# Ivan Lyon

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{{Short description|British Army officer (1915–1944)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2021}}
{{Infobox military person
|name= Ivan Lyon
|image= Major Ivan Lyon.jpg
|image_size=
|alt= 
|caption= Major Ivan Lyon in 1943
|birth_date= {{birth date|1915|08|17|df=yes}}
|birth_place= 
|death_date= {{death date and age|1944|10|16|1915|08|17|df=yes}}
|death_place= Soreh Island, [Riau](/source/Riau), [Japanese-occupied Dutch East Indies](/source/Japanese_occupation_of_the_Dutch_East_Indies)
|burial_place= [Kranji War Cemetery](/source/Kranji_War_Cemetery), Singapore
|allegiance= [United Kingdom](/source/United_Kingdom)
|branch= [British Army](/source/British_Army)
|service_years= 1935–1944
|rank= [Lieutenant colonel](/source/Lieutenant_colonel_(United_Kingdom))
|unit= 
|commands= [Z Special Unit](/source/Z_Special_Unit)
|battles= 
{{tree list}}
* [Second World War](/source/Second_World_War)
** [Pacific War](/source/Pacific_War)
*** [Battle of Singapore](/source/Battle_of_Singapore)
*** [Operation Jaywick](/source/Operation_Jaywick)
*** [Operation Rimau](/source/Operation_Rimau){{KIA}}
{{tree list/end}}
|awards= [Distinguished Service Order](/source/Distinguished_Service_Order)<br/>Member of the [Order of the British Empire](/source/Order_of_the_British_Empire)
|relations= 
|other_work=
}}
[Lieutenant-Colonel](/source/Lieutenant_colonel_(United_Kingdom)) '''Ivan Lyon''', {{postnominals|country=GBR|size=100%|sep=,|DSO|MBE}} (17 August 1915 – 16 October 1944) was a [British Army](/source/British_Army) officer who served in [World War II](/source/World_War_II). As a member of [Z Special Unit](/source/Z_Special_Unit), Lyon took part in a number of [commando](/source/commando) operations against the [Japanese](/source/Empire_of_Japan) and was killed during [Operation Rimau](/source/Operation_Rimau) while attempting to infiltrate [Singapore](/source/Singapore)'s harbour and destroy Japanese shipping there in 1944.

==Early life==
Born on 17 August 1915, Lyon was the second son of Brigadier General Francis Lyon, [Royal Artillery](/source/Royal_Artillery), a senior British Army general staff officer during the First World War and the grandson of Colonel Francis Lyon, Royal Horse Artillery, who had fought in the [Indian Mutiny](/source/Indian_Mutiny). He was educated at [Harrow](/source/Harrow_School) and the [Royal Military College, Sandhurst](/source/Royal_Military_College%2C_Sandhurst),<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, pp. 18–19.p</ref> and in 1935 was commissioned into the [Gordon Highlanders](/source/Gordon_Highlanders) before being posted to Singapore in 1936.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, pp. 19–20.</ref> While there, Lyon spent much of his spare time sailing around South East Asia. In 1939, he married Gabrielle Bouvier, the daughter of a French official in [French Indochina](/source/French_Indochina), and fathered a son, Clive.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, pp. 25–27.</ref>

==Military career==
===Battle of Singapore===
In mid-1940 Indochina became controlled by [Vichy France](/source/Vichy_France) and was occupied by the [Empire of Japan](/source/Empire_of_Japan) later that year. As the prospect of war between the [Allies](/source/Allies_of_World_War_II) and Japan loomed, Lyon undertook covert operations with [Free French](/source/Free_French_Forces) sympathisers in Indochina.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, p. 29.</ref> After Japan [invaded Malaya](/source/Battle_of_Malaya) on 8 December 1941, Lyon's wife and son found themselves behind enemy lines and they spent the war in Japanese internment after the ship they were travelling on was intercepted by a German raider and they were taken prisoner.<ref>Thompson 2005, p. 395.</ref> As the Japanese advanced towards Singapore, Lyon worked to form resistance groups among the local population.<ref>Thompson 2005, p. 184.</ref> Later, he evacuated civilians from Singapore by boat, until [its fall to the Japanese](/source/Battle_of_Singapore), in February 1942.<ref>Thompson 2005, p. 259.</ref> During this period he met an [Australia](/source/Australia)n named Bill Reynolds, who operated a small ship called ''[Kofuku Maru](/source/MV_Krait)''.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, p. 46.</ref>

===Operation Jaywick===
{{Main|Operation Jaywick}}
[[File:Ivanlyon.jpg|thumb|Lieutenant [Robert Page](/source/Robert_Page_(soldier)), Major Ivan Lyon and Lieutenant D.M.N. Davidson enjoying beer in [Brisbane](/source/Brisbane) after the completion of Operation Jaywick]]
Lyon and Reynolds both later joined [Special Operations Australia](/source/Special_Operations_Australia) (a joint Allied intelligence unit for operations in the [South West Pacific](/source/South_West_Pacific_Area_(command))). Lyon was appointed to lead an SOA [commando](/source/commando) unit, [Z Special Unit](/source/Z_Special_Unit) or Z Force, as it was usually known. In September 1943, he led [Operation Jaywick](/source/Operation_Jaywick), using ''Kofuku Maru'' (which had been renamed ''Krait''). Z Force sailed from [Exmouth Gulf](/source/Exmouth%2C_Western_Australia), Australia and raided Japanese ships in Singapore Harbour. They sank or seriously damaged six Japanese ships, amounting to over 39,000 tons of shipping, before returning to Australia after an {{convert|8000|km|mi}} round trip.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, p. 101.</ref>

