| Field Marshal The Earl of Ypres | |
|---|---|
Field Marshal The Earl of Ypres |
|
| Born | 28 September 1852 Ripple, Kent, England |
| Died | 22 May 1925 (age 72) Deal Castle, Kent, England |
| Allegiance | United Kingdom |
| Service/branch | British Army |
| Years of service | 1866–1921 |
| Rank | Field-Marshal (1913) |
| Battles/wars | Mahdist War Second Boer War World War I Anglo-Irish War |
| Awards | KCB (1900), KCMG (1902), GCVO (1905), GCB (1909), ADC (1911), OM (1914), KP (1917), PC (1918) |
Field Marshal John Denton Pinkstone French, 1st Earl of Ypres, KP, GCB, OM, GCVO, KCMG, ADC, PC (28 September 1852 – 22 May 1925), known as The Viscount French between 1916 and 1922, was a British and Anglo-Irish officer. He distinguished himself commanding British cavalry during the Second Boer War, then served as the first Commander-in-Chief of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in World War I.
Contents |
John French was born in Ripple in Kent (where he is also buried), the only son of Commander John Tracy William French RN, of Ripple Yale, co. Kent, and Margaret Eccles, daughter of William Eccles RN of Glasgow. Commander French died in 1854, and soon his fragile widow was confined to a mental home. In 1863 the family moved to London.[1]
His sister was the suffragette and Sinn Féin member Charlotte Despard. She would remain highly critical of her brother throughout his career.
French joined the Navy in 1866. He attended the Eastman’s Naval Academy in Portsmouth. In 1869 he served as a midshipman on HMS Warrior, where it was discovered that he was acrophobic.[2] He transferred to the British Army as a lieutenant in the 8th (King's Royal Irish) Hussars in 1874.
French took part in the Sudan expedition in 1884–1885 and thereafter received quick promotion. He commanded the 19th Hussars in 1889–1893 and then was made Assistant Adjutant-General 1893–1897. In 1897, he received command of the 2nd Cavalry Brigade, which he exchanged two years later for the 1st Cavalry Brigade, with which he took part in the Second Boer War 1899–1902, notably commanding the troops that relieved the Siege of Kimberley. He featured prominently too in the subsequent Battle of Paardeberg.
After the war, he was Commander-in-Chief for Aldershot Command 1901–1907[3], after which tenure he was promoted to full general and made Inspector-General of the Army (1907–1912). In 1911 he was made an ADC General to H.M. the King.
From March 1912 to April 1914, he served as Chief of the Imperial General Staff but resigned following the Curragh Mutiny and was made again Inspector-General of the Army, in which post he was serving at the outbreak of World War I.
French was the natural choice as Commander-in-Chief of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in August 1914.
A man of hot temper, he argued with the Cabinet against Field-Marshal Lord Kitchener and General Sir Douglas Haig that the BEF should be deployed in Belgium, rather than Amiens, where both Haig and Kitchener believed it would be well placed to deliver a vigorous counterattack once the route of German advance was known. Kitchener argued that the placement of the BEF at Mons would result in having to abandon its position and much of its supplies almost immediately, as the Belgian Army would be unable to hold its ground against the Germans; given the solid belief in fortresses at the time, it is not surprising that French and the British cabinet disagreed with Kitchener on this issue.
The Belgian fortresses at Liege soon fell and most of the remaining Belgian troops were soon besieged in Antwerp, opening up Belgium to the German advance. Sir John French, who could not speak French well, had a poor relationship with General Lanzerac, who commanded the French Fifth Army on his right - at an early meeting, asking whether the German advance guards spotted at Huy on the Meuse were crossing the river (a reasonable question, as a German crossing of the Meuse exposed the BEF to encirclement from the west), his inability to pronounce the name "Huy" caused Lanzerac to exclaim in exasperation that the Germans had probably gone there to fish. After the BEF's first battle at Mons, as Kitchener had predicted, it had to retreat from its position to avoid the danger of being flanked, both from the west and from the east, when the French position on its right failed.
Sir John began a retreat to the Marne which threatened to break the link with the French armies. French's instructions from Kitchener were that he was to cooperate with the French in repelling the German invasion, but not to take orders from them; but also to avoid undue losses or the risk of being attacked.[4] He was increasingly indecisive; and more concerned with preserving his troops—even suggesting removing them behind the Loire or to the Channel Ports—than with aiding the French. Although the French commander-in-chief, Joffre, dealt tactfully with French, at this time Joffre sacked three of his own army commanders (including Lanzerac), ten corps commanders, and thirty-eight divisional commanders, and one historian writes that "one cannot help wonder" whether Sir John would have suffered the same fate had he reported directly to Joffre.[5] Kitchener travelled to France for an emergency meeting with Sir John on 2 September 1914 to re-organise his thinking and direct him to take part in the counter-offensive at the First Battle of the Marne. French was particularly upset by the fact that Kitchener arrived wearing his field marshal's uniform; he felt Kitchener was implying that he was French's superior and not simply a cabinet member, a fact he mentioned in a letter to Sir Winston Churchill. No one knows exactly what was said during the meeting, as neither man kept any record, but French became increasingly antagonistic towards Kitchener in the following months.
During the First Battle of Mons, French issued a series of hasty orders to abandon positions and equipment, which were ignored by his subordinate in charge of the II Corps of the BEF, General Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien. Smith-Dorrien's II Corps instead mounted a vigorous defensive action at Le Cateau, relieving the pressure and allowing the troops to re-organise, gather up their supplies, and make a fighting withdrawal. Smith-Dorrien also ignored other orders from French which he considered to be unrealistic. Smith-Dorrien was removed from command after advocating a tactical withdrawal away from German lines at Ypres, following the first use of poison gas by German troops. Several days after this, French accepted the advice of General Plumer to perform a withdrawal almost identical to the one Smith-Dorrien had recommended.
