susan kitchen Posted 2 July , 2012 Share Posted 2 July , 2012 Can anyone recommend a biography of Douglas Haig. Not a problem to buy one but i did look in my local library. The only book on Haig they had was called " Reappraisal 80 years on." I know that in the post war years Haig came in for a lot of criticism and, i believe that during the 80's the tide of thinking begam to turn in his favour. Be interesting to know, without starting WW3 who is in the Haig camp. And those of you not on his side. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill24chev Posted 2 July , 2012 Share Posted 2 July , 2012 Haig! Its a very big can of worms. A recall a thread being closed recently by moderators after a member said something ungentlemanly about Haig. One or two of us took the bait and nearly started WW3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Sheldon Posted 2 July , 2012 Share Posted 2 July , 2012 Susan I suggest you start with the book in your library. It comprises a series of essays by respected historians and highlights various aspects of the man. After that, it is up to you, there is plenty of choice. The most recent - 'The Chief' by Gary Sheffield - has much to commend it. Jack Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim_Grundy Posted 2 July , 2012 Share Posted 2 July , 2012 John Terraine's "Haig. The Educated Soldier" is a pretty good place to start. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hazelclark Posted 2 July , 2012 Share Posted 2 July , 2012 John Terraine's "Haig. The Educated Soldier" is a pretty good place to start. As a relatively new reader of WW1 books, I would concur with Jack. The essays will give a more balanced view to start with. Terraine's book, is really pro Haig. If you read widely you can decide for yourself. I am still vacillating after reading umpteen books!! It was a different world with different values then. Hazel C Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
keithjk Posted 2 July , 2012 Share Posted 2 July , 2012 I agree with you Hazel. I have read probably the same 'umpteen books', and the verdict on Haig seems to range from 'Callous murderer' to 'The hero who single-handedly won the War'. I tend to come down somewhere close to the latter view, but that is of course a matter of personal choice. Keith Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimSmithson Posted 2 July , 2012 Share Posted 2 July , 2012 Is George away at the moment or busy watching the tennis? Or is that the name 'Winter' triggers something somewhere? Oh blast, done it now! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Tom Posted 2 July , 2012 Share Posted 2 July , 2012 Gary Sheffield's The Chief has a sub title - and the British Army. A consise overview of the war together with Haig's story in quite a small tome, a well worth while read. Old Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
susan kitchen Posted 2 July , 2012 Author Share Posted 2 July , 2012 Thanks for the replies. I had also seen a couple at the NAM, but i decided to ask peoples opinions first. I've read loads of books on the War but not concentrated on any one person. Thought i'd delve into Haig. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SWorrall Posted 12 July , 2012 Share Posted 12 July , 2012 Gary Mead's, J. P. Harris' & Walter Reid's volumes are all modern and all worth a read. Interesting to note that almost all recent work has taken a balanced view of Haig. The dire and hackneyed old idea of 'Butchers & Bunglers' has largely vanished. Winter is thoroughly discredited in academic circles. Simon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteveMarsdin Posted 13 July , 2012 Share Posted 13 July , 2012 Has GAC met his LBH ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenneth505 Posted 13 July , 2012 Share Posted 13 July , 2012 Interesting to note that almost all recent work has taken a balanced view of Haig. The dire and hackneyed old idea of 'Butchers & Bunglers' has largely vanished. Simon. It was Peter Hart's The Somme, and this forum that made me realize that opinion had moved or even could move from the Butchers and Bunglers view. I have come to think Haig a rather unsung star figure of the war. I notice that all the regular potatos on this forum (common taters) get a little edgy whenever his name is invoked. I must say that whenever I have a discussion about Haig with a person who might be called a casual student of the issue, meaning someone who does not obsessively check in at online chat forums about the topic they tend to think I'm daft when I make the argument in favor of Haig and attrition. On the surface the numbers seem to cry out that there must have been another way. Short of inventing cell phones and portable radios a few decades earlier I've come to think that there probably wasn't. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phil andrade Posted 14 July , 2012 Share Posted 14 July , 2012 One of the best summaries of Haig's record that I've ever encountered is on page 47 of David Stevenson's book WITH OUR BACKS TO THE WALL Victory and Defeat in 1918 In just one paragraph he gives a concise and balanced rendition of one of the most controversial personalities in British Military History. My own feeling is that it was Haig's personality - or lack of ? - that makes assessment so challenging. Has there ever been a commander who did so much, but of whom so little is mentioned regarding personal anecdote ? Sheffield's biography is well worth reading ; but if anyone wants to get a pithy summary which does justice to Haig's qualites, than I would suggest that a single paragraph from Stevenson's book will do the work. Phil (PJA) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Filsell Posted 14 July , 2012 Share Posted 14 July , 2012 Not sure that Harris is worth even bothering to open. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhilB Posted 14 July , 2012 Share Posted 14 July , 2012 if anyone wants to get a pithy summary which does justice to Haig's qualites, than I would suggest that a single paragraph from Stevenson's book will do the work. Phil (PJA) Any chance of posting this paragraph, Phil? