Hone was made commandant of the Uganda Defence Force following the outbreak of the Second World War. In 1941 he was transferred to General Headquarters Middle East, first as legal advisor to advise on law in the conquered Italian territories and later as chief political officer. In March 1943 he was promoted to major-general, "to ease his command over the Brigadiers under him"; he was also appointed CBE. This was followed by a period in the War Office in London, dealing with the war situation in South-East Asia. While working at South East Asia Command (SEAC) headquarters he got to know Louis Mountbatten, later Earl Mountbatten of Burma. In August 1945 Hone was sent to Malaya, to oversee the handover to civilian rule, and was present at the Japanese surrender at Singapore on 12 September. Hone married again in 1945, and had a son by his second wife Sybil. Hone was awarded the KBE in 1946. He served as Secretary-General to the Governor-General of Malaya for two years from 1946, followed by Deputy Commissioner-General in south-east Asia from 1948 to 1949, and in 1949 he was appointed Governor and Commander-in-Chief of North Borneo. Hone was considered a great success as Governor of North Borneo, encouraging the country's recovery from the ravages of the Japanese occupation and expanding the colony's export trades. He was appointed in 1951. Hone was head of the legal division of the Commonwealth Relations Office from 1954 to 1961, when he retired from the civil service, and resumed practice at the bar. Given his background in diplomacy and overseas service, he also held many important advisory posts both at home and overseas: his final advisership was to the Bermudan government from July to November 1966. Hone was Vice President of the Royal Commonwealth Society. He was also an active freemason, a member of the higher degree of freemasonry, the Ancient and Accepted (Scottish) Rite 33º. Hone was also Bailiff Grand Cross of the Venerable Order of St John. He died on 28 November 1992. An archive of Hone's papers dating from 1937 to 1972 has been deposited at the Bodleian Library of Commonwealth and African Studies at Rhodes House, part of the University of Oxford. The reference for the records is MSS Brit Emp s 407, MSS Ind Ocn s 271. In addition, the papers of Louis Francis Albert Victor Nicholas George Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma held at Southampton University Library include correspondence with Hone relating to South East Asia Command 1944–1946.