Frederick E. Morgan
Sir Frederick Morgan | |
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First World War :
Second World War :
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Awards | Croix de guerre (France) |
Other work | United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration Controller of Atomic Energy Controller of Atomic Weapons |
A graduate of the
Shortly before the outbreak of the
After the war, Morgan served as Chief of Operations for the
Early life
Frederick Morgan was born in
Morgan was commissioned as a
First World War
Following the outbreak of the
Morgan became a staff captain in February 1916,[12] and was promoted to the temporary rank of captain in May 1916.[13] The Lahore divisional artillery was broken up in mid-1917 and Morgan, promoted to captain on 18 July 1917,[14][1] was posted to the 42nd (East Lancashire) Division as a staff captain.[10][15] On 15 August 1917, he married Marjorie Cecile Whaite, the daughter of Colonel Thomas du Bédat Whaite of the Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC).[3] The couple had met on board the Rewa en route to India in 1914.[16] Their marriage produced two daughters and a son.[3]
During the Hundred Days Offensive which ultimately led to the armistice with Germany on 11 November 1918, he served as brigade major of the 42nd Divisional Artillery.[10] During the war Morgan was twice mentioned in dispatches, on 15 May 1917,[17] and again on 5 July 1919.[18][1][2]
Of the end of the war and its aftermath Morgan later wrote:
So to England, home and a new start. No question of returning home in triumph as a conquering hero. There was nothing to show outwardly for those four years in the shadows, years of inner tension for which no relief could be found since it was impossible to describe the fullness of one's sensations to any who had not shared them. Unlike the later occasion when all men, women and even children smelt the whiff of hell, in 1919 there were few among those whose task had been to keep the home fires burning who could, even with the utmost endeavour, comprehend what had happened to those of us who came back, bent or broken, aged beyond our years.
So one had to screw the lid down on it all and strive to deaden the thought of the past by immersing oneself in present soil. This drug lay plentifully at hand, specially to the hands of those of us who must reshape the shattered army in this new world that had had more than enough of armies.[19]
Between the wars
In 1919, Morgan volunteered for a six-year tour of India, where he would ultimately spend much time during the interwar period, and joined the 118th Field Battery, 26th Field Brigade, at Deepcut, where it was forming and training for service in the subcontinent.[20] Later that year the brigade moved to its new station at Jhansi. After three years Morgan was posted to Attock, where he commanded the Divisional Ammunition Column. In 1924 he accepted a temporary staff posting as Deputy Assistant Adjutant-General (DAAG) of Major-General Herbert Uniacke's 1st (Peshawar) Division at Murree. This was followed in 1925 by a year's secondment to the headquarters of Lieutenant-General Sir Claud Jacob's Northern Command, where Morgan helped plan and direct large-scale manoeuvres.[21]
Morgan returned to England in 1926, and assumed command of the 22nd Heavy Battery. Equipped with a mixture of
Returning to England in 1934, Morgan assumed command of the 4th Anti-Aircraft Battery, which was deployed to Malta during the diplomatic crisis that accompanied the Italian invasion of Abyssinia in 1935.[26] He then returned to England and served in the War Office from 1936 to 1938.[2] Here he became increasingly disturbed at the lack of urgency that the British government displayed in the face of a war that Morgan and his fellow staff officers felt was inevitable and imminent. On 28 May 1938 he was promoted to colonel (with seniority backdated to 1 January 1934)[27][1] and became GSO1 of the 3rd Infantry Division, in which Brigadier Bernard Montgomery commanded the 8th Infantry Brigade.[3][2]
Second World War
Battle of France and service in the UK
I had won notable victories on paper and the map with the aid of greaseproof pencils and a typewriter. In the course of this very campaign, if one may dignify the disaster thus, I had seen French generals create imaginary "masses of manoeuvre" with strokes of the crayon and dispose of hostile concentrations, that unhappily were on the ground as well as on the map, with sweeps of the eraser. Who was I to criticise them, hero as I was of a hundred "Chinagraph wars" of make-believe?
