 He left school at the age of 12 and briefly worked as a butcher's assistant before lying about his age and joining the 20th Hussars of the British Army in 1906.He was invalided four years later after a horse fell on him, but recalled up to service at the onset of the First World War.He fought in France with the 3rd The King's Own Hussars where he was wounded three times and gassed so severely that the army sent him back to Britain in 1917.