Sir John French Part 1

Sir John French.

by Cecil Chisholm.

INTRODUCTION

BY FIELD-MARSHAL SIR EVELYN WOOD, V.C.

I regard John Denton French as the man who for the last twelve years has been the driving force of tactical instruction in the British Army. He made use of all the best ideas of the Generals who preceded him in the Aldershot Command, and he was, I think, instrumental in causing the appointment of Horace Smith-Dorrien and Douglas Haig to succeed in turn to that nursery of soldiers.

How sound his judgment has proved to be may be discovered from the dispatches--carefully worded--in which he describes how Smith-Dorrien conducted the most successful retreat since that of Sir John Moore to Corunna, 1808-9, and how Douglas Haig carried his Army across the Aisne river in the face of the enemy's fire opposition.

From 1884-5, when as a Squadron Officer he showed marked determination in the abortive expedition for the relief of Gordon, until 1899-1902 in South Africa, he has been the foremost man to inculcate the "Cavalry Spirit," and unlike many advocates of that spirit, he has never become a slave to the idea. He has been at pains to teach the Cavalry soldier that when he can no longer fight to the best advantage in the saddle, he is to get off his horse and fight on foot. This is a marked feature of his military genius.

He is intensely practical; and he is possessed of great moral and physical courage which never fail to a.s.sert themselves in the face of the most difficult situations. They were conspicuously shown during the Boer War when, with an extraordinary determination, he formed up his men on their tired and exhausted horses and advanced in extended order, galloping through the Boers in position, and reaching Kimberley as the result of his heroic determination.

When, in the earlier part of this War, things were not going well, I was asked to give my opinion of our chances of success. I said that I did not think that our prospects were then bright, but although many men had gone "Hands up" before John French, he would never put up his own, whatever happened.

EVELYN WOOD, F.-M.

_November 10_, 1914.

PREFACE

In writing this biography of Field-Marshal Sir John French I have been deeply indebted to many of his personal friends for helping me with first-hand impressions of our General in the Field. A number of military writers have been almost equally helpful. Among those to whom I owe sincere thanks for personal a.s.sistance are Lady French, Mr.

J.R.L. French, Mrs. Despard, Field-Marshal Earl Roberts, Field-Marshal Sir Evelyn Wood, General Bewicke Copley, Colonel E.K. Aylener, Colonel Kendal Coghill, Colonel Charles E. Warde, M.P., the Editor of the _Army and Navy Gazette_, Mr. Percy J. King, the Editor of the _Regiment_, Mr. Frederick W. Carter, Mr. Leonard Crocombe and Mr. S.R.

Littlewood, who put valuable material at my disposal.

I shall be very grateful for any further biographical particulars, stories, or corrections for incorporation in subsequent editions: all communications should be addressed to me, care of my publishers.

C.C.

SIR JOHN FRENCH

CHAPTER I

EARLY DAYS

A Kentish Celt--A Rebellious Boy--Four Years in the Navy--With the 19th Hussars--"Captain X Trees"--A Studious Subaltern--Chafing at Home--The First Opportunity.

"If I don't end my days as a Field-Marshal it will not be for want of trying, and--well, I'm jolly well going to do it." In these words, uttered many years ago to a group of brother officers in the mess room of the 19th Hussars, Sir John French quite unconsciously epitomised his own character in a way no biographer can hope to equal. The conversation had turned upon luck, a word that curiously enough was later to be so intimately a.s.sociated with French's name. One man had stoutly proclaimed that all promotion was a matter of luck, and French had claimed that only work and ability really counted in the end. Yet "French's luck" has become almost a service proverb--for those who have not closely studied his career. Luck is frequently a word used to explain our own failure and another man's success.

Not that success and John French could ever have been strangers. There are some happy natures whose destiny is never in doubt, Providence having apparently planned it half a century ahead. Sir John French is a striking instance of this. Destiny never had any doubt about the man. He was born to be a fighter. On his father's side he comes of the famous old Galway family of which Lord de Freyne, of French Park, Co.

Roscommon, is now the head. By tradition the Frenches are a naval family, although there have been famous soldiers as well as famous sailors amongst its members. There was, for instance, the John French who fought in the army of King William, leading a troop of the Enniskillen Dragoons at Aughrim in 1689.

Sir John French is himself the son of a sailor, Commander J.T.W.

French, who on retiring from the Navy settled down on the beautiful little Kentish estate of Ripplevale, near Walmer. Here John Denton Pinkstone French was born on September 28, 1852, in the same year as his future colleague, General Joffre. His mother, a Miss Eccles, was the daughter of a Scotch family resident near Glasgow.

[Page Heading: PLAYING WITH SOLDIERS]

Of the boy's home life at Ripplevale very little is known. He was the sixth child and the only son of the family. Both his parents dying while he was quite young, he was brought up under the care of his sisters. But there is no reason to suppose that he was therefore spoilt; for one of these ladies shared in a remarkable degree the qualities of energy and determination which were to distinguish her brother. Young French's earliest education was largely guided by this gifted sister, who is now so well known in another field of warfare as Mrs. Despard.

It is extremely difficult to say what manner of boy the future Field-Marshal was. Only one fact emerges clearly. He was high-spirited and full of mischief. Everything that he did was done with the greatest enthusiasm, and already there were signs that he possessed an unusually strong will.

