27 Facts About Thomas Pilcher

Major-General Thomas David Pilcher, CB was a British Army officer, who commanded a mounted infantry unit in the Second Boer War and the 17th Division during the First World War, before being removed from command in disgrace during the Battle of the Somme.

However, further promotion was checked by his having come into conflict with his commander-in-chief, who regarded him as unsuited for senior command in part because of his writings; Thomas Pilcher was a keen student of the German army and its operational methods, and an active theorist who published a number of controversial books advocating the adoption of new military techniques as well as an anonymous invasion novel.

The division supported the initial attacks at the Battle of the Somme in July 1916, where Thomas Pilcher again clashed with his superiors over his refusal to push on an attack without pausing for preparations, believing it would result in failure and heavy casualties.

Thomas Pilcher ran as a parliamentary candidate for the splinter right-wing National Party in the 1918 general election, and continued a loose involvement with right-wing politics which extended to membership in the early British Fascisti.

Thomas Pilcher had married Kathleen Gonne, daughter of a cavalry officer, in 1889; the marriage was strained, partly through Thomas Pilcher's gambling habits and adultery, and partly through his dislike for Maud Gonne, Kathleen's sister and a prominent Irish nationalist.

Thomas Pilcher remarried in 1913, and remained married to his second wife Millicent until his death in 1928.

Thomas Pilcher was the eldest of five children ; his younger brother, Percy, would go on to become a pioneering aeronautical engineer, assisted by their sister Ella who undertook the fabric work on the aircraft's wings.

Thomas Pilcher was educated at Harrow School, but after his father died in October 1874, he left the school the following year.

Thomas Pilcher brought his three younger siblings home, and entered the British Army, commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Dublin City Artillery Militia in August 1878.

Commissions in the Militia were often used as a stepping-stone to a commission in the Regular Army, and Thomas Pilcher rapidly transferred out, first to the 22nd Regiment of Foot in June 1879, then almost immediately to the 5th Fusiliers in July.

Thomas Pilcher had been promoted to temporary lieutenant colonel in November 1897.

Thomas Pilcher was promoted to lieutenant colonel on 20 October 1900, and to colonel on 29 November 1900, and in 1901 he was made an aide-de-camp to King Edward VII.

Thomas Pilcher commanded Regular brigades at Aldershot from 1902 to 1907, including the 3rd Brigade, part of the 2nd Division of the 1st Army Corps, in May 1904, for which he was promoted to substantive colonel and temporary brigadier general while employed in this role.

Thomas Pilcher was promoted to major general in February 1907, while still commanding the brigade.

Thomas Pilcher disapproved of his sister-in-law, particularly after her marriage to John MacBride, and relations were frequently strained; however, the two sisters remained close.

The elder son, Sir Gonne Thomas Pilcher, became a High Court judge, while Tommy would be killed at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle in 1915, aged 21.

Thomas Pilcher's marriage was not a happy one; a gambler and womaniser, he expected his independently wealthy wife to bail out his debts and turn a blind eye to his mistresses.

The precipitating event was Thomas Pilcher having been named as co-respondent in a divorce suit; it was alleged that he had committed adultery with Millicent Knight-Bruce, the wife of Major James Knight-Bruce.

Thomas Pilcher did not contest his wife's suit, and his own divorce was granted in 1911; he married Millicent, now divorced, in 1913.

Thomas Pilcher was a particularly active observer of the German army, studying their military methods and attending German army manoeuvres.

Thomas Pilcher's writing was sometimes controversial, beginning with the 1896 Artillery from an Infantry Officer's Point of View, in which he argued strongly in favour of adopting indirect fire techniques from concealed locations.

In 1906, Thomas Pilcher had published an anonymous invasion novel, The Writing on the Wall, which described a German invasion of Britain; The war he theorised was an invasion by Germany followed by a rapid collapse of the British forces, particularly the volunteers, which he saw as unfit for purpose; he advocated a form of conscription and a mandatory reserve system to strengthen the Army.

Thomas Pilcher was perceived by many as old-fashioned and disengaged, rarely visiting the trenches; the journalist Philip Gibbs remarked on his "courteous old-fashioned dignity and gentleness of manner", but concluded simply that "modern warfare was too brutal for him".

Thomas Pilcher's command was certainly slack; an observer in the summer of 1916, recently appointed to the 17th Division as a staff officer, recalled finding a completely disorganised unit, with no central co-ordination, no effective provision of laundry or comforts for front-line units, and described the divisional staff as simply "of no value".

Thomas Pilcher was later appointed to command the Eastern Reserve Centre at St Albans, and retired from the army in 1919, by which time the war was over.

Thomas Pilcher opposed the sitting Liberal member Athelstan Rendall, a Coalition Coupon candidate, representing the splinter right-wing National Party of Conservatives opposed to the Coalition.

Thomas Pilcher continued a loose association with right-wing politics, chairing the anti-Bolshevik National Security Union, and joining the anti-socialist and protectionist British Commonwealth Union.