Apr 1, 2022
What did it take to be a good junior officer in the First World
War?
This month, Chris, Angus and Jessica speak to Charles Fair about
the development of junior officer training in the war. Along the
way we discuss the significance of the Territorial Force, which
schools had officer training corps and the definition of a
'temporary gentleman'.
References
Blackadder Goes Forth (1983)
Dan Todman, The Great War: Myth and Memory
(2007)
Dorothy L. Sayers, Murder Must Advertise (1933)
Gary Sheffield, Leadership in the Trenches: Officer-Man
Relations, Morale and Discipline in the British Army in the Era of
the First World War (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2000)
Henry Ogle and Michael Glover (ed), The Fateful Battle
Line: The Great War Journals and Sketches of Captain Henry Ogle
MC (1993)
H. F. Maltby, A Temporary Gentleman (1920)
Ian Isherwood, Remembering the Great War: Writing and
Publishing the Experiences of World War I (2017)
John Bourne, ‘British Generals in the First World War’ in Gary
Sheffield (ed), Leadership and Command: The Anglo-American
Military Experience since 1861, (London: Brassey's, 1997) pp.
93-116
John Bourne, ‘The BEF's Generals on 29 September 1918: An
Empirical Portrait with Some British and Australian Comparisons’ in
Peter Dennis and Jeffrey Gray (eds), Defining Victory
1918, (Canberra: Army History Unit, Dept of Defence, 1999),
pp.96-113.
Martin Petter, (1994). ‘Temporary Gentlemen’ in the aftermath
of the Great War: Rank, status and the ex-officer problem. The
Historical Journal, 37(1), 127-152.
doi:10.1017/S0018246X00014734
Michael Roper, The Secret Battle: Emotional Survival in
the Great War (2009)
Paul Harris, The Men Who Planned the War: A Study of the
Staff of the British Army on the Western Front,
1914-1918(2015)
Peter Simkins,‘ ‘Building Blocks’: Aspects of Command and
Control at Brigade level in the BEF’s Offensive Operations,
1916-–1918’ in Gary Sheffield and Dan Todman (eds), Command and
Control on the Western Front: The British Army’s Experience
1914-18, (Staplehurst: Spellmount, 2004)
R.C. Sherrif, Journey's End (1928)
Reginald Hill, The Wood Beyond (1995)
Robert Graves, Goodbye to All That (1929)
Royal Military College Sandhurst, ‘Syllabus of the Course of
Instruction (For Three-Term Course)’, 1912
Siegfried Sassoon, The Memoirs of George Sherston
(1928-1936)
Tim Halstead, ' "A Ragged Business": Officer Training Corps,
Public Schools and the Recruitment of the Junior Officer Corps of
1916' in Spencer Jones (ed) At All Costs: The British Army on
the Western Front 1916, pp. 414-429. Also see his forthcoming
More Than Victims of Horace: Public Schools 1914-1918
(Helion, 2022)