A Field-Marshal in the Family

London: Constable and Company Ltd, 1973. P4 - A first British edition hardcover book SIGNED and dated by Brian Montgomery on the front free endpaper in very good condition in very good dust jacket that is mylar protected. Dust jacket has some wrinkling, chipping and crease on edges and corners, fading on the spine, some scattered light scratches, rubbing, scuffing, and foxing, tanning and light shelf wear. Book cocked, some bumped corners, wrinkling on the spine edges, light tanning and shelf wear. What kind of background lies behind the development of the most consistently successful military career of modern times? Field-Marshal Montgomery's brother, younger by 17 years and himself a high ranking military officer, is in a unique position to provide the answer. The result is primarily a fascinating account of the influences of heredity and environment that contributed to making him what he became, together with a wealth of unknown details of his career. The Field-Marshal's grandfather, Sir Robert Montgomery, was on the first Board of Administration of the Punjab, with wide responsibility for millions of people, and his exploits at Lahore and Lucknow in the Indian Mutiny unquestionably influenced the Field-Marshal's career, which was to contain various intriguing echoes of his grandfather's adventures. Dean Farrar, the Field-Marshal's maternal grandfather, was no less well-known. As Headmaster of Marlborough College, Dean of Canterbury, and author of several books, including Eric, or Little by Little he had an incalculable influence on mid-Victorian England. Aspects of the Field-Marshal's character that the author analyses include his regular opposition to authority, his many decisions to ignore rules and regulations, and his determined and perfectly logical views on self-publicity and the absolute necessity of it for commanders if they are to get the best results out of their troops. Also stemming from 1914 (when he was severely wounded in the first month of the war) was his intense concentration on battle training, and his comparative contempt for parade ground drill. 8.75"x5.5", 372 pages. Satisfaction Guaranteed. Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, KG, GCB, DSO, PC, DL, nicknamed "Monty", was a senior British Army officer who served in the First World War, the Irish War of Independence and the Second World War. Montgomery first saw action in the First World War as a junior officer of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment. At Méteren, near the Belgian border at Bailleul, he was shot through the right lung by a sniper, during the First Battle of Ypres. On returning to the Western Front as a general staff officer, he took part in the Battle of Arras in April-May 1917. He also took part in the Battle of Passchendaele in late 1917 before finishing the war as chief of staff of the 47th (2nd London) Division. In the inter-war years he commanded the 17th (Service) Battalion, Royal Fusiliers and, later, the 1st Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment before becoming commander of the 9th Infantry Brigade and then General officer commanding (GOC), 8th Infantry Division. During the Western Desert campaign of the Second World War, Montgomery commanded the British Eighth Army from August 1942, through the Second Battle of El Alamein and on to the final Allied victory in Tunisia in May 1943. He 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 (Operation Overlord), from D-Day on 6 June 1944 until 1 September 1944. He 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. When German armoured forces broke through the American lines in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge, Montgomery received command of the northern shoulder of the Bulge. This included temporary command of the US First Army and the US Ninth Army, which held up the German advance to the north of the Bulge while the US Third Army under Lieutenant General George Patton relieved Bastogne from the south. Montgomery's 21st Army Group, including the US Ninth Army and the First Allied Airborne Army, crossed the Rhine in Operation Plunder in March 1945, two weeks after the US First Army had crossed the Rhine in the Battle of Remagen. By the end of the war, troops under Montgomery's command had taken part in the encirclement of the Ruhr Pocket, liberated the Netherlands, and captured much of north-west Germany. On 4 May 1945, Montgomery accepted the surrender of the German forces in north-western Europe at Lüneburg Heath, south of Hamburg, after the surrender of Berlin to the USSR on 2 May. After the war he became Commander-in-Chief of the British Army of the Rhine (BAOR) in Germany and then Chief of the Imperial General Staff (1946-1948). From 1948 to 1951, he served as Chairman of the Commanders-in-Chief Committee of the Western Union. He then served as NATO's Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe until his retirement in 1958. . Signed by Author. First British Edition. Hardcover. Very Good/Very Good. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.