Freepedia is a series of free encyclopaedias. We currently specialize in history but we intend to branch out into other areas. This section is about Douglas Haig.

Douglas Haig, the son of John Haig, the head of the successful whisky distilling company, was born in Edinburgh in 1861. After obtaining a degree at Brasenose College, Oxford University he went to the Royal Military College at Sandhurst. After he completed his training Haig was commissioned into the 7th Hussars.

Haig was sent to India with his regiment in 1886 and while there worked his way through the ranks. Haig experienced active service in the Sudan (1898) and the Boer War (1899-1902), where he served under Major-General Sir John French. Promoted to the rank of colonel, Haig returned to India where he served in a variety of administrative posts under Lord Kitchener. When Haig became major-general he was the youngest officer of that rank in the British Army.

In 1906 Haig took up the important post at the War Office as Director of Military Training. He worked closely with R. B. Haldane, the Secretary of State for War, to establish a general staff and a territorial army. It was also Haig's responsibility to organize a British Expeditionary Force (BEF) to be deployed in time of war.

In 1914 Haig obtained the rank of Lieutenant General and was given command over the 1st Army Corps of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in France and Belgium. Haig commanded his forces at Mons and was praised for his Ypres campaign in 1914. Later in the same year, Haig was promoted to full general and was given command of the recently enlarged BEF, under the supreme command of General Sir John French.

In December 1915, Haig was appointed commander in chief of the BEF. Haig now become under extreme pressure from the French to produce a diversion from Verdun. The first Battle of the Somme was fought from July to November 1916. In that time Allied forces advanced 12km and suffered 420,000 British and 200,000 French casualties.

In 1918 Haig took charge of the successful British advances on the Western Front which led to an Allied victory later that year. After the war Haig's management of the major campaigns, notably on the Somme in 1916, and at Passchendaele in 1917, was criticized by David Lloyd George, the British prime minister. Some military historians have claimed that Haig tactics were deeply flawed. Others have defended his actions and claimed that his approach was largely determined by French demands for continuous action at that part of the Western Front.

After the war Haig was posted as commander in chief of home forces until his retirement in 1921. Haig, who was granted £100,000 by the British government, devoted the rest of his life to the welfare of ex-servicemen via the Royal British Legion. He was made Earl Haig in 1919 and then Baron Haig of Bemersyde in 1921. Douglas Haig died in 1928.

 

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Military Commanders and the First World War

Battle of the Somme

Sir Douglas Haig

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(1) General Douglas Haig, battle orders issued just before the Battle of the Somme (May 1916)

The First, Second, and Third Armies will take steps to deceive the enemy as to the real front of attack, to wear him out, and reduce his fighting efficiency both during the three days prior to the assault and during the subsequent operations. Preparations for deceiving the enemy should be made without delay. This will be effected by means of -

(a) Preliminary preparations such as advancing our trenches and saps, construction of dummy assembling trenches, gun emplacements, etc.

(b) Wire cutting at intervals along the entire front with a view to inducing the enemy to man his defences and causing fatigue.

(c) Gas discharges, where possible, at selected places along the whole British front, accompanied by a discharge of smoke, with a view to causing the enemy to wear his gas helmets and inducing fatigue and causing casualties.

(d) Artillery barrages on important communications with a view to rendering reinforcements, relief, and supply difficult.

(e) Bombardment of rest billets by night.

(f) Intermittent smoke discharges by day, accompanied by shrapnel fire on the enemy's front defences with a view to inflicting loss.

(g) Raids by night, of the strength of a company and upwards, on an extensive scale, into the enemy's front system of defences. These to be prepared by intense artillery and trench-mortar bombardments.

 

(2) Sir Douglas Haig explained the importance of using heavy artillery at the Battle of the Somme in his book Dispatches, that was published after the war.

The enemy's position to be attacked was of a very formidable character, situated on a high, undulating tract of ground. The first and second systems each consisted of several lines of deep trenches, well provided with bomb-proof shelters and with numerous communication trenches connecting them. The front of the trenches in each system was protected by wire entanglements, many of them in two belts forty yards broad, built of iron stakes, interlaced with barbed-wire, often almost as thick as a man's finger. Defences of this nature could only be attacked with the prospect of success after careful artillery preparation.