In January 1915, French, with the concurrence of senior commanders (e.g. Haig), wanted the New Armies incorporated into existing divisions as battalions rather than sent out as entire divisions. He took the step of appealing to the Prime Minister, Asquith, over Kitchener’s head, but Asquith refused to overrule Kitchener. This was a further factor in the deterioration of relations between French and Kitchener. However, French felt that the war would be over by the summer, as Germany had recently redeployed some divisions to the east.[6] This did not happen, and New Army divisions first saw action at Loos in September 1915.
French remained in command as major trenching began, and oversaw the fighting at Neuve Chapelle and Ypres that finally destroyed the last of the original BEF. In 1915, he declined to co-operate with the French, and after the failures at Aubers Ridge and Loos, British offensive operations were almost halted. In December 1915, he was replaced by General Sir Douglas Haig.
French returned to England to be appointed Commander-in-Chief of the British Home Forces in December 1915, and oversaw the suppression of the Irish uprising in 1916. In January 1916, he was created Viscount French, of Ypres and of High Lake in the County of Roscommon.
At the beginning of the First World War a supporter of French, A.C. Ainger, tried, with little success, to popularize a marching song in honour of French. The words read: "Do you ken John French with his khaki suit His belt and gaiters and stout brown boot Along with his guns and his horse and his foot On the road to Berlin in the morning."[7]
In May 1918, French was appointed British Viceroy, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and Supreme Commander of the British Army in Ireland.
On 19 December 1919, an Irish Republican Army unit which consisted of 11 volunteers, including Seán Treacy, Seamus Robinson, Seán Hogan, Paddy Daly (Leader), Joe Leonard, Martin Savage, and Dan Breen, planned to assassinate Lord French, head of the Dublin Castle administration in Ireland. An ambush was organised as he returned from a private party which he had hosted the previous evening at his country residence in Frenchpark, County Roscommon.[8]
The volunteers' intelligence operative had informed the unit that Lord French would be travelling in an armed convoy which would bring him from Ashtown railway station to the Vice-Regal Lodge in Phoenix Park, Dublin.[9] The convoy would consist of an outrider and three following cars, and Lord French was to be in the second car.
The IRA unit gathered at Fleming's Pub in Drumcondra but left in small groups to avoid raising suspicion as they cycled through Phibsboro and up the Cabra Road. They regrouped at Kelly's Public House (now called the Halfway House) in Ashtown. At approximately 11:40 a.m., as the train carrying Lord French pulled into the station, the unit left the pub and took up positions along the crossroads at Ashtown.
The plan was for Martin Savage, Tom Kehoe, and Dan Breen to push a hay-cart halfway across the road. Then, after the out-rider and the first car had passed, they would push it the rest of the way across the road, thereby completely blocking the path of the remaining vehicles. As they had been informed that Lord French was to be in the second car, it would be attacked with grenades (known as Mills Bombs at the time) and concentrated rifle fire.
Their plan was almost foiled as they pushed the hay-cart across the road, as a Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) officer disturbed them, telling them to move on. One of IRA men lobbed a grenade at him, although it did not explode. It struck the police officer on the head, knocking him unconscious. The police officer was then dragged from the road and the attack went ahead as planned.[10]
When the convoy appeared minutes later, the IRA unit attacked the second car, forcing it to swerve off the road. However, unknown to the unit, Lord French was actually travelling in the first car, and managed to drive through the blockade. The occupants of the second car, part of Lord French's guard, returned fire. As the gun battle developed, the third car arrived on the other side of the cart and began firing with rifles and machine-guns on the now-exposed IRA fighters.
In the crossfire Dan Breen was shot in the leg, and seconds later Savage fell mortally wounded after being hit by a bullet in the neck. He died in the arms of Dan Breen; his last words to Breen were, "I'm done, but carry on....". Tom Kehoe and the wounded Dan Breen carried Savage's body from the road and back to Kelly’s Pub while the gunfight continued.[11]
Two Dublin Metropolitan Police officers were also wounded in the gun battle. At this point the British military, including some wounded, began to withdraw from the scene and continued on towards Phoenix Park. Realising that reinforcements would be on their way, the IRA unit then dispersed to safehouses in the Dublin area. Dan Breen was helped onto his bike by Paddy Daly, who helped him to a safehouse in the Phibsboro area, where he was attended to by the captain of the Dublin hurling team, Dr J.M. Ryan.
French was President of The Ypres League, a veterans society for those who had served at the Ypres Salient. He retired from the military in April 1921, and in May 1922 he was elevated to the Earldom of Ypres. French died on 22 May 1925, aged 72. A funeral parade was held for him in London, after which his body was cremated and his ashes buried in his native Ripple.
In 1972 the ownership of French's war diaries was disputed following the bankruptcy of the 3rd Earl of Ypres.[12]
| Military offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Sir Redvers Buller |
GOC-in-C Aldershot Command 1902 – 1907 |
Succeeded by Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien |
| Preceded by The Duke of Connaught |
Inspector-General of the Forces 1907–1912 |
Succeeded by Sir Charles Douglas As Inspector-General of Home Forces |
| Preceded by Sir William Nicholson |
Chief of the Imperial General Staff 1912–1914 |
Succeeded by Sir Charles Douglas |
| New title Start of World War I
|
Commander of the British Expeditionary Force 1914–1915 |
Succeeded by Sir Douglas Haig |
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by The Lord Wimborne |
Lord Lieutenant of Ireland 1918–1921 |
Succeeded by The Viscount Fitzalan of Derwent |
| Peerage of the United Kingdom | ||
| New creation | Earl of Ypres 1922–1925 |
Succeeded by John French |
| Viscount French 1916–1925 |
||