Brigadier James Hargest, CBE, DSO & Two Bars, MC, ED (4 September 1891 – 12 August 1944) was an officer of the New Zealand Military Forces, serving in both the First and Second World Wars.

Born in Gore in 1891, Hargest was a farmer when he volunteered for the New Zealand Expeditionary Force following the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914.

[3] Following the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914 Hargest volunteered to serve in the New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Otago Mounted Rifles.

[5] His actions in restoring order in his battalion, when he assumed command of four companies that had suffered heavy casualties following a failed attack on 27 September,[6] saw him rewarded with the Military Cross.

[9] He participated in the last offensive action of the war involving the New Zealand Division when on 4 November 1918, a week before the armistice with Germany, his battalion attacked Germans positioned in a fortified house in the Mormal Forest.

[10] His leadership of his battalion during the last few months of the war was recognised with an appointment to the Distinguished Service Order, a mention in despatches and the French Legion of Honour.

Constantly in the front trenches he inspired all ranks with the keenest offensive spirit, and the uninterrupted success of the battalion operations were largely due to his fine personal leadership.

The couple had been married since 1917, the ceremony taking place in England where Marie was serving as a nurse in the New Zealand military hospital at Brockenhurst.

[17] Ward Jr. retired at the end of the term,[18] and this allowed Hargest to enter the New Zealand Parliament in the 1931 general election on his third attempt, becoming the MP for the Invercargill electorate.

At the time, many South Island MPs would meet at the home of Christchurch property developer Henry G. Livingstone after arriving on Saturday mornings on the overnight ferry from Wellington; Hargest, Adam Hamilton, and Sidney Holland belonged to that group.

[23] Hargest, who had retained his Awarua seat for National in the election,[19] was one of two contenders for the party leadership (the other was Keith Holyoake, but he had lost his Motueka electorate).

[20] The National Party leadership eventually went to Sidney Holland in November 1940; there was a view that this was a temporary situation that could be reassessed once Holyoake or Hargest returned to Parliament.

[25] Hargest remained a member of parliament during his time on active service and in the 1943 election, he was the sole candidate in the Awarua electorate whilst an internee in Switzerland; he was thus returned unopposed.

[27] On volunteering for service in the war, Hargest sought to serve abroad in command of one of the infantry brigades of the Second New Zealand Expeditionary Force (2NZEF).

At the time, the Chief of the General Staff of the New Zealand Military Forces, Major-General John Duigan, wrote to Freyberg, disassociating himself from the decision.

Originally intended to join the First Echelon of 2NZEF then in Egypt, it was diverted en route to England following the threat of a German invasion.

[30] Within a matter of weeks, the brigade, as part of the 2nd New Zealand Division, was in Greece and manning defences on the Aliakmon Line[31] in preparation for the anticipated invasion of the country by the Germans.

[36] When gliders containing paratroopers began landing around and to the west of the airfield on 20 May, Andrew became cut off from several of his platoons and companies with some being overrun by the German forces.

[39] Despite the belated arrival of a reinforcing company of infantry sent by Hargest that evening, Andrew decided his position was not defensible in daylight and withdrew his units to join the other battalions of the brigade.

[44] Once he was back in Egypt, Hargest was critical of Freyberg's conduct of the fighting on Crete in a meeting with General Archibald Wavell, commander of the Allied forces in the Middle East.

[4][47] After the loss of Crete, the 2nd New Zealand Division underwent a period of refit and training before it was assigned to the British Eighth Army, which was then engaged in the North African Campaign.

In the meantime, Generalleutnant (lieutenant general) Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps had outflanked the Allies and were approaching Hargest's position,[48] which was clustered with transport that made defending an attack difficult.

[50] Hargest was transported to Italy where he was initially held in a villa near Sulmona but was transferred, along with a fellow New Zealander, Brigadier Reginald Miles, who had been captured in December 1941, to Castle Vincigliata, known as Campo 12, near Florence.

[51] In late March 1943, a group of officers, including Hargest and Miles, managed to escape using a tunnel dug from a disused chapel within the castle walls.

[52] Hargest was one of only three men (Miles was one of the others) known to British Military Intelligence to have escaped from an Italian prisoner of war camp and made their way to another country prior to the armistice with Italy.

[57] By early 1944, the 2nd New Zealand Division was fighting in the Italian Campaign and, with his former brigade commanded by Brigadier Howard Kippenberger, Hargest sought a new role.

Now that the Allies were on mainland Europe, thought was turning to the issue of dealing with the expected arrival of newly released New Zealanders from liberated prisoner of war camps.

Hargest was appointed the commander of the group but on 12 August 1944, was killed by shell fire during the Battle of Normandy, when he was making a farewell visit to the British 50th Division.

[9] A fourth child, Geoffrey Hargest, had been killed on 30 March 1944, aged 22 years, during the Battle of Monte Cassino while serving with the 23rd Battalion.