 

(3) Sir Douglas Haig, dispatch written after the first day of fighting at the Somme (1st July, 1916)

On the spur running south from Thiepval the work known as the Leipzig Salient was stormed, and severe fighting took place for the possession of the village and its defences. Here and north of the valley of the Ancre as far as Serre, on the left flank of our attack, our initial successes were not sustained. Striking progress was made at many points, and parties of troops penetrated the enemy's positions to the outer defences of Grandcourt, and also to Pendant Copse and Serre; but the enemy's continued resistance at Thiepval and Beaumont Hamel made it impossible to forward reinforcements and ammunition, and, in spite of their gallant efforts, our troops were forced to withdraw during the night to their own lines. The subsidiary attack at Gommecourt also forced its way into the enemy's positions; but there met with such vigorous opposition that, as soon as it was considered that the attack had fulfilled its object, our troops were withdrawn.

 

(4) Charles Repington worked as a military correspondent for The Times during the First World War. Repington recorded in his diary a meeting he had with Sir Douglas Haig on 8th July, 1916.

I went by invitation to G.H.Q., which are at Beauquesne, north of Amiens. Haig is living at a chateau in a wood on the right-hand side of the road, a mile along the Marieux road. I found Haig with Kiggell: the latter was very pleasant, but spoke little. Haig explained things on the map. It is staff work rather than generalship which is necessary for this kind of fighting. He laid great stress on his raids, and he showed me on a map where these had taken place. He said that he welcomed criticisms, but when I mentioned the criticisms which I had heard of his misuse of artillery on July 1, he did not
appear to relish it, and denied its truth. As he was not prepared to talk of things of real interest, I said very little, and left him to do the talking. I also had a strong feeling that the tactics of July 1 had been bad. I don't know which of us was the most glad to be rid of the other.

 

(5) After the war David Lloyd George wrote about General Haig's tactics in his war memoirs.

It is not too much to say that when the Great War broke out our Generals had the most important lessons of their art to learn. Before they began they had much to unlearn. Their brains were cluttered with useless lumber, packed in every niche and corner. Some of it was never cleared out to the end of the War. They knew nothing except by hearsay about the actual fighting of a battle under modern conditions. Haig ordered many bloody battles in this War. He only took part in two. He never even saw the ground on which his greatest battles were fought, either before or during the fight.

The tale of these battles constitutes a trilogy, illustrating the unquestionable heroism that will never accept defeat and the inexhaustible vanity that will never admit a mistake. It is the story of the million who would rather die than own themselves as cowards - even to themselves - and also of the two or three individuals who would rather the million perish than that they as leaders should own - even to themselves - that they were blunderers. Ought I have vetoed it? Ought I not to have resigned rather than acquiesce in this slaughter of brave men? I have always felt there are solid grounds for criticism in that respect. My sole justification is that Haig promised not to press the attack if it became clear that he could not attain his objectives by continuing the offensive.

 

(6) Duff Cooper was asked by the Haig family to write Sir Douglas Haig's official biography. The book included an evaluation of Haig's tactics at the Battle of the Somme.

There are still those who argue that the Battle of the Somme should never have been fought and that the gains were not commensurate with the sacrifice. There exists no yardstick for the measurement of such events, there are no returns to prove whether life has been sold at its market value. There are some who from their manner of reasoning would appear to believe that no battle is worth fighting unless it produces an immediately decisive result which is as foolish as it would be to argue that in a prize fight no blow is worth delivering save the one that knocks the opponent out. As to whether it were wise or foolish to give battle on the Somme on the first of July, 1916, there can surely be only one opinion. To have refused to fight then and there would have meant the abandonment of Verdun to its fate and the breakdown of the co-operation with the French.

 

(7) George Coppard, With A Machine Gun to Cambrai (1969)

Historians say that Haig had the confidence of his men. I very much doubt whether this was strictly true. He had such a vast number of troops under his command and was so completely remote from the actual fighting that he was merely a name, a figurehead. In my view, it was not confidence in him that the men had, but simply their ingrained sense of duty and obedience, in keeping with the times. They were wholly loyal to their own officers, and that was as far as their confidence went. It was trust and comradeship founded on the actual sharing of dangers together.

