Bernard Montgomery took part in the Battle of Passchendaele in late 1917 before finishing the war as chief of staff of the 47th Division.
127 Facts About Bernard Montgomery
2.
Bernard Montgomery subsequently commanded the British Eighth Army during the Allied invasion of Sicily and the Allied invasion of Italy and was in command of all Allied ground forces during the Battle of Normandy, from D-Day on 6 June 1944 until 1 September 1944.
3.
Bernard Montgomery then continued in command of the 21st Army Group for the rest of the North West Europe campaign, including the failed attempt to cross the Rhine during Operation Market Garden.
4.
When German armoured forces broke through the US lines in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge, Bernard Montgomery received command of the northern shoulder of the Bulge.
5.
On 4 May 1945, Bernard Montgomery accepted the surrender of the German forces in north-western Europe at Luneburg Heath, south of Hamburg, after the surrender of Berlin to the USSR on 2 May.
6.
Bernard Montgomery then served as NATO's Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe until his retirement in 1958.
7.
Bernard Montgomery was born in Kennington, Surrey, in 1887, the fourth child of nine, to a Church of Ireland minister, Henry Bernard Montgomery, and his wife, Maud.
8.
Bernard Montgomery was probably a descendant of Colonel Alexander Montgomery.
9.
Bishop Bernard Montgomery considered it his duty to spend as much time as possible in the rural areas of Tasmania and was away for up to six months at a time.
10.
Maud Bernard Montgomery took little active interest in the education of her young children other than to have them taught by tutors brought from Britain, although he briefly attended the then coeducational St Michael's Collegiate School.
11.
In 1901, Bishop Bernard Montgomery became secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, and the family returned to London.
12.
Bernard Montgomery attended St Paul's School and then the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from which he was almost expelled for rowdiness and violence.
13.
Bernard Montgomery was promoted to lieutenant in 1910, and in 1912 became adjutant of the 1st Battalion of his regiment at Shorncliffe Army Camp.
14.
The Great War began in August 1914 and Bernard Montgomery moved to France with his battalion that month, which was at the time part of the 10th Brigade of the 4th Division.
15.
Bernard Montgomery saw action at the Battle of Le Cateau that month and during the retreat from Mons.
16.
Miraculously Bernard Montgomery was still alive and, after being placed in an ambulance and then being sent to a hospital, was treated and eventually evacuated to England, where he would remain for well over a year.
17.
Bernard Montgomery was awarded the Distinguished Service Order, for his gallant leadership during this period: the citation for this award, published in The London Gazette in December 1914 reads:.
18.
Bernard Montgomery became a general staff officer with IX Corps, part of General Sir Herbert Plumer's Second Army, in July 1917.
19.
Bernard Montgomery served at the Battle of Passchendaele in late 1917 before finishing the war as GSO1 of the 47th Division, with the temporary rank of lieutenant-colonel.
20.
Bernard Montgomery was profoundly influenced by his experiences during the war, in particular by the leadership, or rather the lack of it, being displayed by the senior commanders.
21.
Bernard Montgomery had not at first been selected for the Staff College in Camberley, Surrey.
22.
Bernard Montgomery came to the conclusion that the conflict could not be won without harsh measures, and that self-government for Ireland was the only feasible solution; in 1923, after the establishment of the Irish Free State and during the Irish Civil War, Bernard Montgomery wrote to Colonel Arthur Ernest Percival of the Essex Regiment:.
23.
In one noteworthy incident on 2 May 1922, Bernard Montgomery led a force of 60 soldiers and 4 armoured cars to the town of Macroom to search for four British officers who were missing in the area.
24.
At the castle gates Bernard Montgomery spoke to Browne explaining what would happen should the officers not be released.
25.
Once finished, Browne responded with his own ultimatum to Bernard Montgomery to "leave town within 10 minutes".
26.
In May 1923, Bernard Montgomery was posted to the 49th Infantry Division, a Territorial Army formation.
27.
Bernard Montgomery returned to the 1st Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment in 1925 as a company commander and was promoted to major in July 1925.
