M.C. London Gazette 16.9.1918 'For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty. Under heavy shell fire and attacked by the enemy in force, he showed great energy and decision while commanding his Company, and set a fine example to his men'.

2nd Lieutenant Harold Hollingsworth Pither, M.C., was born at Winslow, Buckinghamshire and enlisted into the Royal Fusiliers in September 1914, aged 24 years. He subsequently served out in France with the 12th Battalion between September and October 1915, when he appears to have been wounded by a gunshot in the right shoulder and arm, and again, with the 11th Battalion, between May and September 1916. Having gained advancement to Lance-Sergeant in August 1915, Pither was commissioned into the East Surrey Regiment in October 1917 and joined the 8th Battalion back out in France. But in March of the following year, during an attack, 'he received a slight shrapnel wound to the front of his left leg. He, however, carried on until 28 March, when he was gassed with mustard gas - the wound was then septic and he got a burn in the same region from the gas'. Pither was evacuated back to the U.K. 'with a septic wound measuring about eight inches long and four inches broad', and damage to his lungs caused by the gas. He does not appear to have returned to active service after that date.