===Operation Rimau===
{{Main|Operation Rimau}}
[Operation Rimau](/source/Operation_Rimau)—an attempt to repeat the success of Jaywick—was launched in October 1944, with Lyon commanding a 23-man Z Special Unit raiding team again on a mission to sink Japanese shipping in Singapore Harbour. The party captured a Chinese junk and sailed towards Singapore, but were forced to abandon ship when they destroyed a Kempei Tei patrol boat that had approached them.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, pp. 165–167.</ref> Ordering his men to retreat back to Merapas island and await submarine rescue, Lyon and five others attempted a reduced-capacity raid on Singapore Harbour, destroying three ships.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, p. 169.</ref> After a four-month series of island hops and often ferocious battles with large numbers of Japanese forces, the entire 'Rimau' party were either killed during combat (Lyon was the first of these), drowned or captured.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, pp. 170–215.</ref> Those captured were executed by beheading after a sham trial shortly before the Japanese surrender.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, pp. 216–247.</ref>

Lyon died on the tiny island of [Soreh](/source/Soreh) on 16 October 1944, whilst fighting a rearguard action to assist the getaway of two injured members of the 'Rimau' party.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, p. 177.</ref> Discovered by a Japanese landing crew, Lyon—together with Corporal Clair Stewart and Lieutenant Robert 'Bobby' Ross, and the injured Private Archie Campbell and Lieutenant-Commander Donald Davidson—engaged the Japanese in battle, killing and injuring seven. The remaining Japanese escaped. Knowing that the Japanese would come back in a matter of hours with reinforcements—and that there was no possibility of island-hopping to safety with two injured and exhausted comrades—Lyon made the decision to dose the injured Davidson and Campbell with morphine, and set them on their way towards the nearby island of Tapai, where other members of the Rimau party were known to be holed up.{{Citation needed|date=October 2009}}

Lyon set about creating rudimentary defenses, taking into account the position of a Malay household. The danger of accidentally involving the occupants of the shack in the forthcoming battle led Lyon to switch the position of his defenses away from this location, a formidable task given that the tiny island was bereft of significant cover, and almost entirely indefensible in the daylight. Lyon and Ross climbed a large [Ru tree](/source/Ru_tree), having first equipped themselves with a massive amount of magazines and grenades. Corporal Stewart was positioned in a stone-lined ditch, about {{convert|30|m|ft}} to their left, together with a cache of grenades and ammunition for the Silent [Sten](/source/Sten)s that all three carried.{{Citation needed|date=October 2009}}

The Japanese returned two hours later, consisting of approximately 110 soldiers. For almost four hours, the Japanese suffered tremendous losses, unaware that their enemy was in fact firing from high above them, as well as being caught repeatedly by the grenades thrown by the unseen Stewart. At midnight, Japanese soldiers finally caught sight of the tiny muzzle flashes from the Silent Stens. Grenades were thrown above the branches; Ross and Lyon fell down from the branches, killed by shrapnel. They had accounted for over sixty dead and wounded Japanese.{{Citation needed|date=October 2009}} Stewart remained undiscovered on the island, but marooned as his [folboat](/source/Folding_kayak) had been taken by the Japanese. Stewart was eventually caught and taken, after a series of different island jails, to Singapore, and executed there along with the rest of the captured party on 7 July 1945.<ref>Thompson and Macklin 2002, p. 178.</ref>

After the war, Lyon's remains were found and reburied at [Kranji War Cemetery](/source/Kranji_War_Cemetery) on Singapore Island. A memorial tablet was placed on the outside of [Saint George's Church, Singapore](/source/Saint_George's_Church%2C_Singapore).<ref>Connell 1960, p. 278.</ref>

Lyon's wife, Gabrielle, and son, Clive, imprisoned in a Japanese internment camp from December 1941, survived the war.<ref>"Sailor was last surviving member of daring Singapore mission." Sydney Morning Herald. September 6, 2020. Obituary of Able Seaman Moss Berryman, described as the last survivor of Operation Jaywick. Berryman is quoted as saying that in 1993, the 50th anniversary of Operation Jaywick, he met Lyon’s son – “the spitting image of his father” – at Kranji War Cemetery.</ref>

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

==References==
{{refbegin}}
*{{cite book|last=Connell|first=Brian|title=Return of the Tiger|url=https://archive.org/details/returnoftiger00conn|url-access=registration|year=1960|publisher=Doubleday & Company|location=New York|oclc=566232873}}
*{{cite book|last=Thompson |first=Peter |year=2005 |title=The Battle for Singapore: the True Story of the Greatest Catastrophe of World War II|publisher=Portrait Books|location=London|isbn=0-7499-5085-4}}
*{{cite book|last=Thompson |first=Peter|author2=Robert Macklin |year=2002|title=Kill the Tiger: the Truth about Operation Rimau|publisher=Hodder|location=Sydney|isbn=0-7336-1448-5}}
{{refend}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lyon, Ivan}}
Category:1915 births
Category:1944 deaths
Category:British Army personnel killed in World War II
Category:Z Special Unit personnel
Category:Companions of the Distinguished Service Order
Category:Gordon Highlanders officers
Category:Members of the Order of the British Empire
Category:People educated at Harrow School
Category:Graduates of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst
Category:Burials at Kranji War Cemetery
Category:Deaths by hand grenade

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Ivan Lyon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Lyon) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Lyon?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.