28.
Bernard Montgomery's approach included drawing diagrams in the sand of how he would deploy his tanks and infantry in a future war, a contingency which seemed very remote at that time.
29.
Bernard Montgomery respected his ambition and single-mindedness, but declined his proposal of marriage.
30.
Bernard Montgomery was the sister of the future Second World War commander Major-General Sir Percy Hobart.
31.
Dick Carver later wrote that it had been "a very brave thing" for Bernard Montgomery to take on a widow with two children.
32.
The loss devastated Bernard Montgomery, who was then serving as a brigadier, but he insisted on throwing himself back into his work immediately after the funeral.
33.
Bernard Montgomery was taken prisoner at Mersa Matruh on 7 November 1942.
34.
Bernard Montgomery wrote to his contacts in England asking that inquiries be made via the Red Cross as to where his stepson was being held, and that parcels be sent to him.
35.
Bernard Montgomery eventually reached British lines on 5 December 1943, to the delight of his stepfather, who sent him home to Britain to recuperate.
36.
In 1931 Bernard Montgomery was promoted to substantive lieutenant-colonel and became the Commanding officer of the 1st Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment and saw service in Palestine and British India.
37.
Bernard Montgomery was promoted to colonel in June 1934.
38.
Bernard Montgomery attended and was then recommended to become an instructor at the Indian Army Staff College in Quetta, British India.
39.
On completion of his tour of duty in India, Bernard Montgomery returned to Britain in June 1937 where he took command of the 9th Infantry Brigade with the temporary rank of brigadier.
40.
Bernard Montgomery was promoted to major-general on 14 October 1938 and took command of the 8th Infantry Division in the British mandate of Palestine.
41.
In Palestine, Bernard Montgomery was involved in suppressing an Arab revolt which had broken out over opposition to Jewish emigration.
42.
Bernard Montgomery returned in July 1939 to Britain, suffering a serious illness on the way, to command the 3rd Infantry Division.
43.
Bernard Montgomery had issued a circular on the prevention of venereal disease, worded in such "obscene language" that both the Church of England and Roman Catholic senior chaplains objected; Brooke told Monty that he did not want any further errors of this kind, though deciding not to get him to formally withdraw it as it would remove any "vestige of respect" left for him.
44.
Bernard Montgomery's training paid off when the Germans began their invasion of the Low Countries on 10 May 1940 and the 3rd Division advanced to its planned position, near the Belgian city of Louvain.
45.
The 3rd Division saw little action compared to many other units and formations in the BEF but, owing to the strict training methods of Bernard Montgomery, who ensured that his division was thoroughly well-trained, disciplined and rehearsed, the division always managed to be in the right place at the right time, especially so during the retreat into France.
46.
The 3rd Division, temporarily commanded by Kenneth Anderson in Bernard Montgomery's absence, returned to Britain intact with minimal casualties.
47.
On his return Bernard Montgomery antagonised the War Office with trenchant criticisms of the command of the BEF and was briefly relegated back to divisional command of 3rd Division.
48.
Bernard Montgomery was made a Companion of the Order of the Bath.
49.
Bernard Montgomery was ordered to make ready his 3rd Division to invade the neutral Portuguese Azores.
50.
Bernard Montgomery was then ordered to prepare plans for the invasion of neutral Ireland and to seize Cork, Cobh and Cork harbour.
51.
Bernard Montgomery was ruthless in sacking officers he considered would be unfit for command in action.
52.
Bernard Montgomery renamed his command the South-Eastern Army to promote offensive spirit.
53.
Bernard Montgomery had stabilised the Allied position at the First Battle of El Alamein, but after a visit in August 1942, the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, replaced him as C-in-C with General Sir Harold Alexander and William Gott as commander of the Eighth Army in the Western Desert.
54.
However, after Gott was killed flying back to Cairo, Churchill was persuaded by Brooke, who by this time was Chief of the Imperial General Staff, to appoint Bernard Montgomery, who had only just been nominated to replace Alexander, as commander of the British First Army for Operation Torch, the invasion of French North Africa.
