Geoffrey Dyett Abbott was born at Srinagar, India, on 12 October 1891, the son of Colonel Frank Abbott, 37th Lancers and a grandson of Lieutenant-General H. D. Abbott, C.B., and of Major-General J. C. Berkeley, C.I.E. He was educated at Cheltenham College and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. He was gazetted to the Connaught Rangers in March 1911 and served with the 1st Battalion in India. Promoted to Lieutenant in June 1914, he entered the France/Flanders theatre of war on 26 September 1914. He was killed in action at Laventie, France, on 2 November 1914. His company commander sent the following account of the circumstances: ‘On the 2nd instant [November, 1914] we went to relieve the 2nd Gurkhas and came under rather heavy fire crossing an open place. It was in the above open place he was killed.’ Geoffrey Abbott was buried in the Royal Irish Rifles Graveyard at Laventie.
Lt Abbott's 1914 Star and Victory Medal were sold by Dix Noonan Webb in March 2010 for £460 (estimate £200-£250) and the italicised text above is from the DNW site.
