Horatio Pettus Mackintosh Berney-Ficklin

Horatio Berney-Ficklin
Born	13 June 1892 Cavendish Square, London, England
Died	17 February 1961 (aged 68) Cape Town, South Africa
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service/branch	British Army
Years of service	1912–1936 1936–1948
Rank	Major General
Unit	Norfolk Regiment Highland Light Infantry
Commands held	2nd Battalion, Highland Light Infantry 15th Infantry Brigade 5th Infantry Division 48th Infantry (Reserve) Division 55th (West Lancashire) Infantry Division
Battles/wars	World War I North Russia Intervention World War II
Awards	Companion of the Order of the Bath Military Cross

Major General Horatio Pettus Mackintosh Berney-Ficklin CB MC (13 June 1892 – 17 February 1961) was a senior British Army officer who served in both World War I and World War II. During the latter, he commanded for just over three years – from 1940 to 1943 – the 5th Infantry Division (nicknamed "The Globe Trotters"), the most widely travelled division of the British Army during World War II.^[1]

Early life and military career

Born on 13 June 1892, the son of Philip Berney-Ficklin and Janet Margaret Tennant (Rita) Mackintosh, Horatio was educated at Rugby School and Jesus College, Cambridge. He had a younger brother, Alexander Tennent Mackintosh, born on 10 May 1895.^[2] After attending the Officers' Training Corps (OTC) at Rugby School, he was commissioned as a second lieutenant (on probation) into the Special Reserve of the Norfolk Regiment in May 1912.^[3]

He was gazetted into the 1st Battalion, Norfolk Regiment in June 1914, shortly before the outbreak of World War I.^[4] In December he transferred to the 8th (Service) Battalion, Norfolk Regiment, a Kitchener's Army unit in which his brother was also serving, which formed part of the 53rd Brigade of the 18th (Eastern) Division, as the battalion's adjutant. Promoted to lieutenant on 5 March 1915, his battalion departed for the Western Front in July. He was awarded the Military Cross (MC) on 3 June 1916 and was promoted to temporary major on 1 July 1916. The following year he became brigade major of the 152nd (Seaforth Highlanders) Brigade, part of the 51st (Highland) Division,^[4] and, also in 1917, married Audrey Brenda Knyvet Wilson at St Peter Mancroft, Norwich on 9 July.^[5] In 1918, during the German Army's Spring Offensive, he was wounded and taken prisoner.^[3]

Between the wars

Released after the war in 1919, and, remaining in the army, he was sent to Russia to become liaison officer at Brigadier General Edmund Ironside's GHQ during the North Russia Intervention, where he was again wounded.^[3] Between 1923–25 he was adjutant of the Bristol University Officer Training Corps (OTC), and retired from the army in 1926.^[3]

Rejoining the army in 1936, after divorcing his wife, he transferred from the Norfolks to the Highland Light Infantry, and, in late December, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel and became Commanding Officer (CO) of the 2nd Battalion of his new regiment, which was then serving in India, before moving to Palestine in 1938 during the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine.^[6] After serving in Palestine until 1939, he returned to England later in the year where he received promotion to brigadier and was given command of the 15th Infantry Brigade, succeeding Brigadier Henry Willcox.^[3] The brigade formed part of the 5th Infantry Division in Yorkshire, whose General Officer Commanding (GOC) was then Major General Harold Franklyn.^[7]

World War II

Shortly after the outbreak of World War II in September, the brigade was sent to France, arriving there in early October as an independent formation, where it became part of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) and served initially under the command of General Headquarters (GHQ) BEF and later Lieutenant General Sir John Dill's I Corps, as the 5th Division was, at this stage, still not fully formed.^[7] However, the divisional HQ arrived in France in late December, and the 15th Brigade reverted to the 5th Division, still under Major General Franklyn, which now included, in addition to Berney-Ficklin's 15th Brigade, Brigadier Miles Dempsey's 13th Brigade and Brigadier Montagu Stopford's 17th Brigade, along with divisional troops.^[7]

The first few months of the conflict in the west were, for Berney-Ficklin's brigade, spent relatively inactive – leading to this period of time being known as the "Phoney War" – except for a brief period on the Saar front with the French in January and February 1940, where the brigade was able to see light action, confined mostly to skirmishing and patrolling,. In April the brigade was withdrawn from France and sent to Norway after the German invasion.^[7] He preceded his brigade as he had been selected to command the British forces intended to take Trondheim as part of Operation Hammer.^[7] Major General Frederick Hotblack, the original force commander, had had a stroke and Berney-Ficklin was selected to replace him, temporarily relinquishing command of his brigade. However, travelling by air to Norway via the Orkneys to take over his new command, his plane crashed at Kirkwall, injuring him and several of his staff and putting him out of action, the command eventually passing to Major General Bernard Paget.^[8]