55.
Bernard Montgomery asked Alexander to send him two new British divisions that were then arriving in Egypt and were scheduled to be deployed in defence of the Nile Delta.
56.
Bernard Montgomery moved his field HQ to Burg al Arab, close to the Air Force command post in order to better coordinate combined operations.
57.
Bernard Montgomery was determined that the army, navy and air forces should fight their battles in a unified, focused manner according to a detailed plan.
58.
Bernard Montgomery ordered immediate reinforcement of the vital heights of Alam Halfa, just behind his own lines, expecting the German commander, Erwin Rommel, to attack with the heights as his objective, something that Rommel soon did.
59.
Bernard Montgomery ordered all contingency plans for retreat to be destroyed.
60.
Bernard Montgomery made a great effort to appear before troops as often as possible, frequently visiting various units and making himself known to the men, often arranging for cigarettes to be distributed.
61.
Bernard Montgomery was criticised for not counter-attacking the retreating forces immediately, but he felt strongly that his methodical build-up of British forces was not yet ready.
62.
Bernard Montgomery prepared meticulously for the new offensive after convincing Churchill that the time was not being wasted.
63.
Bernard Montgomery correctly predicted both the length of the battle and the number of casualties.
64.
Bernard Montgomery was advanced to KCB and promoted to full general.
65.
Bernard Montgomery kept the initiative, applying superior strength when it suited him, forcing Rommel out of each successive defensive position.
66.
Bernard Montgomery managed to have the plans recast to concentrate the Allied forces, having Lieutenant General George Patton's US Seventh Army land in the Gulf of Gela rather than near Palermo in the west and north of Sicily.
67.
In conjunction with the Anglo-American landings at Salerno by Lieutenant General Mark Clark's US Fifth Army and seaborne landings by British paratroops in the heel of Italy, Bernard Montgomery led the Eighth Army up the toe of Italy.
68.
Bernard Montgomery abhorred what he considered to be a lack of coordination, a dispersion of effort, a strategic muddle and a lack of opportunism in the Allied effort in Italy, and he said that he was glad to leave the "dog's breakfast" on 23 December 1943.
69.
Bernard Montgomery was assigned to command the 21st Army Group consisting of all Allied ground forces participating in Operation Overlord, codename for the Allied invasion of Normandy.
70.
However Bernard Montgomery's patron, General Sir Alan Brooke, firmly argued that Bernard Montgomery was a much superior general to Alexander and ensured his appointment.
71.
Bernard Montgomery envisaged a ninety-day battle, with all forces reaching the Seine.
72.
Bernard Montgomery thus had to face what Stephen Badsey called the "most formidable" of all the German divisions in France.
73.
Later, when this plan had clearly failed, Eisenhower wrote that Bernard Montgomery had "evolved" the plan to have the US forces achieve the break-out instead.
74.
Air Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder complained that it was impossible to move fighter squadrons to France until Bernard Montgomery had captured some airfields, something he asserted that Bernard Montgomery appeared incapable of doing.
75.
Bernard Montgomery drew what was the indisputably correct conclusion from these events.
76.
Bernard Montgomery thus knew German Army Group B had lost 96,400 men while receiving 5,200 replacements and the Panzer Lehr Division now based at St Lo was down to only 40 tanks.
77.
Bernard Montgomery later wrote that he knew he had the Normandy campaign won at this point as the Germans had almost no reserves while he had three armoured divisions in reserve.
78.
The British journalist Mark Urban wrote that the purpose of Goodwood was to draw German troops to their left flank to allow the American forces to break out on the right flank, arguing that Bernard Montgomery had to lie to his soldiers about the purpose of Goodwood, as the average British soldier would not have understood why they were being asked to create a diversion to allow the Americans to have the glory of staging the breakout with Operation Cobra.
79.
American military writer Drew Middleton wrote that there is no doubt that Bernard Montgomery wanted Goodwood to provide a "shield" for Bradley, but at the same time Bernard Montgomery was clearly hoping for more than merely diverting German attention away from the American sector.
