David Fraser (British Army officer)

General Sir David William Fraser, GCB, OBE (born 30 December 1920) is a retired British Army officer who became Commandant of the Royal College of Defence Studies.

Military career

Born the son of Brigadier The Honourable William Fraser (1890–1964) DSO MC, who had been the military attaché in Paris when the Second World War begun, David Fraser was educated at Eton College and Christ Church College, Oxford.^[1] He left school to enlist at earliest opportunity after the Second World War begun, and joined his father's regiment, the Grenadier Guards in 1940,^[1] serving for much of the War with the Guards Armoured Division, later in North West Europe, ending the war in the rank of Major.

He was involved afterwards in the Malayan Emergency in 1948, the Suez Crisis in 1956 and the Cyprus Emergency in 1958.^[1]

He was appointed General Officer Commanding 4th Division in 1969, Assistant Chief of Defence Staff (Policy) in 1971 and Vice Chief of the Imperial General Staff in 1973.^[1] He went on to be British Military Representative to NATO in 1975, and Commandant of the Royal College of Defence Studies in 1977 before retiring in 1980.^[1]

He was appointed KCB in 1973.^[2]

Family

In 1947 he married Anne Balfour-Fraser but they divorced in 1952; they had one daughter (Antonia Isabella Fraser).^[1] In 1957 he married Julia Frances Oldridge de la Hey;^[1] they have two sons (Alexander James Fraser and Simon William Fraser) and two daughters (Lucy Caroline Fraser and Arabella Katherine Fraser).^[3]

Books

He is the author of 21 books:^[4]

• Knight's Cross : A Life of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel
• Frederick the Great : King of Prussia
• And We Shall Shock Them: British Army in the Second World War^[5]
• Alanbrooke
• Blitz
• The Grenadier Guards (Men at Arms Series, 73) 8 copies
• Fairest Isle: BBC Radio 3 Book of British Music
• The Fortunes of War
• The Jews of the Channel Islands and the Rule of Law, 1940-1945: “Quite Contrary to the Principles of British Justice”, Sussex Academic Press, Eastbourne, 2002
• The Fragility of Law: Constitutional Patriotism and the Jews of Belgium, 1940–1945, Routledge-Cavendish, 2008
• Yr anturiaethwyr
• The Christian Watt Papers
• Wales in History: The Defenders, 1066-1485 Bk. 2
• Codename Mercury (Hardrow Chronicles)
• Around the House
• Law After Auschwitz: Towards A Jurisprudence Of The Holocaust
• Wars and Shadows : Memoirs of General Sir David Fraser
• A Candle for Judas (Treason in Arms)
• Dragon's Teeth (Treason in Arms)
• The Pain of Winning (Hardrow Chronicles)
• Imperatives for Defence (Policy challenge), 1990
• Adam Hardrow (Hardrow Chronicles)
• Adam in the Breach (Hardrow Chronicles)
• The Killing Times (Treason in Arms)
• The Seizure (Treason in Arms)
• Wellington and the Waterloo Campaign (Wellington Lectures), March 1996
• August 1988
• To War with Whitaker: Wartime Diaries of the Countess of Ranfurly, 1939-45, (Reed Audio) with Hermione, Countess of Ranfurly, and Imogen Stubbs (Audio Cassette, 1995)
• Kiss for the Enemy (Thorndike Large Print Popular Series)

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g} Debrett's People of Today 1994
2. ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 45984. p. 6474. 2 June 1973. Retrieved 2011-04-29.
3. ^ The Peerage.com
4. ^ Library Thing
5. ^ From Shakespeare's King John.

   This England never did, nor never shall, Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror, But when it first did help to wound itself. Now these her princes are come home again, Come the three corners of the world in arms, And we shall shock them: nought shall make us rue, If England to itself do rest but true. (5.7.112)