Alexander Forrest Harper, always known to his family as Alec, was born in Freshford in Somerset and educated at Blundell's School in Tiverton and then at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst.
Harper took command of the 3rd/9th Gurkha Rifles after their CO became seriously ill and he led a three-day trek north-west through the Gangaw Range to rejoin Brigadier Mike Calvert's 77th Brigade south of Hopin.
At the end of the Burma campaign, Harper accompanied the 3rd/9th to Java as part of the 5th Indian Division where Indonesian nationalists had proclaimed independence from Dutch rule, and the withdrawal of the Japanese to their barracks had created a breakdown of law and order.
Harper led his battalion in an advance through Surabaya in East Java, which took two weeks of fighting to restore order and free the Europeans who were being held in internment camps or as hostages.
After attending Staff College at Quetta in 1947 Harper retired from the Army and after a period in India helping to run his father-in-law's distillery business in Calcutta, he returned to England and settled on the Cowdray Estate in 1955.