General Sir John Lysaght Pennefather GCB (9 September 1798 – 9 May 1872) was a British soldier who won two very remarkable victories.

Second, at the Battle of Inkerman on 5 November 1854 during the Crimean War, where he commanded the 2nd Division, a force of 3,000 soldiers who fought in the fog and played a key role in the defeat of 35,000 Russians.

"The noble soldier, Pennefather" (as Napier described him), fell wounded mortally, it was thought, on the top of the bank that bordered the riverbed and formed the crest of the Baluchis' position.

In 1854 he was given command of the first brigade of the 2nd Division (Sir De Lacy Evans's) in the army that was dispatched, and on 20 June he was made Major-General.

He commanded it with credit at the battle of the Alma, and in the affair of 26 October, when a sortie in force was made from Sebastopol against the heights held by the 2nd Division on the extreme right of the allies.

But he had more opportunity of distinguishing himself ten days later, when the attack, for which this sortie was only preparatory, was made by the Russians, and the battle of Inkerman was fought (5 November).

On 26 October Evans had drawn up his force on the ridge immediately in front of the camp of the division, and allowed his pickets to be driven in rather than leave his chosen ground.

Even when his radiant countenance could not be seen, there was comfort in the sound of his voice, "and the 'grand old boys' favourite oaths roaring cheerily down through the smoke".

He was invalided from the Crimea in July 1855, and on 25 September he was appointed to command the troops in Malta, with the local rank of Lieutenant-General.