In mid-July 1940, by now deemed to be sufficiently recovered from his injuries, Berney-Ficklin was promoted to major general and became GOC of the 5th Infantry Division in place of Major General Franklyn, who had received the promotion to lieutenant general and command of VIII Corps, which he would command for the next three years.^[1] The division, now reunited with all three brigades under command, was then in Scotland under Scottish Command, reforming after fighting in France and participating in the Dunkirk evacuation, where heavy casualties were sustained to both the 13th and 17th Brigades.^[8] The division's three brigades, the 13th, 15th and 17th, were now commanded by Brigadiers Douglas Wimberley, James Gammell and Montagu Stopford, respectively.^[8] The division, after moving to North West England in October 1940, was then sent to Northern Ireland in March 1941, to help prevent a possible German invasion of the country via Southern Ireland.^[8]

Returning to England in early 1942, the division left soon after, in late March, and was destined to be sent to India. The war situation had changed by this time, with the Japanese entering the war in December 1941, which was followed soon after by a string of Japanese victories, in Malaya and Singapore, and British and Indian forces on the retreat, causing India to be threatened. Reinforcements, therefore, were desperately needed, Berney-Ficklin's 5th Division being among them.^[8] The division, stopping briefly in South Africa, then crossed the Indian Ocean, where it lost both the 13th and 17th Brigades to Operation Ironclad, the invasion of Madagascar. The rest of the division arrived in Bombay in May, travelling to Ranchi soon after. The monsoon season, however, brought operations in Burma and India to a close and the division, now reformed with all three brigades, was sent to Persia, after Berney-Ficklin went personally to General Sir Archibald Wavell, the Commander-in-Chief, India and requested that the 5th Division be sent there, instead of the 2nd Division.^[8]

At the time there was fear that the German Army, then fighting the Soviet Red Army on the Eastern Front where it recently launched an offensive, carrying it across the Don and threatening the Caucasus, and there were not enough British or Indian troops to prevent a German breakthrough if Soviet resistance collapsed. Arriving there in late September 1942, the division formed part of the Tenth Army, commanded by General Sir Edward Quinan, itself part of Paiforce (formerly Iraqforce) under Persia and Iraq Command.^[8] In early October the division concentrated in Kermanshah before moving to Qum for the winter. The German defeat at Stalingrad in February 1943 removed the threat of invasion and the division was available elsewhere. Travelling and training in the Lebanon, Egypt and Syria, the division became part of Lieutenant General Miles Dempsey's XIII Corps, itself part of the British Eighth Army, under General Sir Bernard Montgomery.^[8] Berney-Ficklin knew Dempsey well, as the latter had commanded the 13th Brigade while the former commanded the 15th Brigade in France.^[8]

On 10 July Berney-Ficklin's 5th Division landed on the Italian island of Sicily as part of the Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily.^[1] They were amongst the first British troops to land in Europe for more than three years.^[8] Before the day was over his division had captured Syracuse, with Augusta falling soon days later. Thereafter the division, aiming for Messina, who had faced only light resistance from the Italian Army, faced stiffening opposition from the Germans, in particular from the Hermann Göring Division in the Plain of Catania. Before the campaign was over, however, Berney-Ficklin was relieved of his command on 3 August and replaced as GOC by Major General Gerard Bucknall, a protégé of Montgomery's, and returned to England.^[9] Despite being a popular GOC, his performance in Sicily had impressed neither Montgomery or Dempsey.^[10]

In early September, however, shortly after returning to England, Berney-Ficklin became GOC of the 48th Infantry (Reserve) Division, succeeding Major General Hayman Hayman-Joyce. The division, originally a first-line Territorial Army (TA) which had fought with distinction in France in 1940, had been converted into a reserve formation in December 1942 and was now responsible for the training of soldiers who had completed their initial training and corps training. The division was not organised for active service and provided an additional five weeks of training for soldiers of all arms before they were drafted overseas.^[9]

In mid-July 1944, after handing over the 48th Division to Major General William Bradshaw, he then became GOC of the 55th (West Lancashire) Infantry Division, succeeding Major General Walter Clutterbuck, which, unlike the 48th Division, was a field formation but remained in the United Kingdom throughout the war and was then serving in Northern Ireland under command of British Troops in Northern Ireland.^[9]

Postwar

After the war he presided over a British Military Tribunal convened at Lüneburg from 17 September to 17 November 1945 to try suspected war criminals from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.^[11] Serving as Colonel of the Royal Norfolk Regiment from 1946–1947, he retired from the army in 1948 and, moving with his new wife, the daughter of a Russian general, to Cape Town, South Africa, where he died on 17 February 1961, at the age of 68.^[1][3]

Bibliography

• Mead, Richard (2007). Churchill's Lions: A Biographical Guide to the Key British Generals of World War II. Stroud: Spellmount. ISBN 978-1-86227-431-0. 
• Smart, Nick (2005). Biographical Dictionary of British Generals of the Second World War. Barnesley: Pen & Sword. ISBN 1844150496. 

References