Frederick Morgan[28]
On 8 August 1939, just a few weeks before the outbreak of the Second World War, Morgan was promoted to the temporary rank of brigadier[29][1] and assumed command of the 1st Support Group of Major-General Roger Evans's 1st Armoured Division.[3] When the 1st Support Group was shipped to France shortly after the German invasion of France in mid-May 1940 it had already been stripped of its two field artillery regiments and two infantry battalions. As a result, Morgan's command included only a force of Royal Engineers and a Territorial Army (TA) battalion of the Royal Welch Fusiliers, which was in the process of converting to an anti-aircraft/anti-tank regiment and armed only with anti-tank guns.[30] His group was, therefore, in no position to fulfil its normal role supporting the division's armoured brigades and so was sent to reinforce the 51st (Highland) Infantry Division south of the River Somme. During a confused retreat most of the 1st Support Group was captured along with the 51st Division at Saint-Valery-en-Caux but the remainder, including Morgan, got away and were evacuated to England.[31]
The 1st Armoured Division was subsequently reformed, and became a mobile reserve in south eastern England. It was tasked with counter-attacking an invading German army, and Morgan's 1st Support Group was given two Canadian infantry battalions for this purpose. On 4 November 1940 Morgan was appointed Brigadier General Staff (BGS) at II Corps, based in Norfolk. Morgan was not there long, however, as on 28 February 1941 he was promoted to the acting rank of major-general[32] and succeeded Major-General Charles Allfrey in command of the Devon and Cornwall County Division, a static formation created for coastal defence, lacking artillery, engineers and divisional troops. The division was serving in South West England in Devon and Cornwall under Lieutenant-General Harold Franklyn's VIII Corps. He was with the division for eight months before handing over to Major-General Godwin Michelmore on 30 October and succeeding Major-General William Morgan in command of the 55th (West Lancashire) Infantry Division, a first-line TA formation serving in Gloucestershire in Southern Command. The division, which moved to North Yorkshire under Northern Command in mid-December, was placed on the Lower Establishment the following month, losing much of its artillery, engineers and divisional troops and receiving a low priority for modern equipment.[31] On 28 February, a year after being made an acting major-general, Morgan's rank of major-general was made temporary.[33][1]
He was not to remain with the division for long, however, as on 14 May Morgan handed over command of the 55th Division to Major-General Hugh Hibbert and was promoted to the acting rank of lieutenant general[34] and took command of I Corps District from Lieutenant-General Henry Willcox, which had responsibility for the defence of Lincolnshire and the East Riding of Yorkshire. In October of that year his headquarters became a mobile formation, was redesignated I Corps and placed under his American superior, Lieutenant General Dwight D. Eisenhower. On 12 November Morgan's permanent rank was advanced from colonel to major-general (with seniority backdating to 13 November 1941).[35] Morgan's I Corps headquarters was later designated Force 125 and was given command of Walter Clutterbuck's 1st and John Hawkesworth's 4th Divisions, and the task of dealing with a German thrust through Spain to Gibraltar.[31]
This operation proved unnecessary, and Morgan's two divisions were sent to North Africa, while he was directed to plan the invasion of
COSSAC
At the Casablanca Conference in January 1943, the Combined Chiefs of Staff agreed to establish a staff to plan operations in north west Europe in 1944. It was envisaged that the Supreme Allied Commander would be British, and the usual practice was for the commander and the chief of staff to be of the same nationality, so it was decided to appoint a British officer for the role of chief of staff to the Supreme Allied Commander (Designate) (COSSAC), with an American deputy.[39] In March 1943 Morgan became COSSAC.[3] Brigadier General Ray Barker became his American deputy. Initially, Morgan's staff consisted of an aide, two batmen and a driver with a car purloined from I Corps headquarters.[40] Morgan established his headquarters in Norfolk House at 31 St James's Square. However, by October 1943, it was clearly too small for COSSAC needs, which called for accommodation for a staff of 320 officers and 600 other ranks. In November and December part of the staff moved to the South Rotunda, a bombproof structure that had originally been fitted up as an anti-invasion base, which was connected to the various ministries by the Whitehall Tunnel. Other staff were accommodated at 80 Pall Mall.[41]