80.
British historian John Keegan pointed out that Bernard Montgomery made differing statements before Goodwood about the purpose of the operation.
81.
Keegan wrote that Bernard Montgomery engaged in what he called a "hedging of his bets" when drafting his plans for Goodwood, with a plan for a "break out if the front collapsed, if not, sound documentary evidence that all he had intended in the first place was a battle of attrition".
82.
Bernard Montgomery expressed his satisfaction at the results of Goodwood when calling the operation off.
83.
Brooke advised Bernard Montgomery to invite Churchill to Normandy, arguing that if the "sack Monty" campaign had won the Prime Minister over, then his career would be over, as having Churchill's backing would give Eisenhower the political "cover" to fire Bernard Montgomery.
84.
The so-called Falaise Gap was closed on 22 August 1944, but several American generals, most notably Patton, accused Bernard Montgomery of being insufficiently aggressive in closing it.
85.
Bernard Montgomery's handling of the Battle of Normandy was of a very high order, and as the person who would certainly have been blamed for losing the battle, he deserves the credit for winning it.
86.
Bernard Montgomery bitterly resented this change, although it had been agreed before the D-Day invasion.
87.
Winston Churchill had Bernard Montgomery promoted to field marshal by way of compensation.
88.
In September 1944, Bernard Montgomery ordered Crerar and his First Canadian Army to take the French ports on the English Channel, namely Calais, Boulogne and Dunkirk, and to clear the Scheldt, a task that Crerar stated was impossible as he lacked enough troops to perform both operations at once.
89.
Bernard Montgomery refused Crerar's request to have British XII Corps under Neil Ritchie assigned to help clear the Scheldt as Bernard Montgomery stated he needed XII Corps for Operation Market Garden.
90.
On 6 September 1944, Bernard Montgomery told Crerar that "I want Boulogne badly" and that city should be taken no matter what the cost.
91.
Bernard Montgomery was highly impatient with Simonds, complaining that it had taken Crocker's I Corps only two days to take Le Havre while it took Simonds two weeks to take Boulogne and Calais, but Simonds noted that at Le Havre, three divisions and two brigades had been employed, whereas at both Boulogne and Calais, only two brigades were sent in to take both cities.
92.
Bernard Montgomery had little respect for the Canadian generals, whom he dismissed as mediocre, with the exception of Simonds, whom he consistently praised as Canada's only "first-rate" general in the entire war.
93.
Ramsay in very strong language argued to Eisenhower that the Allies could only invade Germany if Antwerp was opened, and that as long as the three Canadian divisions fighting in the Scheldt had shortages of ammunition and artillery shells because Bernard Montgomery made the Arnhem salient his first priority, then Antwerp would not be opened anytime soon.
94.
Bernard Montgomery replied by accusing Ramsay of making "wild statements" unsupported by the facts, denying the Canadians were having to ration ammunition, and claimed that he would soon take the Ruhr thereby making the Scheldt campaign a sideshow.
95.
Bernard Montgomery further issued a memo entitled "Notes on Command in Western Europe" demanding that he be made Land Forces Commander.
96.
Bernard Montgomery was able to persuade Eisenhower to allow him to test his strategy of a single thrust to the Ruhr with Operation Market Garden in September 1944.
97.
Bradley was "concerned because it might discredit the American command" but that it might mean Bernard Montgomery would commit more of his reserves to the battle.
98.
Four days after Bernard Montgomery took command of the northern flank, the bad weather cleared and the USAAF and RAF resumed operations, inflicting heavy casualties on German troops and vehicles.
99.
Six days after Bernard Montgomery took command of the northern flank, General Patton's Third Army relieved the besieged American forces in Bastogne.
100.
On 4 May 1945, on Luneburg Heath, Bernard Montgomery accepted the surrender of German forces in north-west Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands.
101.
Britain, in 1944, did not possess the manpower to rebuild shattered divisions and it was imperative for Bernard Montgomery to protect the viability of the British army so that Britain could still play an important part in the final victory.