Inevitably games quickly took possession of his imagination. Very soon the war game had first place in his affections. He was perpetually playing with soldiers--a fascinating hobby which intrigued the curious mind of the rather silent child. French, in fact, was a very normal and healthy boy, with just a touch of thoughtfulness to mark him off from his fellows.

He was not, however, to enjoy the freedom of home life for very long.

At an early age he was sent to a preparatory school at Harrow, which he left for Eastman's Naval College at Portsmouth. After the necessary "cramming" he pa.s.sed the entrance examination to the Navy at the age of thirteen. In the following year (1866) he joined the _Britannia_ as a cadet. Four years of strenuous naval work followed. But like another Field-Marshal-to-be, Sir Evelyn Wood, the boy was not apparently enamoured of the sea. As a result he decided to leave that branch of the service.

That action is typical of the man. He is ruthless with himself as well as with others. If the Navy were not to give scope for his ambition, then he must quit the Navy. Already, no doubt, his life-long hero, Napoleon, was kindling the young man's imagination. But the English Navy of those days gave little encouragement to the Napoleonic point of view. It was bound up with the sternest discipline and much red tape. If rumour speaks true young French was irritated by the almost despotic powers then possessed by certain naval officers. So he boldly decided at the age of eighteen to end one career and commence another.

To enter the sister service he had to stoop to what is dubbed the "back-door," in other words a commission in the militia. It seems rather remarkable that one of our most brilliant officers should have had this difficulty to face. Incidentally it is a curious sidelight on the system of compet.i.tive examinations. But there are several facts to remember. Sir John French's genius developed slowly. One does not figure him as ready, like Kitchener, at twenty-one, with a complete map of his career. In these days he was probably more interested in hunting than in soldiering. The man who is now proverbial for his devotion to the study of tactics was then very little of a book-worm.

Indeed he seems to have shown no special intellectual or practical abilities until much later in life.

[Page Heading: THE "DUMPIES"]

In 1874 he was gazetted to the 8th Hussars, being transferred three weeks later to the 19th. At that time the 19th Hussars was scarcely a crack regiment. With two other regiments raised after the Indian mutiny it was nicknamed the "Dumpies," owing to the standard of height being lowered, and it had yet to earn the reputation which Barrow and French secured it. About John French the subaltern, as about John French the midshipman, history is silent. No fabulous legends have acc.u.mulated about him. Presumably the short, firmly-built young officer was regarded as normal and entirely _de rigeur_ in his sporting propensities.

The subaltern of the 'eighties took himself much less seriously than his successor of today. The eternal drill and the occasional manoeuvres were conducted on well-worn and almost automatic principles. As a result, the younger officers found hunting and polo decidedly better sport. Few or none of them were military enthusiasts; and study did not enter largely into their programme. It entered into French's--but only in stray hours, often s.n.a.t.c.hed by early rising, before the day's work--or sport--began.

Despite constant rumours to the contrary, there can be no question that French was a most spirited young officer and a thorough sportsman. He at once earned for himself the sobriquet of "Capt. X Trees," as a result of his being a "retired naval man." To this day among the very few remaining brother officers of his youth, he is still greeted as "Trees."

As might be expected, French showed no desire to pose as "the gla.s.s of fashion or the mould of form." He never attempted to cultivate the graces of the _beau sabreur_. His short square figure did not look well on horseback and probably never will. But he was admitted to be a capable horseman and to have "good hands." Although not keen on polo he was very fond of steeplechasing. Of his love for that sport there is ample proof in the fact that he trained and rode his own steeplechasers.

[Page Heading: A DIFFICULT TEAM]

One of his best horses was a mare called "Mrs. Gamp," which he lent on one occasion to a brother subaltern--now Colonel Charles E. Warde, M.P. for Mid-Kent. Riding with his own spurs on French's mare, Colonel Warde was one of three out of a field of four hundred to live through a Warde Union run which was responsible for the death of six hunters before the day was over.

Young French also became a very good whip. Along with Colonel H.M.A.

Warde--now the Chief Constable of Kent--he had a thrilling adventure in coach driving. When the regiment first started a coach it was necessary to bring it from Dublin to the Curragh. The two subalterns, neither of whom had ever driven four horses before, commandeered four chargers belonging to brother officers. One of the animals was a notorious kicker. But they took them up to Dublin and drove the coach twenty-eight miles down to the Curragh next day, arriving there alive and with no broken harness!

At that time French differed from his fellow officers probably rather in degree than in temperament. Although a very keen sportsman he did not put sport first. Colonel C.E. Warde, one of his closest friends, gives the following description of the man. "Although he never attempted to go to the Staff College he was continually studying military works, and often, when his brother subalterns were at polo or other afternoon amus.e.m.e.nts, he would remain in his room reading Von Schmidt, Jomini, or other books on strategy. I recollect once travelling by rail with him in our subaltern days, when after observing the country for some time, he broke out: 'There is where I should put my artillery.' 'There is where I should put my cavalry' and so on to the journey's end."

In spite of these evidences of a soldier's eye for country, there is nothing to show that French had developed any abnormal devotion for his work. He was interested but not absorbed. In 1880 a captaincy and his marriage probably did something to make him take his career more seriously. His wife, Lady French, was a daughter of Mr. R.W.

Selby-Lowndes, of Bletchley, Bucks. They have two sons and a daughter.

A few months after his marriage he accepted an adjutancy in the Northumberland Yeomanry. For four uneventful years he was stationed at Newcastle, where the work was monotonous and the opportunities almost _nil_.

[Page Heading: THE WAITING GAME]