Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu Patrick Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu , ( 1937 – 1967 ) was born in the Northern Region ’ s capital of Kaduna to Igbo immigrant parents from the Mid - Western Region - Okpanam Town , near Asaba in the present day Delta State . Background . Major Nzeogwu was an infantry and intelligence officer of the Nigerian Army . Such was his family ’ s affinity to the city of Nzeogwu ’ s birth that they and his military colleagues called him “ Kaduna ” . Nzeogwu was a devout Roman Catholic and a teetotaler . He attended the military academy at Sandhurst in England , and was a promising , charismatic and rebellious military officer who eventually became the Chief Instructor at the Nigerian Military Training College in Kaduna . The forerunner of the Nigerian Army Intelligence Corps ( NAIC ) was the Field Security Section ( FSS ) of the Royal Nigerian Army , which was established on 1 November 1962 with Captain PG Harrington ( BR ) as General Staff Officer Grade Two ( GSO2 Int ) . The FSS was essentially a security organization whose functions included vetting of Nigerian Army ( NA ) personnel , document security and counter intelligence . Major Nzeogwu was the first Nigerian Officer to hold that appointment from November 1962 to 1964 . 1966 Coup . In the early hours of January 15 , 1966 , citing a list of complaints against the corrupt political class , Nzeogwu led a military coup against the Nigerian First Republic . These complaints include the violence in Western region instigated by the Sarduana of Sokoto , through his puppet , SL Akintola . At least , two thousand Yorubas died in this violence . The acclaimed Yoruba leader , Obafemi Awolowo has also been jailed in order to wrest control from Action Group . The western Region was by now a satellite region to the north . The January 15 , 1966 movement was clearly to arrest this slide to anarchy . His accomplices were Majors in the Army , mainly Eastern Nigerians , but also including a Western Nigerian Major ( Ademoyega Adewale ) . The Prime Minister , a federal minister , two regional premiers , and top Army officers from the Northern and Western regions of the nation were brutally murdered . Lt Colonel Chinyere Unegbe , from eastern Nigeria was also killed . The coup failed , and he was later arrested in Lagos on January 18 , 1966 . He was in the company of Lt . Col . Conrad Nwawo . The coup was initially popular until rumors that it was an Igbo coup began to swirl . Further fuelling suspicion was the fact that the premiers of the Northern and Western regions were killed , but the premier of the Eastern region ( where most of the plotters came from ) was overlooked . On the Federal level the ( Northern ) Prime Minister and the corrupt Finance Minister , Festus Okotie - Ebo ( effectively the number 3 man in government ) from the eastern region were killed . The leniency with which the new leader , General Aguiyi Ironsi , handled the coup plotters led to the dissatisfaction of northern officers and subsequently resulted in a counter - coup on the 29th of July , 1966 . Nzeogwu was initially detained at the Kirikiri maximum security prison in Lagos , before later being transferred to the East . He and other January 15 mutiny detainees were subsequently released from jail by Lt . Col . Emeka Ojukwu at the end of the first quarter of 1967 , following demonstrations by students of the University of Nigeria , Nsukka . Nigerian Civil war and death . On May 30 , 1967 , The nation of Biafra declared its independence from Nigeria . Nzeogwu was released from close observation , and asked to go into battle on the side of the Biafrans . On July 29 , 1967 , Nzeogwu - who had been promoted to the rank of Biafran Lt . Colonel - was trapped in an ambush near Nsukka while conducting a night reconnaissance operation against federal troops of the 21st battalion under Captain Mohammed Inua Wushishi . He was killed in action and his corpse was subsequently identified . After the defeat of Biafra and the end of the war , orders were given by the Head of the Nigerian government , Major General Yakubu Gowon , for him to be buried with full military honours at the military cemetery in Kaduna . However , by the time the corpse arrived in Kaduna , it had been mutilated by unknown persons and his eyes gouged out . A photograph of Nzeogwu ' s corpse is available at the National Archives in Kaduna .