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phil andrade Posted 14 July , 2012 Share Posted 14 July , 2012 Yes, of course. It'd be a pleasure, Phil : Haig was born in Edinburgh in 1861, into a prosperous middle - class background as the son of a whisky distiller. As was quite customary at the period, he studied at Oxford University without taking his degree, proceeding to Sandhurst to train as a cavalry officer. He passed out first, and although initially failing to gain admittance to staff college, he later excelled there. In the South African War he served as a staff officer and commanded a mobile column. He became Director of Staff Duties and Director of Military Training at the War Office in 1906 - 9 and Chief of Staff in India in 1909 - 11 before returning to Whitehall. In 1914 he commanded the BEF First Corps and then the BEF First Army before in December 1915 he became Commander - in - Chief at the age of fifty four. In 1905 he had married Doris, a maid of honour to Queen Alexandra who was barely half his age, but they established a contended partnership that produced four children. Haig was well connected but he also had wide experience and considerable intellect, as well as physcal courage. He was interested in modern technology and enthusiastic about applying it. His judgement was firm, though not always consistent, and he had strong likes and dislikes, many of the latter confined to his diary ( which he intended to publish). Among his dislikes were the French - with whom none the less he generally co-operated loyally and whose language he spoke adequately - and politicians, against whom he sniped but towards whom he could be surprisingly deferential. During his tenure the BEF suffered hundreds of thousands of casualties, and yet a big majority elected him the first President of the British Legion after the war. He believed the struggle could not be won by staying on the defensive, or by operations in secondary theatres, and that an extended period of attrition would be needed before victory was attainable - a victory that none the less through 1916 and 1917 he had supposed to be closer than it was. He seems never to have questioned that victory's necessity, although the peace terms he envisaged were moderate. A fair reckoning, I think. Phil (PJA) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhilB Posted 14 July , 2012 Share Posted 14 July , 2012 Thanks Phil. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steenie Posted 15 July , 2012 Share Posted 15 July , 2012 (edited) Why haig should be such a can of worms I don't know. There is enough to read about him. However, some people like George will take this and run with it and damn everyon else in a pompous way who dare even hint at this man being a *****. I think he was, He screwed up in every war game before the war he was in, in the Boer War, without French he would have done the same and in the Great War Lloyd George was actively NOT sending Englishmen to France so that Haig didn't get them killed off in another futile offensive. If that doesn't get George up and shouting I don't know what will. LOL Edited 15 July , 2012 by Alan Curragh Crudity removed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IanA Posted 15 July , 2012 Share Posted 15 July , 2012 some people like George will take this and run with it and damn everyon else in a pompous way who dare even hint at this man being a dick head. I think he was, I can't see George being bothered to reply to that. I was going to report the crudity but I think matters are best served by letting it stand. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PMHart Posted 15 July , 2012 Share Posted 15 July , 2012 Yep - Steenie is exactly what it says on the tin! Pete Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert Dunlop Posted 16 July , 2012 Share Posted 16 July , 2012 He screwed up in every war game before the war he was in...Unlike Kaiser Wilhelm, who won every war game before the war that he was in... Robert Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phil andrade Posted 16 July , 2012 Share Posted 16 July , 2012 The thing that I'm driving at here - and it can be extended well beyond Haig, and, indeed, to many other walks of life - is how we might accord more praise to someone when he achieves something " outside his comfort zone " ( that horrible phrase again ) than when he achieves great things in circumstances more suited to his training and inclination. That great series of victories - The Hundred Days - is cited as Haig's vindication. This is the thrust of so much of recent historiography, with an implication - no, it's explicit - that this has been overlooked and not properly acknowledged for the triumph that it was. Now I'm thinking about the desperate battle that Haig made as Commander First Corps at Ypres in Ocotober - November 1914. It was noted at the time - principally by Wilson, for questionable reasons - that this defined Haig as a good defensive commander. This is not the way that many people today would choose to depict him. I wonder if it's how Haig himself would choose to be desribed. Editing here : Sorry, this post belongs to a thread I opened on the Western front section of the Forum ; it's not completely out of place here, though. Phil (PJA) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jacksdad Posted 3 August , 2012 Share Posted 3 August , 2012 Unlike Kaiser Wilhelm, who won every war game before the war that he was in... Robert hehehe - I like that... how come everyone gets down on Haig - sure 'everyone' got killed - but he won... Willie killed 'everyone', lost, blamed the ones who managed to survive and shot through on holiday leaving the mess. Then realised that the great German army was 'never defeated in the field'.. so technically they didn't really lose - admittedly 'everyone' still got killed but, well, that was harder to fudge wasn't it. or was that another guy who figured that out... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris_Baker Posted 3 August , 2012 Share Posted 3 August , 2012 Lloyd George was actively NOT sending Englishmen to France so that Haig didn't get them killed off in another futile offensive. Instead, he sent them to Palestine, Salonika, East Africa, Italy and numerous other places where they could have no effect whatsoever on beating the main enemy in the main theatre. Futility? Got it in one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steven Broomfield Posted 3 August , 2012 Share Posted 3 August , 2012 Why haig should be such a can of worms I don't know. There is enough to read about him. However, some people like George will take this and run with it and damn everyon else in a pompous way who dare even hint at this man being a *****. I think he was, He screwed up in every war game before the war he was in, in the Boer War, without French he would have done the same and in the Great War Lloyd George was actively NOT sending Englishmen to France so that Haig didn't get them killed off in another futile offensive. If that doesn't get George up and shouting I don't know what will. LOL I've only just read this. What an extremely unpleasant and un-necessary post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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