I was demobbed a few days after my 21st birthday, after four and a half years of service. My leg had shrunk a bit and I was given a pension of twenty-five shillings per week for six months. Dropping to nine shillings per week for a year, the pension ceased altogether.

During this time the government, in the flush of victory, were busily engaged in fixing the enormous sums to be voted as gratuities to the high-ranking officers who had won the war for them. Heading the formidable list were Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig and Admiral Sir David Beatty. For doing the jobs for which they were paid, each received a tax-free golden handshake of £100,000 (a colossal sum then), an earldom and, I believe, an estate to go with it. Many thousands of pounds went to leaders lower down the scale. Sir Julian Byng picked up a trifle of £30,000 and was made a viscount. If any reader should ask, 'What did the demobbed Tommy think about all this?' I can only say, 'Well, what do you think?'

 

(8) Philip Gibbs watched the preparation for the major offensive at the Somme in July, 1916.

Before dawn, in the darkness, I stood with a mass of cavalry opposite Fricourt. Haig as a cavalry man was obsessed with the idea that he would break the German line and send the cavalry through. It was a fantastic hope, ridiculed by the German High Command in their report on the Battles of the Somme which afterwards we captured.

In front of us was not a line but a fortress position, twenty miles deep, entrenched and fortified, defended by masses of machine-gun posts and thousands of guns in a wide arc. No chance for cavalry! But on that night they were massed behind the infantry. Among them were the Indian cavalry, whose dark faces were illuminated now and then for a moment, when someone struck a match to light a cigarette.

 

(9) In an interview in 1993, William Brooks, a private in the British Army was highly critical of Sir Douglas Haig.

The Yanks and the Aussies were disgusted at the way our officers treated us. There were cases where British officers tried to put Yanks or Aussie soldiers in front of a firing-squad but couldn't get away with it. If they had, I reckon those countries would have pulled out of the war and left us to it.

There was a big riot about September 1917 by the Australians at a place called Etaples. They called it "collective indiscipline", what it was was mutiny. It went on for days. I think a couple of military police got killed. Field Marshall Haig would have shot the leaders but dared not of course because they were Aussies.

Haig's nickname was the butcher. He'd think nothing of sending thousands of men to certain death. The utter waste and disregard for human life and human suffering by the so-called educated classes who ran the country. What a wicked waste of life. I'd hate to be in their shoes when they face their Maker.

 

(10) James Lovegrove, a lieutenant in the British Army was highly critical of Britain's military commanders.

The military commanders had no respect for human life. General Douglas Haig, later he was made a Field Marshal, cared nothing about casualties. Of course, he was carrying out government policy, because after the war he was knighted and given a lump sum and a massive life-pension. I blame the public schools who bred these ego maniacs. They should never have been in charge of men. Never.

 

(11) Henry Hamilton Fyfe, worked for the Daily Mail and met Sir Douglas Haig several times during the First World War.

Haig was, in truth, at close quarters very disappointing. He looked the part. His face on a postcard was not less impressive than Kitchener's. But - his face was his fortune. He had little general intelligence, no imagination. When the official war correspondents, much against his will, first went out to France, he made them a speech of "welcome". He said he knew what they wanted. "Something for Mary Jane in the kitchen to read."

Haig was as shy as a schoolgirl. He was afraid of newspaper men - afraid of any men but those he gathered round him, and they were mostly like himself. If ever the history of the war is written as frankly as that of Napoleon's campaign has been, Haig will be held accountable for the appalling slaughter in the Somme battles and in Flanders, caused by his flinging masses of men against positions far too strong to be carried by assault.

 

(12) Lieutenant Bernard Montgomery was highly critical of his senior officers on the Western Front during the First World War.

The higher staffs were out of touch with the regimental officers and with the troops. The former lived in comfort, which became greater as the distance of their headquarters behind the lines increased. There was no harm in this provided there was touch and sympathy between the staff and the troops. This was often lacking. The frightful casualties appalled me. The so-called "good fighting generals" of the war appeared to me to be those who had a complete disregard for human life.

