John Cowans
Sir John Cowans | |
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Presidency Brigade | |
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Awards |
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Educated at
Cowans became Quartermaster-General to the Forces in 1912, and in this capacity he was responsible for finding accommodation and supplies for more than a million newly
Early life
John Steven Cowans was born in Woodbank, St Cuthbert Without, Carlisle, on 11 March 1862, the oldest of three sons of John Cowans, an engineer who co-founded the Carlisle firm of Cowans, Sheldon & Co., and his wife Jeannie (née Steven).[1][2] Cowans was always known as "Jack".[3]
Cowans was educated at Burney's Academy at Gosport, a preparatory school for the Royal Navy. It was intended that he should enter the Navy, but, at the age of thirteen, he failed the entrance exam. He was sent on a tour of France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland with a tutor, before returning to Burney's Academy to prepare for the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, which he entered in 1878.[4]
Subaltern
After
In late 1883, Cowans returned to the United Kingdom on sick leave and was assigned to the Regimental depot. He married Eva Mary Coulson, the eldest daughter of Reverend John Edmund Coulson, the Vicar of Long Preston in Yorkshire, on 14 February 1884. The wedding ceremony was held in the parish church in Grange-over-Sands, Lancashire, and was presided over by Reverend Henry White, the chaplain of the Queen's Chapel of the Savoy and Chaplain-in-Ordinary to Queen Victoria. They had no children.[8]
Cowans was posted to the 2nd Battalion of the Rifle Brigade at
Staff officer
Cowans decided to further his career by entering the Staff College, Camberley. This was seen as a means of speedy advancement, and competition for places was keen. Cowans managed to narrowly pass the entrance examination, and entered on 1 February 1890. His class of thirty was a distinguished one; half of them later became generals.[10] While he was there he was promoted to captain on 3 September.[11]
Upon graduation in January 1892, Cowans was attached to the War Office under the Assistant-Adjutant-General, Major-General Sir Coleridge Grove. His section (AG.7) worked on the mobilisation scheme, the first version of which had been issued shortly before Cowans arrived.[12] He was officially seconded to the staff on 13 June 1893.[13] On 1 September 1894, he became the brigade major of the 2nd Infantry Brigade at Aldershot,[14] which was considered a plum job for a young staff officer who, despite the title, was still a captain.[15]
His appointment as brigade major ended on 1 September 1897,
Cowans did not return to his regiment. On 11 May 1898, he was appointed a Deputy Assistant Quartermaster General at the War Office,[19] working in the movements section (QMG.2). He was involved with arrangements for the deployment of troops to the Sudan for the Nile Expedition of 1898, and for the autumn military manoeuvres in September 1898, the largest military manoeuvres since 1872, with 50,000 troops involved. Cowans had to make the required arrangements for rail and maritime transport.[20][21]
On 11 October 1899, the
Some division commanders requested Cowans's services as a staff officer, but the
In February 1906, Cowans was appointed Director-General of Military Education of the British Indian Army, and was replaced by Colonel Alexander Godley.[28][29] He assumed the post on 22 March,[30] but when the General Staff of India was created he became Director of Staff Duties and Training at Army Headquarters in India on 1 April.[29] In this role he was involved with the new staff college in India at Deolali, which relocated to Quetta in April 1907, ensuring that the curriculum was brought into line with that of Camberley. He acted as Director of Military Operations for a time, and as Chief of the General Staff (India) when Lieutenant-General Sir Beauchamp Duff was in England.[31]
General officer
Cowans became Commander of the
While on leave in Évian-les-Bains in France, Cowans was summoned back to England by the Secretary of State for War, Richard Haldane, who offered him the recently created position of Director-General of the Territorial Force, which had come into being as a result of the Haldane Reforms. Cowans returned to India briefly to settle private affairs and hand over command of the Presidency Brigade to Brigadier-General Hew Dalrymple Fanshawe,[36] before he assumed his new post on 7 November 1910.[37]
The Territorial Force was administered by county associations, military committees chaired by the
Most of their problems were financial, and Cowans had little additional money to give them, but he gave them the benefit of his time, energy, enthusiasm and administrative skills, and was able to secure some additional latitude in spending their funding.