COSSAC was charged with planning three operations: Operation Cockade, a deception operation to keep German forces pinned to the coast; Operation Rankin, a plan for measures to be taken in the case of a sudden German collapse; and Operation Overlord, a plan for a full-scale assault on north western Europe. Morgan and his staff worked on the Overlord plan throughout June and the first half of July 1943. He presented it to the Chiefs of Staff Committee on 15 July. The plan set forth in detail the conditions under which the assault could be made, the area where a landing would be feasible, and the means by which a lodgement on the continent would be developed.[42]
On 28 July, a group of the COSSAC staff, headed by Barker, travelled to
The Combined Chiefs of Staff authorised Morgan to issue orders in the name of the Supreme Allied Commander to the
SHAEF
When Eisenhower was appointed Supreme Allied Commander in January 1944 the COSSAC team was absorbed into
Morgan was also called upon on occasion to deal with Montgomery, with whom his professional relationship as deputy chief of staff was similar to that before the war when Montgomery was a brigade commander. On one occasion Morgan was summoned to Smith's office to find him white with rage at a telephone receiver. "That's your bloody marshal on the other end of that," Smith explained. "I can't talk to him any more. Now you go on."[49] "As the campaign progressed," Morgan later wrote, "it became more difficult for us British at SHAEF to provide explanation, as we were continually called upon to do, for the attitude and behaviour of the British authorities as exemplified by their chosen representative in the field."[50] Senior British officers at SHAEF, notably Morgan, Kenneth Strong and Jock Whiteley remained loyal to Eisenhower.[51] This cast a pall over their careers after the war, when Montgomery became Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS).[52]
After the war Smith described Morgan as his British alter ego, "a man I wouldn't willingly have dispensed with".
Post-war career
UNRRA
In September 1945 Morgan became the Chief of Operations for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) in Germany. He applied his energy and planning skills to the problem of providing relief to millions of refugees and displaced persons in Europe in the wake of the war. However, he became disillusioned with UNRRA believing it was being misused by sinister organisations.[3]
In his position Morgan was responsible for administering Jewish displaced persons camps in Germany. A highly publicised incident occurred on 29 March 1946 when German policemen entered a Jewish DP camp in Stuttgart without notifying UNRRA or military authorities; when the DPs angrily shouted at the police, a German officer shot dead one of them, a Jewish concentration camp survivor. A local UNRRA district director was outraged and wanted to "admonish" the Germans; however, Morgan was angered by this admonishment and overruled his subordinate, forcing the district director to resign. Morgan's superior, the UNRRA director general Fiorello La Guardia, after hearing of the incident, denounced the Stuttgart shooting as "brutal, cruel, cowardly", overruled Morgan and pushed for a ban on German police freely entering DP camps which was duly implemented by military authorities.[57]
Morgan had pushed for repatriating the displaced persons back to their devastated home countries. However, as an anti-Communist, he was outspokenly against repatriation of former collaborationists with the Nazis who had fought against the Soviets.[58]
In January 1946 Morgan created an uproar by claiming at a press conference that there was a "secret Jewish organisation" that was attempting to facilitate an "exodus" of Jewish people from Europe to Palestine. Morgan stated that he had witnessed an "exodus of Jews from Poland on Russian trains on a regular route from Lodz to Berlin. All of them were well dressed, well fed, healthy and had pockets bulging with money. All of them told the same monotonous story of threats, pogroms, and atrocities in Poland as a reason for their leaving".[59] Morgan claimed that by the end of 1946 there would be 300,000 to 500,000 Jews in Germany who would form "the seeds of World War III".[60] One reporter quoted Morgan as remarking that "the Jews seem to have organised a plan enabling them to become a world power- a weak force numerically, but one which will have a generating power for getting what they want".[61]
Morgan's statements caused a furore in the press, which portrayed them as anti-Semitic and distasteful.[62] Chaim Weizmann, leader of the World Zionist Organization, called Morgan's statement "palpably anti-Semitic".[63] The Board of Deputies of British Jews issued a statement that said that "General Morgan’s references to a “Jewish plot” to become a “world force” coming on top of the Nuremberg evidence of the extermination of nearly 6,000,000 Jews by the Nazis is not only a grotesque bogey, but highly uncharitable and unworthy when it comes from the head of an organization whose purpose it is to bring comfort to suffering victims of Nazi barbarity."[64]
