Claude Auchinleck
Field Marshal Sir Claude John Eyre Auchinleck, (/ˌɒxɪnˈlɛk/ OKH-in-LEK), GCB, GCIE, CSI, DSO, OBE (21 June 1884 – 23 March 1981), was a British Indian Army commander who saw active service during the world wars. A career soldier who spent much of his military career in India, he rose to become commander-in-chief of the Indian Army by early 1941 during the Second World War. In July 1941 he was appointed commander-in-chief of the Middle East Theatre, but after initial successes, the war in North Africa turned against the British-led forces under his command, and he was relieved of the post in August 1942 during the North African campaign.
Sir
Claude Auchinleck
The Auk
1904–1947
115611
Supreme Commander India and Pakistan (1947–1948)
Commander-in-Chief, India (1941, 1943–1947)
Middle East Command (1941–1942)
Southern Command (1940)[3]
V Corps (1940)
Commander-in-chief, Northern Norway (1940)
IV Corps (1940)
3rd Indian Infantry Division (1939)
Meerut district (1938)
Peshawar Brigade (1933–1936)
1st Battalion, 1st Punjab Regiment (1929–1930)
- Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath[4]
- Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Indian Empire[5]
- Companion of the Order of the Star of India[6]
- Distinguished Service Order[7]
- Officer of the Order of the British Empire
- Mentioned in Despatches (3)[7][8][9]
- Chief Commander of the Legion of Merit (USA)[10]
- Virtuti Militari (Poland)[11]
- Order of the Star of Nepal (Nepal)[12]
- Knight Grand Cross of Order of St. Olav (Norway)[13]
- Military Cross (Czechoslovakia)[14]
- Croix de guerre (France)[15]
- Colonel Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers (April 1941)[17]
- Colonel 1st Battalion 4th Bombay Grenadiers (July 1939)[18]
- Colonel 4th Bombay Grenadiers (May 1944)[19]
- Colonel 1st Punjab Regiment (1947)[16]
In June 1943, he was once again appointed Commander-in-Chief, India, where his support through the organisation of supply, maintenance and training for General William Slim's Fourteenth Army played an important role in its success. He served as Commander-in-Chief, India, until the Partition in 1947, when he assumed the role of Supreme Commander of all British forces in India and Pakistan until late 1948.
First World War[edit]
Auchinleck saw active service in the First World War and was deployed with his regiment to defend the Suez Canal: in February 1915 he was in action against the Turks at Ismaïlia.[21] His regiment moved into Aden to counter the Turkish threat there in July 1915.[21] The 6th Indian Division, of which the 62nd Punjabis were a part, was landed at Basra on 31 December 1915 for the Mesopotamian campaign.[21] In July 1916 Auchinleck was promoted acting major and made second in command of his battalion.[28] He took part in a series of fruitless attacks on the Turks at the Battle of Hanna in January 1916 and was one of the few British officers in his regiment to survive these actions.[21]
He became acting commanding officer of his battalion in February 1917 and led his regiment at the Second Battle of Kut in February 1917 and the Fall of Baghdad in March 1917.[21] Having been mentioned in despatches and having received the Distinguished Service Order in 1917 for his service in Mesopotamia,[7] he was promoted to the substantive rank of major on 21 January 1918,[29] to temporary lieutenant-colonel on 23 May 1919[30] and to brevet lieutenant-colonel on 15 November 1919 for his "distinguished service in Southern and Central Kurdistan" on the recommendation of the Commander-in-Chief of the Mesopotamia Expeditionary Force.[31]
Between the world wars[edit]
Auchinleck attended the Staff College, Quetta, between 1920 and 1921.[7] As a lieutenant colonel, he outranked most of his fellow students and even some members of the staff. Despite performing well there – passing the course and being among the top ten students – he was critical of many aspects of the college, which he believed to be too theoretical and with little emphasis being placed on matters such as supply and administration, both of which he thought had been mishandled in the campaign in Mesopotamia.[32] He married Jessie Stewart in 1921. Jessie had been born in 1900 in Tacoma, Washington, to Alexander Stewart, head of the Blue Funnel Line that plied the west coast of the United States. When he died about 1919, their mother took her, her twin brother Alan and her younger brother Hepburne back to Bun Rannoch, the family estate at Innerhadden in Perthshire. Holidaying at Grasse on the French Riviera, Auchinleck, who was on leave from India at the time, met Jessie on the tennis courts. She was a high-spirited, blue-eyed beauty. Things moved quickly, and they were married within five months. Sixteen years younger than Auchinleck, Jessie became known as 'the little American girl' in India, but adapted readily to life there.[33] They had no children.[34]
Auchinleck became temporary Deputy Assistant Quartermaster-General at Army Headquarters in February 1923 and then second-in-command of his regiment, which in the 1923 reorganisation of the Indian Army had become the 1st Punjab Regiment, in September 1925.[7] He attended the Imperial Defence College in 1927 and, having been promoted to the permanent rank of lieutenant-colonel on 21 January 1929[35] he was appointed to command his regiment.[7] Promoted to full colonel on 1 February 1930 with seniority from 15 November 1923,[36] he became an instructor at the Staff College, Quetta in February 1930[37] where he remained until April 1933.[38]
He was promoted to temporary brigadier on 1 July 1933[39] and given command of the Peshawar Brigade, which was active in the pacification of the adjacent tribal areas during the Mohmand and Bajaur Operations between July and October 1933: during his period of command he was mentioned in despatches.[8] He led a second punitive expedition during the Second Mohmand Campaign in August 1935 for which he was again mentioned in despatches, promoted to major-general on 30 November 1935[40] and appointed a Companion of the Order of the Star of India on 8 May 1936.[6]
On leaving his brigade command in April 1936, Auchinleck was on the unemployed list (on half pay)[41] until September 1936 when he was appointed Deputy Chief of the General Staff and Director of Staff Duties in Delhi.[42] He was then appointed to command the Meerut District in India in July 1938.[43] In 1938 Auchinleck was appointed to chair a committee to consider the modernisation, composition and re-equipment of the British Indian Army: the committee's recommendations formed the basis of the 1939 Chatfield Report which outlined the transformation of the Indian Army – it grew from 183,000 in 1939 to over 2,250,000 men by the end of the war.[44]