Brehon B. Somervell

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Ministers Robert P. Patterson and Somervell, 1945

Brehon B. Somervell , also Brehon Burke "Bill" Somervell , (born May 9, 1892 in Little Rock , Arkansas , † February 13, 1955 in Ocala , Florida ) was an American general and commanding general of the Army Service Forces during the Second world war .

biography

Until 1941

Somervell was the only son of a doctor; he grew up in Arkansas. He graduated from the US Military Academy in West Point from 1910 . He was then used as a lieutenant in the United States Army Corps of Engineers . He studied 1916/17 at the US Army Engineer School at Fort Leonard Wood , Missouri . During the First World War he served from July 1917 to May 1919 as a temporary captain ( captain ), major and lieutenant colonel (1918) in the US engineering regiment and then in the 89th division , i.e. in the logistics area, in France. In 1920 he was now installed as a major in the chief engineer's office in Washington DC. He studied again, now at Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth .
After 1922 he was entrusted with various engineering tasks interrupted by further studies at the US Army War College in Carlisle , Pennsylvania .

From 1936 to 1940, Somervell was a lieutenant colonel in charge of construction project management in New York City and was responsible for major measures, including the construction of LaGuardia Airport .
As head of the construction department of the Quartermaster Corps , as Brigadier General in 1941 he took over the construction of camps for conscripts and other military facilities. 485,000 workers and employees were under his command for around 700 projects. The most famous project from 1941 onwards was the construction of the Pentagon .

The USA at war

From February 1942 to December 1945 Somervell commanded the US Army Service Forces of Supply (ASF), the logistical supply unit of the United States Army , which existed from 1942 to 1946 as temporary major general and lieutenant general (1942) and as deputy chief of staff . The Manhattan project to develop and build an atomic bomb was also in his area of ​​command .
On March 9, 1945 he was promoted to general, the only four-star general in World War II who did not command any armed forces overseas.

After the war

Somervell retired in 1946. He was president of a Pittsburgh- based global corporation from 1946 to 1955 .

He had been married since 1919 and had three daughters. After the death (1942) of his first wife, he remarried in 1943. After his retirement he lived in Ocala, Florida. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery .

Honors (selection)

Web links

Commons : Brehon B. Somervell  - collection of images, videos and audio files

swell

  • R. Manning Ancell, Christine Miller: The Biographical Dictionary of World War II Generals and Flag Officers . The US Armed Forces. Westport, Connecticut, ISBN 0-313-29546-8 .
  • Lenore Fine, Jesse A. Remington: The Corps of Engineers: Construction in the United States. United States Army Center of Military History, Washington DC 1972.
  • John Kennedy Ohl: Supplying the Troops: General Somervell and American Logistics in World War II . Northern Illinois Press 1994, ISBN 0-87580-185-4 .