UNRRA expected that Morgan would offer his resignation but he did not do so.[65] Morgan's friends vouched for him. Time magazine reported at the time that: "Observers here ... are positive of [Morgan's] sincerity, and know he had no intention of feeding the fires of anti-Semitic propaganda." A correspondent asserted that Morgan made "casual observations based on what he saw ... but the controversial remarks were taken out of the context and put together by correspondents."[66] When Morgan's first attempt to clarify his position "off the record" failed and he was ousted, Morgan flew to Washington to meet with UNRRA Director General, Herbert H. Lehman, and convinced Lehman to reinstate him.[60]
Six months later Morgan was again in the news, this time alleging that UNRRA organisations were being used as a cover by Soviet agents to stir up trouble among displaced persons.[3] This time Morgan's position in Germany was eliminated by the new UNRRA Director General Fiorello La Guardia.[62]
In his memoirs Morgan stood by his allegations claiming they were based on military intelligence.[67] Morgan wrote that he had been able to uncover how the UNRRA was being manipulated to promote a "Zionist campaign of aggression" with Russian connivance.[65]
According to the
Atomic Energy
Morgan was appointed Colonel Commandant of the Royal Artillery[3][1] from 24 June 1948[68] until 24 June 1958[69] In 1951, he succeeded Lord Portal as Controller of Atomic Energy. The position had been created in January 1946 as "Controller of Production, Atomic Energy" when the Ministry of Supply had assumed responsibility for nuclear weapons. The job, the title of which was changed to "Controller Atomic Energy" in 1950, had no written terms of reference, but carried broad responsibility for the coordination of all aspects of nuclear weapons production. Although located within the Ministry of Supply, the controller had direct access to the Prime Minister; Portal rarely exercised this, however.[70] It was widely believed that Morgan, who was, in the words of Margaret Gowing, "amiable but not adequate to the task",[71] had been appointed by mistake, having been confused with his namesake, General Sir William Morgan. The latter had greatly impressed Prime Minister Clement Attlee as Army member of the Joint Staff Mission to the United States from 1947 to 1950.[72] Morgan, therefore, relied heavily on his key subordinates, Sir John Cockcroft, William Penney, and Christopher Hinton.[71]
In his role as Controller of Atomic Energy, Morgan was present for
Morgan retired in 1956, although he remained Colonel Commandant of the Royal Artillery until 1958. He published his memoirs, entitled Peace and War: A Soldier's Life in 1961. He died at Mount Vernon Hospital on 19 March 1967, at the age of 73.[3]
Notes
- ^ a b c d e f g h i "British Army officer histories". Unit Histories. Retrieved 3 January 2018.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Smart 2005, p. 225.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Bond 2004
- ^ "Clifton College Register" Muirhead, J.A.O. p285: Bristol; J.W Arrowsmith for Old Cliftonian Society; April, 1948
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 17–21
- ^ "No. 28747". The London Gazette. 19 August 1913. p. 5933.
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 25
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 29–31
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 35–36
- ^ a b c d e Morgan 1961, pp. 49–54
- ^ "No. 29298". The London Gazette (Supplement). 16 September 1915. p. 9201.
- ^ "No. 29466". The London Gazette (Supplement). 7 February 1916. p. 1469.
- ^ "No. 29580". The London Gazette (Supplement). 12 May 1916. p. 4823.
- ^ "No. 30195". The London Gazette (Supplement). 20 July 1917. p. 7431.
- ^ "No. 30379". The London Gazette (Supplement). 14 November 1917. p. 11767.
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 31–32
- ^ "No. 30072". The London Gazette (Supplement). 15 May 1917. p. 4750.
- ^ "No. 31435". The London Gazette (Supplement). 5 July 1919. p. 8497.
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 59–60
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 61–62
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 64–69
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 86–92
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 100–105
- ^ "No. 33845". The London Gazette. 12 July 1932. p. 4559.
- ^ "No. 34011". The London Gazette. 2 January 1934. p. 55.
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 117–123
- ^ "No. 34519". The London Gazette. 10 June 1938. p. 3718.
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 138
- ^ "No. 34658". The London Gazette. 29 August 1939. p. 5842.
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 136
- ^ a b c Mead 2007, pp. 310–311
- ^ "No. 35096". The London Gazette (Supplement). 4 March 1941. p. 1350.
- ^ "No. 35485". The London Gazette (Supplement). 10 March 1942. p. 1157.
- ^ "No. 35567". The London Gazette (Supplement). 19 May 1942. p. 2229.
- ^ "No. 35836". The London Gazette (Supplement). 25 December 1942. p. 5625.