There is a story of Sir Douglas Haig's Chief of Staff who was to return to England after the heavy fighting during the winter of 1917-18 on the Passchendaele front. Before leaving he said he would like to visit the Passchendaele Ridge and see the country. When he saw the mud and the ghastly conditions under which the soldiers had fought and died, he was horrified and said: "Do you mean to tell me that the soldiers had to fight under such conditions?" And when he was told that it was so, he said: "Why was I never told about this before?"

 

(13) In 1926 Sir Douglas Haig wrote an article about the impact that the First World War had made on military tactics.

I believe that the value of the horse and the opportunity for the horse in the future are likely to be as great as ever. Aeroplanes and tanks are only accessories to the men and the horse, and I feel sure that as time goes on you will find just as much use for the horse - the well-bred horse - as you have ever done in the past.

 

(14) Charles Edward Bean, Official History of Australia in the War (1930)

In round figures this period cost the two allies three quarters of a million casualties against half a million on the German side. These figures include the casualties incurred during the latter stages at Verdun and also on quiet parts of the front; but they may safely be assumed to indicate, at least roughly, the proportion of the German loss to that of the Allies in the First Battle of the Somme.

Far from the German loss being the greater, the British Army was being worn down - numerically - more than twice as fast, and the loss is not to be measured by bare numbers. The troops who bore the brunt of the Somme fighting were the cream of the British population - the new volunteer army, inspired by the lofty altruistic ideals traditional in British upbringing, in high purity of aim and single-minded sacrifice probably the finest army that ever went to war. Despite the indignation expressed by one of the higher commanders at the criticism current in England, a general who wears down 180,000 of his enemy by expending 400, 000 men of this quality has something to answer for.

 

(15) John Buchan, Memory Hold the Door (1940)

But in a soldier character is at least as vital as intellect, and there can be no question about the quality of his (Douglas Haig) character. He had none of the lesser graces which make a general popular with troops, and it took four years for his armies to feel his personality.

He had to feel his way in his task and was often conscious of blunders more acutely conscious, I think, than most of his critics. He had difficulties with his allies, with his colleagues, with the home Government, though, let it be said, he had far less to complain of on the latter score than most soldiers of a democracy.

He had repeated bitter disappointments. He had the wolf by the ears, and at first he clung to traditional methods, when a smaller man might have tried fantastic experiments which would have assuredly spelt disaster. He did not revise his plans until the old ones had been fully tested, and a new one had emerged of which his reason could approve. Under him we incurred heavy losses, but I believe that these losses would have been greater had he been the brilliant empiric like Nivelle or Henry Wilson.

When the last great enemy attack came he took the main shock with a quiet resolution; when the moment arrived for the advance he never fumbled. He broke through the Hindenburg line in spite of the doubts of the British Cabinet, because he believed that only thus could the War be ended in time to save civilisation. He made the decision alone - one of the finest proofs of moral courage in the history of war. Haig cannot enter the small circle of the greater captains, but it may be argued that in the special circumstances of the campaign his special qualities were the ones most needed - patience, sobriety, balance of temper, unshakable fortitude.

 

(16) Sir Llewellyn Woodward wrote about Sir Douglas Haig in his book Great Britain and the War of 1914-1918 that was published in 1967.

His knowledge of his profession was sound and solid; he was a man of strong nerve, resolute, patient, somewhat cold and reserved in temper, unlikely to be thrown off his balance either by calamity or success. He reached opinions slowly, and held to them. He made up his mind in 1915 that the war could be won on the Western Front, and only on the Western Front. He acted on this view, and, at the last, he was right, though it is open to argument not only that victory could have been won sooner elsewhere but that Haig's method of winning it was clumsy, tragically expensive of life, and based for too long on a misreading of the facts.

Haig failed to comprehend that the policy of "attrition" or in plain English, "killing Germans" until the German army was worn down and exhausted, was not only wasteful and, intellectually, a confession of impotence; it was also extremely dangerous. The Germans might counter Haig's plan by allowing him to wear down his own army in a series of unsuccessful attacks against a skilful defence. Fortunately the enemy generals were of much the same "textbook" type of mind as Haig.