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Edgar Williams (musician)
Brigadier Sir Edgar Trevor Williams (20 November 1912 – 26 June 1995) was a British historian and Army military intelligence officer who played a significant role in the Second Battle of El Alamein in the Second World War. He was one of the few officers who was privy to the Ultra secret, and served on the staff of Field Marshal Sir Bernard Montgomery as his intelligence officer for the rest of the war. A graduate of Merton College, Oxford, where he obtained a First in modern history in 1934, Williams was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 1st King's Dragoon Guards in June 1939. In February 1941, the troop he was commanding was the first British unit to encounter the German Afrika Korps. He was recruited to work in military intelligence by Brigadier Francis de Guingand, who later became Montgomery's chief of staff. As an historian, Williams was accustomed to integrating different sources of information to build up a larger picture. He integrated information from Ult ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chatham, Kent
Chatham ( ) is a town located within the Medway unitary authority in the ceremonial county of Kent, England. The town forms a conurbation with neighbouring towns Gillingham, Rochester, Strood and Rainham. The town developed around Chatham Dockyard and several Army barracks, together with 19th-century forts which provided a defensive shield for the dockyard. The Corps of Royal Engineers is still based in Chatham at Brompton Barracks. The Dockyard closed in 1984, but the remaining major naval buildings are an attraction for a flourishing tourist industry. Following closure, part of the site was developed as a commercial port, other parts were redeveloped for business and residential use, and part was used as the Chatham Historic Dockyard museum. Its attractions include the submarine . The town has important road links and the railway and bus stations are the main interchanges for the area. It is the administrative headquarters of Medway unitary authority, as well as its pri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Field Marshal (United Kingdom)
Field Marshal (FM) has been the highest rank in the British Army since 1736. A five-star rank with NATO code OF-10, it is equivalent to an Admiral of the Fleet (Royal Navy), Admiral of the Fleet in the Royal Navy or a Marshal of the Royal Air Force in the Royal Air Force (RAF). A Field Marshal's insignia consists of two crossed batons surrounded by yellow leaves below St Edward's Crown. Like Marshals of the RAF and Admirals of the Fleet, Field Marshals traditionally remain officers for life, though on half-pay when not in an appointment. The rank has been used sporadically throughout its history and was vacant during parts of the 18th and 19th centuries (when all former holders of the rank were deceased). After the Second World War, it became standard practice to appoint the Chief of the General Staff (United Kingdom), Chief of the Imperial General Staff (later renamed Chief of the General Staff (United Kingdom), Chief of the General Staff) to the rank on his last day in the post. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dictionary Of National Biography
The ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (''DNB'') is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published since 1885. The updated ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (''ODNB'') was published on 23 September 2004 in 60 volumes and online, with 50,113 biographical articles covering 54,922 lives. First series Hoping to emulate national biographical collections published elsewhere in Europe, such as the ''Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie'' (1875), in 1882 the publisher George Smith (1824–1901), of Smith, Elder & Co., planned a universal dictionary that would include biographical entries on individuals from world history. He approached Leslie Stephen, then editor of the ''Cornhill Magazine'', owned by Smith, to become the editor. Stephen persuaded Smith that the work should focus only on subjects from the United Kingdom and its present and former colonies. An early working title was the ''Biographia Britannica'', the name of an earlier eighteen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Balliol College, Oxford
Balliol College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. One of Oxford's oldest colleges, it was founded around 1263 by John I de Balliol, a landowner from Barnard Castle in County Durham, who provided the foundation and endowment for the college. When de Balliol died in 1268, his widow, Dervorguilla, a woman whose wealth far exceeded that of her husband, continued his work in setting up the college, providing a further endowment and writing the statutes. She is considered a co-founder of the college. The college's alumni include four former Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom (H. H. Asquith, Harold Macmillan, Edward Heath, and Boris Johnson), Harald V of Norway, Empress Masako of Japan, five Nobel laureates, several Lords of Appeal in Ordinary, and numerous literary and philosophical figures, including Shoghi Effendi, Adam Smith, Gerard Manley Hopkins, and Aldous Huxley. John Wycliffe, who translated the Bible into English, was master o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Long Range Desert Group
)Gross, O'Carroll and Chiarvetto 2009, p.20 , patron = , motto = ''Non Vi Sed Arte'' (Latin: ''Not by Strength, but by Guile'') (unofficial) , colours = , colours_label = , march = , mascot = , equipment = Chevrolet or Ford trucks, Willys Jeep , equipment_label = , battles = Second World War * North African campaign * Battle of Kufra * Operation Caravan * Dodecanese Campaign * Battle of Leros * Albania * Yugoslavia * Italian Campaign , decorations = , battle_honours = , disbanded = 1 August 1945 , commander1 = , commander1_label = , commander2 = , commander2_label = , commander3 = , commander3_label = , notable_commanders ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aerial Reconnaissance
