Archibald Wavell, 1st Earl Wavell

Born the son of Archibald Graham Wavell (who later became a major general in the British Army and military commander of Johannesburg after its capture during the Second Boer War[1]) and Lillie Wavell (née Percival), Wavell attended Eaton House,[2] followed by the leading preparatory boarding school Summer Fields near Oxford, Winchester College, where he was a scholar, and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst.[3] His headmaster, Dr. Fearon, had advised his father that there was no need to send him into the Army as he had "sufficient ability to make his way in other walks of life".[1]

After graduating from Sandhurst, Wavell was commissioned into the British Army on 8 May 1901 as a second lieutenant in the Black Watch,[4] and joined the 2nd battalion of his regiment in South Africa to fight in the Second Boer War.[3] The battalion stayed in South Africa throughout the war, which formally ended in June 1902 after the Peace of Vereeniging. Wavell was ill, and did not immediately join the battalion as it transferred to British India in October that year; he instead left Cape Town for England on the SS Simla at the same time.[5] In 1903 he was transferred to join the battalion in India and, having been promoted to lieutenant on 13 August 1904,[6] he fought in the Bazar Valley Campaign of February 1908.[7] In January 1909 was seconded from his regiment to be a student at the Staff College.[8] He was one of only two in his class to graduate with an A grade.[9] In 1911, he spent a year as a military observer with the Russian Army to learn Russian,[7] returning to his regiment in December of that year.[10] In April 1912 he became a General Staff Officer Grade 3 (GSO3) in the Russian Section of the War Office.[11] In July, he was granted the temporary rank of captain and became GSO3 at the Directorate of Military Training.[12] On 20 March 1913 Wavell was promoted to the substantive rank of captain.[13] After visiting manoeuvres at Kiev in summer 1913, he was arrested at the Russo-Polish border as a suspected spy, following a search of his Moscow hotel room by the secret police, but managed to remove from his papers an incriminating document listing the information wanted by the War Office.[14]

Wavell was working at the War Office during the Curragh incident. His letters to his father record his disgust at the Government's behaviour in giving an ultimatum to officers – he had little doubt that the Government had been planning to crush the Ulster Scots, whatever they later claimed. However, he was also concerned at the Army's effectively intervening in politics, not least as there would be an even greater appearance of bias when the Army was used against industrial unrest.[15]

Wavell was working as a staff officer when the First World War began.[16] As a captain, he was sent to France to a posting at General HQ of the British Expeditionary Force as General Staff Officer Grade 2 (GSO2), but shortly afterwards, in November 1914, was appointed brigade major of 9th Infantry Brigade.[17] He was wounded in the Second Battle of Ypres of 1915, losing his left eye[18] and winning the Military Cross.[19] In October 1915 he became a GSO2 in the 64th Highland Division.[3]

In December 1915, after he had recovered, Wavell was returned to General HQ in France as a GSO2.[20] He was promoted to the substantive rank of major on 8 May 1916.[21] In October 1916 Wavell was graded General Staff Officer Grade 1 (GSO1) as an acting lieutenant colonel,[22] and was then assigned as a liaison officer to the Russian Army in the Caucasus.[7] In June 1917, he was promoted to brevet lieutenant colonel[23] and continued to work as a staff officer (GSO1),[24] as liaison officer with the Egyptian Expeditionary Force headquarters.[7]

In January 1918 Wavell received a further staff appointment as Assistant Adjutant & Quartermaster General (AA&QMG)[25] working at the Supreme War Council in Versailles.[18] In March 1918 Wavell was made a temporary brigadier general and returned to Palestine where he served as the brigadier general of the General Staff (BGGS) with XX Corps, part of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force.[18]

Wavell was given a number of assignments between the wars, though like many officers he had to accept a reduction in rank. In May 1920 he relinquished the temporary rank of Brigadier-General, reverting to brevet lieutenant colonel.[26] In December 1921, still a brevet lieutenant colonel, he became an Assistant Adjutant General (AAG) at the War Office[27] and, having been promoted to full colonel on 3 June 1921,[28] he became a GSO1 in the Directorate of Military Operations in July 1923.[29]

Apart from a short period unemployed on half pay in 1926,[30][31] Wavell continued to hold GSO1 appointments, latterly in the 3rd Infantry Division, until July 1930 when he was once again granted the rank of temporary brigadier and was given command of 6th Infantry Brigade.[32] In March 1932, he was appointed ADC to the King,[33] a position he held until October 1933 when he was promoted to Major-General.[34][35] However, there was a shortage of jobs for Major-Generals at this time and in January 1934, on relinquishing command of his brigade, he found himself unemployed on half pay once again.[36]

