General Henry Seymour Rawlinson, 1st Baron Rawlinson, (20 February 1864 – 28 March 1925), known as Sir Henry Rawlinson, 2nd Baronet between 1895 and 1919, was a senior British Army officer in the First World War who commanded the Fourth Army of the British Expeditionary Force at the battles of the Somme (1916) and Amiens (1918) as well as the breaking of the Hindenburg Line (1918). He also commanded the Indian Army from 1920 until his sudden death in 1925.
Early life Rawlinson was born at Trent Manor in Dorset on 20 February 1864. His father, Sir Henry Rawlinson, 1st Baronet, was an Army officer, and a renowned Middle East scholar who is generally recognised as the father of Assyriology. His mother was Louisa Caroline Harcourt Seymour (1828-1889). He received his early formal education at Eton College.L. G. Pine, The New Extinct Peerage 1884-1971: Containing Extinct, Abeyant, Dormant and Suspended Peerages With Genealogies and Arms (London, U.K.: Heraldry Today, 1972), page 227. Hereinafter cited as The New Extinct Peerage.
Early military career After passing out from the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, Rawlinson entered the British Army as a lieutenant in the King's Royal Rifle Corps in India on 6 February 1884. His father arranged for him to serve on the staff of a friend, General Sir Frederick Roberts, the Commander-in-Chief, India. Rawlinson and the Roberts family remained close friends throughout his life. When Roberts died in November 1914, Rawlinson wrote, "I feel as if I have lost my second father." His first military experience was serving in Burma in 1886 at the end of the Third Anglo-Burmese War.Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives
Colonial service In October 1889, Rawlinson's mother died and he returned to Britain. He transferred to the Coldstream Guards, and was promoted to captain, dated 4 November 1891. He attended the Staff College, Camberley, gaining his psc, from 1892 to 1893, which brought him into contact with Henry Wilson, Aylmer Haldane, Thomas Snow, Alexander Hamilton-Gordon, Hubert Hamilton and Frederick Gordon, all of whom would rise to high rank in the First World War, Wilson in particular going on to become a field marshal. While there he "profited greatly from the teaching skills and engaging personality of the military historian G. F. R. Henderson".
On 18 November 1895 he succeeded Frederick Robb, later a major general, as a brigade major in Aldershot, Hampshire. He then served on Major General Herbert Kitchener's staff during the advance on Omdurman in Sudan in 1898, and was promoted to major on 25 January 1899 and to brevet lieutenant colonel on 26 January 1899.
Rawlinson served with distinction in a field command in the Second Boer War from 1899 to 1902, being made an assistant adjutant general in March 1900, earning promotion to the local rank of colonel on 6 May 1901. He was in Western Transvaal during early 1902, and led a column taking part in the Battle of Rooiwal, the last battle of the war (11 April 1902).
Following the end of hostilities in South Africa in June 1902, he returned to the United Kingdom together with Lord Kitchener on board the SS Orotava, which arrived in Southampton on 12 July. In a despatch dated 23 June 1902, Lord Kitchener wrote of Rawlinson that he "possesses the qualities of Staff Officer and Column Commander in the field. His characteristics will always ensure him a front place in whatever he sets his mind to." For his service in the war, Rawlinson was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath in the April 1901 South Africa Honours list (the award was dated to 29 November 1900), and he received the actual decoration after his return home, from Edward VII at Buckingham Palace on 24 October 1902.
Rawlinson had received the brevet rank of colonel in the 1902 Coronation Honours, published on 26 June, was promoted to the substantive rank of colonel on 1 April 1903, and named as commandant of the Staff College, Camberley in December 1903, taking over from Colonel Herbert Miles, who was described by one biographer as "insufficiently practical".
Staff College Rawlinson was the first of three reforming commandants who transformed the Staff College into a real war school. The curriculum was modernised and updated, the teaching given a new sense of purpose and instructors became 'directing staff' rather than 'professors', emphasising practicality. Reade Godwin-Austen, historian of the college, wrote:
Historian Brian Bond wrote:
He remained commandant until January 1907 when he was placed on half-pay.
On 1 March 1907 he succeeded Colonel Edwin Alderson as general officer commanding (GOC) of the 2nd Infantry Brigade, then stationed at Aldershot, and was promoted to temporary brigadier general (although he only held the rank while he held this appointment, as brigadier general, as it then was, was not then a substantive rank.) Having been promoted to substantive major general on 10 May 1909, and after giving up command of the 2nd Brigade, he became GOC of the 3rd Division in June 1910, in succession to Major General William Franklyn.
In the Army Manoeuvres of 1912, which took place in June, he showed an appreciation of the use of artillery, The Times correspondent noting approvingly:
The historians Robin Prior and Trevor Wilson praise Rawlinson's foresight in considering combining infantry with the fire-power of machine-guns and artillery.Robin Prior & Trevor Wilson, Command on the Western Front: The Military Career of Sir Henry Rawlinson 1914–1918 (Barnsley, Pen & Sword, 2004), p. 10. After handing over the division to his successor, Major General Hubert Hamilton (who would later become the first British divisional commander killed in the war which had not yet been declared), in May 1914 Rawlinson went on leave, returning on the outbreak of war to briefly serve as director of recruiting at the War Office.