Aerial reconnaissance is reconnaissance for a military or strategic purpose that is conducted using reconnaissance aircraft. The role of reconnaissance can fulfil a variety of requirements including artillery spotting, the collection of imagery intelligence, and the observation of enemy maneuvers. History Early developments After the French Revolution, the new rulers became interested in using the balloon to observe enemy manoeuvres and appointed scientist Charles Coutelle to conduct studies using the balloon ''L'Entreprenant'', the first military reconnaissance aircraft. The balloon found its first use in the 1794 conflict with Austria, where in the Battle of Fleurus they gathered information. Moreover, the presence of the balloon had a demoralizing effect on the Austrian troops, which improved the likelihood of victory for the French troops. To operate such balloons, a new unit of the French military, the French Aerostatic Corps, was established; this organisatio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Prisoner Of War
A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold prisoners of war in custody for a range of legitimate and illegitimate reasons, such as isolating them from the enemy combatants still in the field (releasing and repatriating them in an orderly manner after hostilities), demonstrating military victory, punishing them, prosecuting them for war crimes, exploiting them for their labour, recruiting or even conscripting them as their own combatants, collecting military and political intelligence from them, or indoctrinating them in new political or religious beliefs. Ancient times For most of human history, depending on the culture of the victors, enemy fighters on the losing side in a battle who had surrendered and been taken as prisoners of war could expect to be either slaughtered or enslaved. Ear ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Y Service
The "Y" service was a network of British signals intelligence collection sites, the Y-stations. The service was established during the First World War and used again during the Second World War. The sites were operated by a range of agencies including the Army, Navy and RAF plus the Foreign Office ( MI6 and MI5), General Post Office and Marconi Company receiving stations ashore and afloat. There were more than 600 receiving sets in use at Y-stations during the Second World War. Background The "Y" stations tended to be of two types, for intercepting of the signals and for identifying where they were coming from. Sometimes both functions were operated at the same site, with the direction finding (D/F) hut being a few hundred metres from the main interception building, because of the need to minimise interference. The sites collected radio traffic which was then either analysed locally or if encrypted, passed for processing initially to the Admiralty Room 40 in London and during Wo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Francis De Guingand
Major-General Sir Francis Wilfred "Freddie" de Guingand, (28 February 1900 – 29 June 1979) was a British Army officer who served as Field Marshal Sir Bernard Montgomery's chief of staff from the Second Battle of El Alamein until the end of the Second World War. He played an important diplomatic role in sustaining relations between the notoriously difficult Montgomery and his peers and superiors. A graduate of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, de Guingand joined the West Yorkshire Regiment (Prince of Wales's Own) in December 1919. He served in India and Ireland, and was seconded to the King's African Rifles in Nyasaland from 1926 to 1931. Through the intervention of Montgomery, with whom he had formed a friendship with during their service together the 1920s and 1930s, he secured a nomination to 1935–36 course at the Staff College, Camberley. He served as Military Assistant to the Secretary of State for War, Leslie Hore-Belisha, from 1939 to 1940, in which role he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Afrika Korps
The Afrika Korps or German Africa Corps (, }; DAK) was the German expeditionary force in Africa during the North African Campaign of World War II. First sent as a holding force to shore up the Italian defense of its African colonies, the formation fought on in Africa, under various appellations, from March 1941 until its surrender in May 1943. The unit's best known commander was Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. History Organization The Afrika Korps formed on 11 January 1941 and one of Hitler's favourite generals, Erwin Rommel, was designated as commander on 11 February. Originally Hans von Funck was to have commanded it, but Hitler loathed von Funck, as he had been a personal staff officer of Werner von Fritsch until von Fritsch was dismissed in 1938. The German Armed Forces High Command ('' Oberkommando der Wehrmacht'', OKW) had decided to send a "blocking force" to Italian Libya to support the Italian army. The Italian 10th Army had been routed by the British Commonwealth ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Troop
A troop is a military sub-subunit, originally a small formation of cavalry, subordinate to a squadron. In many armies a troop is the equivalent element to the infantry section or platoon. Exceptions are the US Cavalry and the King's Troop Royal Horse Artillery where a troop is a subunit comparable to an infantry company or artillery battery. Historically the remainder of the Royal Horse Artillery used the term Troop in the same manner however they are now aligned with the rest of the Royal Regiment of Artillery in referring to Troops as subordinate to artillery batteries. Troops is often used to refer to the other members of one's company or cause, but because of its military connotations, it conveys a particularly altruistic type of dedicated worker. Traditionally, troops refers to the soldiers in a military. A cavalry soldier of private rank is called a trooper in many Commonwealth armies (abbreviated "Tpr", not to be confused with "trouper"). A related sense of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Second Lieutenant
Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces, comparable to NATO OF-1 rank. Australia The rank of second lieutenant existed in the military forces of the Australian colonies and Australian Army until 1986. In the colonial forces, which closely followed the practices of the British military, the rank of second lieutenant began to replace ranks such as ensign and cornet from 1871. New appointments to the rank of second lieutenant ceased in the regular army in 1986. Immediately prior to this change, the rank had been effectively reserved for new graduates from the Officer Cadet School, Portsea which closed in 1985. (Graduates of the Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA) and the Royal Military College, Duntroon (RMC-D) are commissioned as lieutenants.). The rank of second lieutenant is only appointed to officers in special appointments such as training institutions, university regiments and while under probation during training. Trai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