By the end of the year, although still on half pay, Wavell had been designated to command 2nd Division and appointed a CB.[37] In March 1935, he took command of his division.[38] In August 1937 he was transferred to Palestine, where there was growing unrest, to be General Officer Commanding (GOC) British Forces in Palestine and Trans-Jordan[39] and was promoted to Lieutenant-General on 21 January 1938.[40]

In April 1938 Wavell became General Officer Commanding-in-Chief (GOC-in-C) Southern Command in the UK.[41] In July 1939, he was named as General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of Middle East Command with the local rank of full General.[42] Subsequently, on 15 February 1940, to reflect the broadening of his oversight responsibilities to include East Africa, Greece and the Balkans, his title was changed to Commander-in-Chief Middle East.[43]

On 15 June Churchill invited Wavell to dinner and offered him the Viceroyalty of India in succession to Linlithgow. Lady Wavell joined him in London on 14 July, when they took up a suite at the Dorchester. Shortly afterwards it was announced that he had been created a viscount (taking the style Viscount Wavell of Cyrenaica and of Winchester, in the county of Southampton)[59] He addressed an all-party meeting at the House of Commons on 27 July, and on 28 July took his seat in the House of Lords as "the Empire's hero".[60] In September, he was formally named Governor-General and Viceroy of India.[61]

One of Wavell's first actions in office was to address the Bengal famine of 1943 by ordering the army to distribute relief supplies to the starving rural Bengalis. He attempted with mixed success to increase the supplies of rice to reduce the prices.[62] During his reign, Gandhi was leading the Quit India campaign, Mohammad Ali Jinnah was working for an independent state for the Muslims and Subhas Chandra Bose befriended Japan "and were pressing forward along India's Eastern border".[63]

Wavell as Viceroy of India (centre), with the C-in-C of the Indian Army Auchinleck (right) and Montgomery.

Although Wavell was initially popular with Indian politicians, pressure mounted concerning the likely structure and timing of an independent India. He attempted to move the debate along—with the Wavell Plan and the Simla Conference—but received little support from Churchill (who was against Indian independence), nor from Clement Attlee, Churchill's successor as prime minister. He was also hampered by the differences between the various Indian political factions. At the end of the war, rising Indian expectations continued to be unfulfilled, and inter-communal violence increased. Eventually, in 1947, Attlee lost confidence in Wavell and replaced him with Lord Mountbatten of Burma.[49][64]

Field Marshal Lord Wavell's banner as Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath, now displayed in Winchester Cathedral.

Memorial plaques for Field Marshal 1st Earl Wavell (died 1950) and his son, the 2nd Earl Wavell (died 1953), in Winchester Cathedral.

In 1947 Wavell returned to England and was made High Steward of Colchester. The same year, he was created Earl Wavell and given the additional title of Viscount Keren of Eritrea and Winchester.[65]

Wavell was a great lover of literature, and while Viceroy of India he compiled and annotated an anthology of great poetry, Other Men's Flowers, which was published in 1944. He wrote the last poem in the anthology himself and described it as a "...little wayside dandelion of my own".[66] He had a great memory for poetry and often quoted it at length. He is depicted in Evelyn Waugh's novel Officers and Gentlemen, part of the Sword of Honour trilogy, reciting a translation of Callimachus' poetry in public.[67] He was also a member of the Church of England and a deeply religious man.[68]

Wavell died on 24 May 1950 after a relapse following abdominal surgery on 5 May.[69] After his death, his body lay in state at the Tower of London where he had been Constable. A military funeral was held on 7 June 1950 with the funeral procession travelling along the Thames from the Tower to Westminster Pier and then to Westminster Abbey for the funeral service.[70] This was the first military funeral by river since that of Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson in 1806.[71] The funeral was attended by the then Prime Minister Clement Attlee as well as Lord Halifax and fellow officers including Field Marshals Alanbrooke and Montgomery. Winston Churchill did not attend the service.[72]

Wavell is buried in the old mediaeval cloister at Winchester College, next to the Chantry Chapel. His tombstone simply bears the inscription "Wavell". A plaque was placed in the north nave aisle of Winchester Cathedral to commemorate both Wavell and his son.[73] St Andrew's Garrison Church, Aldershot, an Army church, contains a large wooden plaque dedicated to Lord Wavell.[74]

Wavell married Eugenie Marie Quirk, only daughter of Col. J. O. Quirk CB DSO, on 22 April 1915.[75] She survived him and died, as Dowager Countess Wavell, on 11 October 1987, aged 100 years.[76]

Children:

