Geoffrey Keyes ( VC ) Lieutenant - Colonel Geoffrey Charles Tasker Keyes , VC , MC ( 18 May 1917 – 18 November 1941 ) was a British recipient of the Victoria Cross , the highest and most prestigious award that can be made to British and Commonwealth forces for gallantry in the face of the enemy . At the time he was the youngest lieutenant colonel in the British Army . Family . Keyes was the oldest son of Admiral of the Fleet Roger John Brownlow Keyes , 1st Baron Keyes , a British naval hero of the Great War and the first Director of Combined Operations during the Second World War . He attended Kings Mead School in Seaford , Sussex , then Eton and the Royal Military College . Keyes was a member of the MCC . Early actions . Geoffrey Keyes was commissioned into the Royal Scots Greys . He saw action at Narvik and was later attached to No . 11 ( Scottish ) Commando , which was sent to the Middle East as part of Layforce . Following the allied invasion of Syria on 8 June 1941 , No . 11 Commando was sent to successfully lead the crossing of the Litani River in Lebanon , fighting against troops of the French Vichy régime , during which Keyes played a leading part . In this operation , Keyes earned the Military Cross . Following the action , 11 Commando returned to Cyprus , then to Egypt in August 1941 , where the unit was disbanded . Keyes was authorized to retain 110 volunteers as a troop in the Middle East Commando . Operation Flipper . In October / November 1941 a plan was formulated at 8th Army headquarters to attack various targets behind enemy lines , including headquarters , base installations and communications facilities . One of the objectives was the assassination by a Commando team of Erwin Rommel , the commander of the Axis forces in North Africa . The raid was intended to disrupt enemy organisation before the start of Operation Crusader . The operation , codenamed Operation Flipper , was led by Lt . Col . Robert Laycock . Keyes , who had been present throughout the planning stage , selected the most hazardous task for himself : the assault on the supposed headquarters of Rommel ' s Afrika Korps established in a house near Beda Littoria . Following a landing by submarine and an exhausting approach march in torrential rain , Keyes tried to gain entry to the house but was confronted by a sentry . His fellow Commando Captain Robin Campbell fired several rounds at the sentry , one of which probably hit Keyes and led to his death a few minutes later . Most of the Commando team was eventually taken prisoner . Keyes was buried with full military honours in a local Catholic cemetery on Rommel ' s orders . It was later ascertained that the house was not Rommel ' s HQ , and indeed that he had been in Italy at the time of the attack . The actual chain of events has been clarified by former SAS member Michael Asher for National Geographic TV . For his actions , Keyes was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross , the citation read : Further information . His body was later moved to Benghazi War Cemetery in Libya . He is remembered on the Kingsmead School War memorial in Seaford , Sussex and also in the parish church in the village of Tingewick in Buckinghamshire , home of the Keyes family . The Medal . His VC is on display in the Lord Ashcroft Gallery at the Imperial War Museum , London .