General Alexander Cobbe commanded a British force from Baghdad on 23 October 1918. Despite the Armistice of Mudros signed between the Ottoman and Allied forces on 30th October 1918, General Cobbe continued to advance and his troops occupied Mosul on 14th November 1918.

Robert Gardiner Sellar was in Hawera practising as a solicitor before he left for England, for health reasons, in May 1915. In England, he took up a commission as Lieutenant with the Royal Field Artillery. After being wounded in France he was attached to a unit serving in Mesopotamia and Persia, achieving the rank of Captain. He served with the 18th Divisional Indian Artillery (formed 1917) and later served on the North West Frontier before returning to New Zealand in 1919. He initially returned to Hawera before taking up legal practise in Auckland in 1920.