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 150–151
- ^ "No. 36037". The London Gazette (Supplement). 28 May 1943. p. 2520.
- ^ "No. 36033". The London Gazette (Supplement). 28 May 1943. p. 2419.
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 153
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 156
- ^ U.S. Army 1944, p. 12
- ^ Pogue 1954, pp. 103–106
- ^ U.S. Army 1944, p. 7
- ^ Morgan 1961, pp. 167–172
- ^ Pogue 1954, p. 45
- ^ Hamilton 1983, p. 487.
- ^ Mead 2007, pp. 312–313
- ^ a b Pogue 1954, pp. 63–64
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 199
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 195
- ^ Mead 2007, p. 313
- ^ Mead 2007, p. 488
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 218
- ^ "No. 36668". The London Gazette (Supplement). 22 August 1944. p. 3917.
- ^ "No. 37027". The London Gazette (Supplement). 16 April 1945. p. 1947.
- ^ "No. 38178". The London Gazette (Supplement). 16 January 1948. p. 401.
- ^ Wyman 1989, pp. 168–169
- ^ Wyman 1989, pp. 73
- ^ "General Morgan's Statement, His Doubts About Polish Pogroms" by The Manchester Guardian, Thursday January 3, 1946 – Page 5
- ^ a b Rosenfield 1946–1947, pp. 307–308.
- ^ Bauer 1989, p. 90
- ^ a b Wyman 1989, pp. 144–145
- ^ a b Wolfson 2015, p. 176.
- ^ Wolfson 2015, p. 178.
- ^ a b Morgan 1961, p. 245
- ^ "The Press: The Morgan Mess". Time. 21 January 1946. Archived from the original on 19 February 2011. Retrieved 30 June 2011.
- ^ Morgan 1961, p. 261
- ^ "No. 38361". The London Gazette (Supplement). 23 July 1948. p. 4235.
- ^ "No. 41426". The London Gazette (Supplement). 20 June 1958. p. 3992.
- ^ Gowing & Arnold 1974a, pp. 39–43
- ^ a b Gowing & Arnold 1974b, p. 4
- ^ Gowing & Arnold 1974a, p. 46
- ^ Gowing & Arnold 1974a, p. 429
- ^ Arnold & Smith 1987, pp. 9–10
- ^ Arnold & Smith 1987, p. 107
- ^ Arnold & Smith 1987, p. 181
- ^ Arnold & Smith 1987, p. 185
- ^ Arnold & Pyne 2001, pp. 97–98
References
- OCLC 753874620.
- OCLC 70673342.
- Bauer, Yehuda (1989). Out of the Ashes: the Impact of American Jews on Post-Holocaust European Jewry. Oxford: Pergamon Press. OCLC 243403914.
- doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/35103. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- OCLC 611555258.
- OCLC 59047125.
- OCLC 9620067.
- Mead, Richard (2007). Churchill's Lions: A biographical guide to the key British generals of World War II. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Spellmount. OCLC 171539131.
- Morgan, Sir Frederick (1961). Peace and War: A Soldier's Life. London: Hodder and Stoughton. OCLC 1345812.
- )
- Rosenfield, Geraldine (1946–1947). "Germany". American Jewish Yearbook. 48: 302–315. JSTOR 23602814.
- Smart, Nick (2005). Biographical Dictionary of British Generals of the Second World War. Barnesley: Pen & Sword. OCLC 58555546.
- U.S. Army (1944). History of COSSAC (Chief of Staff to Supreme Allied Commander) 1943–1944. Washington DC: United States Army Center of Military History. OCLC 13575562. Retrieved 19 September 2010.
- Wolfson, Leah (2015). Jewish Responses to Persecution. Vol. V, 1944–1946. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield in association with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. OCLC 929033776.
- Wyman, Mark (1989). DPs: Europe's Displaced Persons 1945–1951. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. OCLC 39846609.
Further reading
- Gazzelli, John (2021). Lieutenant General Sir Frederick Morgan, KCB The Planner Who Saved Europe. Charleston, South Carolina: Palmento Publishing. ISBN 978-1-63837-411-4.
- Kepher, Stephen C. (2020). COSSAC: Lt. Gen. Sir Frederick Morgan and the Genesis of Operation OVERLORD. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. OCLC 1271437417.
External links