiments that make up the artillery arm of the British Army. The Royal Regiment of Artillery comprises t ...

and saw action at the

Battle of Alma The Battle of the Alma (short for Battle of the Alma River) was a battle in the Crimean War between an allied expeditionary force (made up of French, British, and Ottoman forces) and Russian forces defending the Crimean Peninsula on 20Septemb ...

, at the

Battle of Balaclava The Battle of Balaclava, fought on 25 October 1854 during the Crimean War, was part of the Siege of Sevastopol (1854–55), an Allied attempt to capture the port and fortress of Sevastopol, Russian Empire, Russia's principal naval base on the Bl ...

and at the

Battle of Inkerman The Battle of Inkerman was fought during the Crimean War on 5 November 1854 between the allied armies of United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Britain and Second French Empire, France against the Imperial Russian Empire, Russian Army. Th ...

as well as the Siege of Sevastopol during the

Crimean War The Crimean War, , was fought from October 1853 to February 1856 between Russia and an ultimately victorious alliance of the Ottoman Empire, France, the United Kingdom and Piedmont-Sardinia. Geopolitical causes of the war included the de ...

. He took part in the expedition to China during the

Second Opium War The Second Opium War (), also known as the Second Anglo-Sino War, the Second China War, the Arrow War, or the Anglo-French expedition to China, was a colonial war lasting from 1856 to 1860, which pitted the British Empire and the French Emp ...

in 1860, and saw action again during the

Second Anglo-Afghan War The Second Anglo-Afghan War (Dari: جنگ دوم افغان و انگلیس, ps, د افغان-انګرېز دويمه جګړه) was a military conflict fought between the British Raj and the Emirate of Afghanistan from 1878 to 1880, when the l ...

in 1878. Stirling became assistant adjutant and quartermaster general, Woolwich District in 1880, Commander Royal Artillery for Southern District in 1885 and Governor of the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich in 1890. In 1893 he was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in the 1893 Birthday Honours list. He went on to be

in 1900 and was promoted to full

general A general officer is an Officer (armed forces), officer of highest military ranks, high rank in the army, armies, and in some nations' air forces, space forces, and marines or naval infantry. In some usages the term "general officer" refers t ...

on 5 January 1902, shortly before his retirement in August that year. The grounds of Stirling's childhood home at Muiravonside near Falkirk are in public ownership and they are open as

Muiravonside Country Park Muiravonside Country Park is 170 acres of woodland and parkland open to the public all year round with marked trails, picnic sites and a play area.Muiravonside House’s military history
, 31 March 2014, Falkirk Herald, retrieved 13 February 2016

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stirling, William 1835 births 1906 deaths British Army personnel of the Crimean War British Army personnel of the Second Opium War British military personnel of the Second Anglo-Afghan War People educated at Edinburgh Academy British Army generals Knights Commander of the Order of the Bath Lieutenants of the Tower of London 20th-century British Army personnel