First World War Western Front In September 1914, just weeks after the British entry into World War I, Rawlinson was appointed temporarily as GOC of the 4th Division of the British Expeditionary Force in France, in the place of Major General Thomas Snow, who had been injured when his horse fell on him. "This gave him a first, albeit brief, glimpse of stalemated trench warfare as it had developed on the Aisne. That appointment also proved short-lived".
Promoted to temporary lieutenant general on 4 October 1914, he then took command of the IV Corps.
In late September, the Belgian government formally requested British military assistance in defending Antwerp. IV Corps, acting under orders from the Cabinet, was chosen to reinforce the city. Rawlinson arrived in Antwerp on 6 October. It was soon obvious that the combined British, Belgian, and French forces were too weak to hold the city, and Kitchener decided on an evacuation two days later.
IV Corps and the remnants of the Belgian Army successfully re-joined Allied forces in Western Belgium, with the Cabinet returning Rawlinson's corps to the BEF, commanded by Field Marshal Sir John French.
IV Corps marched into Ypres on the night of 13–14 October, where the BEF, advancing northwards, was preparing to meet the German Army. Located at the centre of the British line, IV Corps met the main thrust of the German attacks between 18 and 27 October and suffered heavy casualties.
On 28 October, IV Corps was put under the temporary command of Lieutenant General Sir Douglas Haig, GOC I Corps, while Rawlinson went to England to oversee the preparation of the 8th Division, which would form part of his corps. When he returned in November the German attacks on Ypres had died down.
Rawlinson wrote to the Conservative politician Edward Stanley, 17th Earl of Derby (24 December 1914) forecasting that the Allies would win a war of attrition but it was unclear whether this would take one, two or three years.Jeffery 2006, p139
In 1915, IV Corps formed part of the First Army of the BEF, commanded by Haig, now a full general. At the Battle of Neuve Chapelle (10–12 March 1915), he massed 340 guns. The weight of this bombardment on a comparatively narrow front enabled the attackers to secure the village and of the German front line. The arrival of German reinforcements prevented further advance. Rawlinson concluded that an enemy's line of trenches could be broken 'with suitable artillery preparation' combined with secrecy.Robin Prior & Trevor Wilson, Command on the Western Front: the Military Career of Sir Henry Rawlinson 1914–1918 (Pen & Sword Books, Barnsley, 2004), p. 56. He also drew a lesson, that trench warfare called for limited advances: 'What I want to do now is what I call "Bite & Hold" – bite off a piece of the enemy's line like Neuve Chapelle & hold it against all counter-attacks...there ought to be no difficulty in holding against the enemy's counterattacks & inflicting on him at least twice the loss that we have suffered in making the bite'.
At the end of 1915, Rawlinson was considered for command of the First Army, in succession to Haig, who succeeded French as commander-in-chief of the BEF, but the command was instead given to General Sir Charles Monro. He was promoted to temporary general on 22 December 1915.
Promoted to the substantive rank of lieutenant general "for distinguished service in the Field" on 1 January 1916, Rawlinson assumed command of the new Fourth Army on 24 January 1916.Prior & Wilson 2003, p. 137. The Army would play a major role in the planned Allied offensive on the Somme. He wrote in his diary:
The offensive was originally conceived as a joint Anglo-French offensive but owing to the demands of the Battle of Verdun, French participation was reduced from one half to one third of the total number of troops engaged, leaving the British, and especially Rawlinson's inexperienced army, to bear the brunt of the offensive. On the eve of the offensive, he "showed an attitude of absolute confidence". To his diary he confided some uncertainties: "What the actual results will be no one can say but I feel pretty confident of success myself though only after heavy fighting. That the bosh [sic] will break and that a debacle will supervene I do not believe..." He was not satisfied that the wire was well cut and enemy trenches sufficiently "knocked about".Rodney Atwood, 'Rawlinson on the Somme, 'Centenary Perspectives on the Great War: Society for Army Historical Research Commemorative Special Publication on the First World War p. 74.
Battle of the Somme
The Somme offensive was launched on 1 July 1916. In English writing, attention has been paid to the first day, a British disaster for three of the five attacking corps, although the battle lasted 141 days against two German armies. On 1 July, British forces were repulsed by the Germans along most of the front north of the Albert–Bapaume road, suffering 57,000 casualties. The worst defeats were in front of Pozières and Thiepval. By the afternoon Rawlinson was aware of much of the disaster but not of the casualties. By 3 July he knew 8,000 prisoners had been taken.Atwood, 'Rawlinson on the Somme', p. 76. On the Allied right, the British and French had more success. Here they had a better fire plan but limited objectives as a flank guard to a main advance further north. This was more in keeping with Rawlinson's idea of "bite and hold". There is no documentary evidence that the corps commander on the right (southern) British flank, Lieutenant General Walter Congreve, commanding XIII Corps, telephoned Rawlinson to ask permission to advance beyond his set objectives or to send in cavalry.Atwood, 'Rawlinson on the Somme', p.91note111.