1. Anthony Farrar-Hockley held a number of senior commands, ending his career as Commander-in-Chief of NATO's Allied Forces Northern Europe.
22 Facts About Anthony Farrar-Hockley
1. 2.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley was born in Coventry, Warwickshire, England, on 8 April 1924, the son of Arthur Farrar-Hockley, a journalist, and Agnes Beatrice.
3.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley was educated at Exeter School, and at the age of 15 he ran away at the start of the Second World War and enlisted in the Gloucestershire Regiment, a line infantry regiment of the British Army.
4.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley was promoted to sergeant while still aged 17 and only 18 when he was commissioned into the Wiltshire Regiment, before transferring to the Parachute Regiment in November 1942.
5.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley fought with the 6th Parachute Battalion, part of the 2nd Parachute Brigade, in Italy and Southern France.
6.
On 7 July 1945 in St Peter's Church, Ealing, Farrar-Hockley married Margaret Bernadette Wells with whom he had three sons.
7.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley established a reputation as an authority on the First World War, publishing The Somme and Death of an Army.
8.
At the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939, at the age of 15, Anthony Farrar-Hockley ran away from school and enlisted in the ranks with the Gloucestershire Regiment.
9.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley was still only 20 in 1944 when he was given command of a company in the 6th Parachute Battalion and later won a Military Cross in Greece whilst resisting the communist rebellion in Athens.
10.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley provided inspiring leadership during the Battle of the Imjin River and fight for Hill 235.
11.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley volunteered to reinforce the company and his presence had an immediate effect.
12.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley were able to retrench and hold on for some time.
13.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley organised an orderly withdrawal but as one of the last to leave the position he was captured.
14.
In 1962 Anthony Farrar-Hockley took command of 3rd Battalion, Parachute Regiment in the Persian Gulf.
15.
In 1965 Anthony Farrar-Hockley was posted as Chief of Staff to the Director of Operations in Borneo in the Far East.
16.
Secret and unattributable cross-border operations which Anthony Farrar-Hockley helped to organise on Indonesian territory helped bring the ill-judged military confrontation to an end.
17.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley held this appointment until his retirement from the army in 1982.
18.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley commanded the French at Waterloo in an episode of the brief TV series A Game of War in 1997.
19.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley is known to have been a target for the IRA after his name was found on an hitlist in the 1980s.
20.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley declared to The Guardian that a secret arms network was established in Britain after the war, but declined to say if it still existed.
21.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley aroused controversy in 1983 when he became involved trying to organise a campaign for a new home guard against possible Soviet invasion and in 1990, following Italian Prime minister Giulio Andreotti's October 1990 revelations concerning Operation Gladio, a NATO stay-behind network, he said that the armed anti-communist secret resistance network across western European had involved Britain.
22.
Anthony Farrar-Hockley's honours included: Mentioned in despatches 1943, MC 1944, DSO 1953, Mentioned in despatches 1954, MBE 1957, DSO bar 1964, KCB 1977, GBE 1982.