Quartermaster General to the Forces
Cowans became the
In the days leading up to the declaration of war on 4 August 1914, Cowans urged the government to cancel the Territorial Army's annual camps, which for most of them was in the first week of August. This was not done, and trains needed for the expeditionary force had to collect Territorials and return them to their depots. Despite this, the first shipload of stores departed on 9 August, and by 23 August, five infantry and two cavalry divisions of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) had reached their wartime stations in France.[48]
The Army Council realised that the existing barracks could hold only 175,000 men, and this would be inadequate for
The large number of troops needed to be outfitted. In peacetime this had been done through contracts with a small number of firms, and production could not be rapidly expanded. As an interim measure, 500,000 blue serge suits were obtained from Post Office stocks, and some units were supplied with nineteenth-century scarlet tunics.[51] Cowans reduced expenditure wherever possible by eliminating middlemen. He arranged for the whole of the British wool production to be purchased from the farmers, and the entirety of Australian wool production was made available by the Australian government.[52]
Accoutrements presented a greater problem. The British Army had adopted 1908 Pattern Webbing equipment, which was superior to the old leather equipment as it did not sweat and corrode ammunition cartridges. However, only two firms in the UK had the specialised machinery to manufacture webbing, which was fine in peacetime when the annual requirement was 100,000 sets. In the interim, 1914 Pattern Leather Equipment was issued in which only backpacks and haversacks were made from webbing, with leather being substituted for other components.[53]
While horses were still the mainstay of transport in the field, as the war went on, there was a tendency to substitute motor transport for horse transport. To economise on manpower, women were trained to drive and maintain motor vehicles. Cowans successfully resisted attempts to absorb his drivers into the
Cowans worked well with the original Quartermaster-General of the BEF, Lieutenant-General Sir William Robertson, but Robertson became Chief of the General Staff of the BEF on 25 January 1915,[56] and was replaced by Major-General Ronald Charles Maxwell.[57] Cowans's relationship with Maxwell slowly deteriorated until, on 23 December 1917, Maxwell was replaced by Lieutenant-General Sir Travers Clarke.[58]
Cowans liked to work late, seldom retiring for the night before 0200, but waking around 0800. Working late at night enabled him to write without interruptions. When he could he left London for the weekend, staying with General Sir
In November 1916, Cowans became embroiled in a scandal. Patsy Cornwallis-West began a relationship with Patrick Barrett, a much younger sergeant in the Royal Welch Fusiliers, and wrote to Cowans urging that Barrett be commissioned. This was done but they subsequently had a falling out and she forwarded a letter he wrote to her to his commanding officer, Colonel Henry Delmé-Radcliffe, who decided to have Barrett transferred from the 12th Battalion to the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. When she heard that Barrett's friends were seeking to take action, she again wrote to Cowans, who replied that orders had already gone out, adding, "I would fight for you if I had the time."[60][61] The government convened a court of inquiry, which declared that "Cornwallis-West's conduct was highly discreditable."[60] Delmé-Radcliffe was relieved of his command, and the government expressed its displeasure at Cowans, but given his excellent service as Quartermaster-General, took no action against him.[60]
One reason for this was the course of the Mesopotamian campaign,[1] where maladministration and the British defeat in the Siege of Kut led to responsibility for the campaign being transferred from the government of India to the War Office, making Cowans responsible for its logistics.[62]
Cowans became
Death
Cowans abruptly resigned on 15 March 1919 and joined the
In November 1920, after consulting with
Honours and awards
Cowans never served in combat, so he never earned any campaign medals or decorations for gallantry, but he was awarded the
Cowans died insolvent; his fortune of £8,000 was consumed by his debts.
Post-mortem scandal
In March 1925, Dorothy Muriel Dennistoun revealed that she had lived as Cowans's mistress with the consent of her husband, Lieutenant Colonel Ian Onslow Dennistoun. She alleged that she had used her influence with the general to secure important Army positions for her husband. The couple had divorced in May 1921, and had agreed to forgo a formal claim of alimony in return for his financial support. He had since married
Reputation
Historian Peter Simkins considered Cowans to be "the only truly outstanding officer on the Army Council",[67] Prime Minister H. H. Asquith described him as "the best Quartermaster since Moses",[86][87] and his successor, David Lloyd George regarded him as "the most capable soldier thrown up by the War in our Army".[1] Nonetheless, historian Clem Maginniss concluded that
It is of course the lot of logisticians, regardless of rank and appointment, to be forgotten. Great War history is replete with well-known generals whose names spring quickly to mind, but Cowans is not one of them.[88]
Dates of rank
Notes
- ^ doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/32593. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 45–51.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, p. 38.
- ^ a b Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 55–57.
- ^ a b "No. 24926". The London Gazette. 21 January 1881. p. 293.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 58–62.
- ^ a b Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, p. xxxiii.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, p. 63.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 65–67.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 72–77.
- ^ a b "No. 26090". The London Gazette. 23 September 1890. p. 5093.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 81–83.
- ^ "No. 26416". The London Gazette. 27 June 1893. p. 3642.
- ^ "No. 26551". The London Gazette. 11 September 1894. p. 5256.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 85–86.
- ^ "No. 26891". The London Gazette. 14 September 1897. p. 5107.
- ^ a b Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 93–97.
- ^ a b "No. 26953". The London Gazette. 1 April 1898. p. 2091.
- ^ "No. 26970". The London Gazette. 24 May 1898. p. 3237.
- ^ Leeson 2008, p. 433.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 97–98.