• Archibald John Arthur Wavell, later 2nd Earl Wavell, b. 11 May 1916; d. 24 December 1953, killed in Kenya, in an action against Mau Mau rebels. Since he was unmarried and without issue, the titles became extinguished on his death.[77]
• Eugenie Pamela Wavell, b. 2 December 1918, married 14 March 1942 Lt.-Col. A. F. W. Humphrys MBE.
• Felicity Ann Wavell, b. 21 July 1921, married at the Cathedral Church of the Redemption, New Delhi, 20 February 1947 Capt. P. M. Longmore MC, son of Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Longmore.[78]
• Joan Patricia Quirk Wavell, b. 23 April 1923, married

• (1) 27 January 1943 Maj. Hon. Simon Nevill Astley (b. 13 August 1919; d. 16 March 1946), 2nd son of Albert Edward Delaval [Astley], 21st Baron Hastings, by his wife Lady Margueritte Helen Nevill, only child by his second wife of Henry Gilbert Ralph [Nevill], 3rd Marquess of Abergavenny.
• (2) 19 June 1948 Maj. Harry Alexander Gordon MC (d. 19 June 1965), 2nd son of Cdr. Alastair Gordon DSO RN.
• (3) Maj. Donald Struan Robertson (d. 1991), son of the Rt. Hon. Sir Malcolm Arnold Robertson GCMG KBE.

• "I think he (Benito Mussolini) must do something, if he cannot make a graceful dive he will at least have to jump in somehow; he can hardly put on his dressing-gown and walk down the stairs again."[96]
• "After the 'war to end war' they seem to have been pretty successful in Paris at making a 'Peace to end Peace.'"[97](commenting on the treaties ending the First World War; this quotation was the basis for the title of David Fromkin's A Peace to End All Peace, New York: Henry Holt, (1989) ISBN 0-8050-6884-8)
• "Let us be clear about three facts: First, all battles and all wars are won in the end by the infantryman. Secondly, the infantryman always bears the brunt. His casualties are heavier, he suffers greater extremes of discomfort and fatigue than the other arms. Thirdly, the art of the infantryman is less stereotyped and far harder to acquire in modern war than that of any other arm."[98]

• The Wavell School

• Allen, Louis (1984). Burma: The Longest War. J. M. Dent and Sons. ISBN 0-460-02474-4.
• Auchinleck, Claude (1946). Despatch on Operations in the Middle East From 5 July 1941 to 31 October 1941. London: War Office. in "No. 37695". The London Gazette (Supplement). 20 August 1946. pp. 4215–4230.
• Axelrod, Alan (2008). The Real History of World War II. Sterling Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4027-4090-9.
• Chips, the diaries of Sir Henry Channon, ed. R Rhodes James, Weidenfeld and Nicolson London, 1987 - especially Ch 8
• Close, H. M. (1997). Attlee, Wavell, Mountbatten, and the transfer of power. National Book Foundation.
• Connell, John (1 January 1964). Wavell, Scholar and Soldier. Collins.
• Connell, John (1 April 1969). Wavell, Supreme Commander. Collins. ISBN 978-0002119207.
• Fort, Adrian. Archibald Wavell: The Life and Death of the Imperial Servant (2009)
• Frame, Alex (2008). Flying Boats: My Father's War in the Mediterranean. Victoria University Press. ISBN 978-0864735621.
• Heathcote, Tony (1999). The British Field Marshals 1736–1997. Barnsley: Pen & Sword. ISBN 0-85052-696-5.
• Glynn, Irial (2007). An Untouchable in the Presence of Brahmins' Lord Wavell's Disastrous Relationship with Whitehall During His Time as Viceroy to India, 1943–7. Modern Asian Studies. pp. 639–663.
• Houterman, Hans; Koppes, Jeroen. "World War II unit histories and officers". Archived from the original on 3 December 2008. Retrieved 20 December 2008.
• 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.
• Pagden, Anthony (2008). Worlds at War: The 2,500-year Struggle between East and West. Oxford University Press US. ISBN 978-0-19-923743-2.
• Playfair, Major-General I. S. O.; with Flynn, Captain F. C. (RN); Molony, Brigadier C. J. C. & Gleave, Group Captain T. P. (2009) [1st. pub. HMSO:1954]. Butler, Sir James (ed.). The Mediterranean and Middle East: The Early Successes Against Italy, to May 1941. History of the Second World War, United Kingdom Military Series. I. Uckfield, UK: Naval & Military Press. ISBN 978-1-84574-065-8.
• Raugh, Harold E., Jr. (2013). Wavell in the Middle East, 1939–1941: A Study in Generalship. University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 978-0806143057.
• Schofield, Victoria (2006). Wavell: Soldier and Statesman. London: John Murray. ISBN 978-0-71956-320-1.
• Wavell, Archibald Percival Wavell (1973). Wavell: The Viceroy's Journal. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0192117236.

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