102.
Bernard Montgomery would be able to ensure that British units were spared some of the high-attrition actions, but would be most prominent when the final blows were struck.
103.
Bernard Montgomery initially remained prepared to push Second Army hard to capture the vital strategic town of Caen, and consequently incur heavy losses.
104.
Bernard Montgomery was notorious for his lack of tact and diplomacy.
105.
Smith jokingly replied that if Bernard Montgomery could do it he would give him a Flying Fortress complete with crew.
106.
Smith tried to laugh it off, but Bernard Montgomery was having none of it and insisted on his aircraft.
107.
Beevor says that in January 1945 Bernard Montgomery had tried to claim far too much credit for the British in defeating the German counter-attack in the Ardennes in December 1944.
108.
Bernard Montgomery was Chief of the Imperial General Staff from 1946 to 1948, succeeding Alan Brooke.
109.
However, Bernard Montgomery was barely on speaking terms with his fellow service chiefs, sending his deputy Kenneth Crawford to attend their meetings and he clashed particularly with Sir Arthur Tedder, who was by now Chief of the Air Staff.
110.
Bernard Montgomery was then appointed Chairman of the Western Union Defence Organization's C-in-C committee.
111.
Bernard Montgomery would continue to serve under Eisenhower's successors, Generals Matthew Ridgway and Al Gruenther, until his retirement, aged nearly 71, in 1958.
112.
Bernard Montgomery was created 1st Viscount Bernard Montgomery of Alamein in 1946.
113.
Bernard Montgomery was buried alongside her husband in the kirkyard behind St Columb's Church, the small Church of Ireland church beside New Park, overlooking Lough Foyle.
114.
Bernard Montgomery did not attend the funeral, claiming he was "too busy".
115.
Bernard Montgomery was an Honorary Member of the Winkle Club, a charity in Hastings, East Sussex, and introduced Winston Churchill to the club in 1955.
116.
Bernard Montgomery was chairman of the governing body of St John's School in Leatherhead, Surrey, from 1951 to 1966, and a generous supporter.
117.
Bernard Montgomery was President of Portsmouth Football Club between 1944 and 1961.
118.
Bernard Montgomery's memoirs criticised many of his wartime comrades in harsh terms, including Eisenhower.
119.
Bernard Montgomery was threatened with legal action by Field Marshal Auchinleck for suggesting that Auchinleck had intended to retreat from the Alamein position if attacked again, and had to give a radio broadcast expressing his gratitude to Auchinleck for having stabilised the front at the First Battle of Alamein.
120.
The 1960 paperback edition of Bernard Montgomery's memoirs contains a publisher's note drawing attention to that broadcast, and stating that although the reader might assume from Bernard Montgomery's text that Auchinleck had been planning to retreat "into the Nile Delta or beyond" in the publisher's view it had been Auchinleck's intention to launch an offensive as soon as the Eighth Army was "rested and regrouped".
121.
Bernard Montgomery was stripped of his honorary citizenship of Bernard Montgomery, Alabama, and was challenged to a duel by an Italian lawyer.
122.
Bernard Montgomery mentioned to the American journalist John Gunther in April 1944 that he kept a secret diary.
123.
Bernard Montgomery was harshly critical of US strategy in Vietnam, which involved deploying large numbers of combat troops, aggressive bombing attacks, and uprooting entire village populations and forcing them into strategic hamlets.
124.
Bernard Montgomery said that the Americans' most important problem was that they had no clear-cut objective, and allowed local commanders to set military policy.
125.
In retirement, Bernard Montgomery publicly supported apartheid after a visit to South Africa in 1962, and after a visit to China declared himself impressed by the Chinese leadership led by Chairman Mao Tse-tung.
126.
Bernard Montgomery died from unspecified causes in 1976 at his home Isington Mill in Isington, Hampshire, aged 88.
127.
Bernard Montgomery was survived by his son and only child David Montgomery, 2nd Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, as well as two grandchildren.