- ^ a b Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 99–105.
- ^ a b "No. 27177". The London Gazette. 27 March 1900. p. 2043.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 118–121.
- ^ "Court Circular". The Times. No. 36844. London. 12 August 1902. p. 8.
- ^ "No. 27467". The London Gazette. 22 August 1902. p. 5462.
- ^ a b "No. 27548". The London Gazette. 1 May 1903. p. 2770.
- ^ "No. 27894". The London Gazette. 13 March 1906. p. 1795.
- ^ a b Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 125–126.
- ^ "No. 27992". The London Gazette. 5 February 1907. p. 828.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 126–129, 136.
- ^ a b "No. 28221". The London Gazette. 5 February 1909. p. 944.
- ^ a b "No. 28354". The London Gazette. 5 April 1910. p. 2330.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 154–155, 169.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, p. 156.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 172–173.
- ^ "No. 28436". The London Gazette. 11 November 1910. p. 8075.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 178–181.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, p. 200.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 187–189.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 196–198.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 250–251.
- ^ "No. 28505". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 16 June 1911. p. 4591.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, p. 290.
- ^ "No. 28615". The London Gazette. 7 June 1912. p. 4131.
- ^ "No. 28724". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 30 May 1913. p. 3904.
- ^ a b "No. 29341". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 26 October 1915. p. 10615.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, pp. 270–280.
- ^ Simkins 2007, pp. 234–244.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 21–26.
- ^ Simkins 2007, pp. 256–263.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, p. 118.
- ^ Simkins 2007, pp. 268–272.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 131–135.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 124–127.
- ^ "No. 29107". The London Gazette (Supplement). 19 March 1915. p. 2819.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, p. 52.
- ^ Brown 1998, pp. 180–181.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 232–233.
- ^ a b c "Army Scandal". The Argus (Melbourne). No. 21, 978. Victoria, Australia. 5 January 1917. p. 7. Retrieved 2 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 147–150.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 158–163.
- ^ "No. 30450". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 28 December 1917. p. 7.
- ^ "No. 30607". The London Gazette. 2 April 1918. p. 4026.
- ^ a b "No. 31097". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 31 December 1918. p. 87.
- ^ "No. 31242". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 18 March 1919. p. 3731.
- ^ a b Simkins 2007, p. 38.
- ^ "Quartermaster-General Resigns". The Herald. No. 13, 452. Victoria, Australia. 18 March 1919. p. 1. Retrieved 2 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 292–293.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 295–298.
- ^ "Sir John Steven Cowans". CWGC Casualty record. Retrieved 20 August 2016.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924a, p. xxxiv.
- ^ "No. 30306". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 25 September 1917. p. 9946.
- ^ "No. 30302". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 21 September 1917. p. 9864.
- ^ "No. 31263". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 28 March 1919. p. 4200.
- ^ "No. 31002". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 8 November 1918. p. 13276.
- ^ "No. 31783". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 13 February 1920. p. 1935.
- ^ "No. 31451". The London Gazette (1st supplement). 11 July 1919. p. 8938.
- ^ "No. 31615". The London Gazette (Supplement). 21 October 1919. p. 13002.
- The Mercury. Vol. CXV, no. 16, 121. Tasmania, Australia. 2 July 1921. p. 7. Retrieved 2 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
- ^ Chapman-Huston & Rutter 1924b, pp. 298–299.
- ^ "Foreign News: Scandal". Time. Retrieved 1 February 2024.
- ^ "Another Cause Celebre". The Daily News. Vol. XLIV, no. 15, 597 (Third ed.). Western Australia. 20 April 1925. p. 6. Retrieved 1 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
- The Register (Adelaide). Vol. XC, no. 26, 285. South Australia. 26 March 1925. p. 11. Retrieved 2 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
- ^ "Jury's Verdict". The Sydney Morning Herald. No. 27, 223. New South Wales, Australia. 6 April 1925. p. 11. Retrieved 2 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
- ^ "Wipers Dead". Time. 1 June 1925. Retrieved 1 February 2024.
- ^ "Praise for Cumbrian who kept the troops supplied". The Mail. 9 February 2017. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
- ^ Maginniss 2018, p. 341.
References
- Brown, Ian (1998). British Logistics on the Western Front. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger. OCLC 468858549.
- OCLC 2322922.
- OCLC 2322922.
- Leeson, D. M. (November 2008). "Playing at War: The British Military Manoeuvres of 1898". War in History. 15 (4): 432–461. S2CID 159710126.
- Maginniss, Clem (2018). An Unappreciated Field of Endeavour: Logistics and the British Expeditionary Force on the Western Front 1914-1918. Warwick: Helion Press. OCLC 154706430.
- Simkins, Peter (2007). Kitchener's Army: The Raising of the New Armies 1914-1916. Barnsley, South Yorkshire: Pen & Sword Military. OCLC 137313532.