Francis Grenfell, 1st Baron Grenfell

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Francis Grenfell, 1st Baron Grenfell from Celebrities of the Army , London 1900
Caricature of Grenfell in the uniform of Sirdar as Men of the Day in Vanity Fair , 1889

Francis Wallace Grenfell, 1st Baron Grenfell , GCB , GCMG , PC (born April 29, 1841 - January 27, 1925 in Swansea ) was a British field marshal , commander in chief of the Egyptian army and governor of Malta . He fought in various British colonial wars.

Life

Francis Grenfell was born the fourth son of a landowner in Maesteg House , Swansea . He was trained in Milton Abbas, Dorset. On August 5, 1859, Grenfell joined the British Army as a Second Lieutenant with the 60th Rifles . On July 16, 1863 he was promoted to second lieutenant and on October 21, 1871 to captain.

In 1874 Grenfell became aide-de-camp of Sir Arthur Cunynghame, who also served in the 60th Rifles when he became commander in chief of the Cape Colony . There he served in the Xhosa War . For this he was promoted to Brevet Major on November 4, 1878 . In 1879 he took part as a staff officer in the Zulu War and the Battle of Ulundi . He returned to England and was promoted to Brevet Lieutenant Colonel on November 29, 1879. In 1881 he took part again as a staff officer in the First Boer War.

In the Anglo-Egyptian War in 1882 , to put down the Urabi uprising and the occupation of Egypt was Grenfell Staff Officer General Wolseley . The Egyptian army was crushed in the battle of Tel-el-Kebir . It was then rebuilt under the command of a British commander in chief , the Sirdar . After the rebellion was put down, Grenfell remained in Egypt as the deputy of the first Sirdar, Evelyn Wood . In April 1885 he succeeded Wood in the role of Sirdar. During this time he prepared the establishment of the Egyptian army, which was later victorious under Lord Kitchener in the suppression of the Mahdi uprising in Sudan . In 1885 he was named Companion of the Order of the Bath and knighted as Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath.

In June 1889, a Mahdist army attacked Wadi Halfa , the southernmost base of the Anglo-Egyptian troops. Grenfell himself took command on the Sudanese border and concentrated his troops at Toski . On August 3, he was able to destroy the Mahdist forces at the Battle of Toski . Grenfell was named major general for the victory and successful rebuilding of the Egyptian army on August 3, 1889 .

In 1892 Grenfell was recalled as Sirdar after Abbas II became the new Khedive of Egypt, who was hostile to him. After his return to Great Britain , he was awarded the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George in 1892 and subsequently first deputy inspector general of the reserve and volunteer associations and then in 1884 inspector general himself.

In 1897 Grenfell returned to Egypt and took command of the British troops in the Anglo-Egyptian Nile Expeditionary Force in the campaign to suppress the Mahdi rebellion. Lieutenant General Grenfell was subordinate to Major General Kitchener, who was younger in rank . As the sirdar of the Egyptian army, he was in command of the united British-Egyptian army. Grenfell placed his ambitions behind those of the Sirdar for political reasons. After winning the Battle of Omdurman , he was awarded the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath.

From 1899 to 1903 Grenfell was Governor and Commander-in-Chief of Malta . In 1902 he was raised to hereditary peer as Baron Grenfell , of Kilvey in the County of Glamorgan . Two years later he was promoted to commanding general of the newly formed IV Army Corps and full general . In May 1904 he took over the post of Commander in Chief in Ireland and Commanding General of the III. Army Corps. In this capacity he was promoted to field marshal on the occasion of his retirement from active service in 1908 .

Baron Grenfell died in 1925 at the age of 83.

family

In his first marriage he had married Evelyn Wood, daughter of General Robert Blucher Wood in 1887. He had three children with her:

After his first wife died in 1899, he married Margaret Aline Majendie, daughter of the House of Commons Lewis Majendie, in 1903. The marriage remained childless.

Web links

Commons : Francis Grenfell, 1st Baron Grenfell  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ TA Heathcote: The British Field Marshals 1763-1997 Leo Cooper, 1999 p. 151 f.
  2. ↑ RJM Pugh: Wingate Pasha: The Life of General Sir Francis Reginald Wingate 1861 - 1953 PEN & SWORD MILITARY, 2011 p. 36
predecessor Office successor
Evelyn Wood Sirdar of the Egyptian Army
1885-1892 		Horatio Herbert Kitchener
James Lyon Fremantle Governor of Malta
1899–1903 		Charles Mansfield Clarke
Arthur, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn Commander in Chief Ireland
1904–1908 		Neville Lyttelton
New title created Baron Grenfell
1902-1925 		Pascoe Grenfell
personal data
SURNAME Grenfell, Francis, 1st Baron Grenfell
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Grenfell, Francis Wallace
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British Field Marshal and Governor of Malta
DATE OF BIRTH April 29, 1841
DATE OF DEATH January 27, 1925
Place of death Swansea