On 15 July 1939, De Guingand became the military assistant to the
Secretary of State for War,
Leslie Hore-Belisha, with the grade of
GSO2. Hore-Belisha had
civil service aides to assist him in his duties, but required an Army officer to advise him on military matters, to provide an Army point of view, and to assist in writing his speeches. As such, de Guingand accompanied Hore-Belisha on visits to military bases and establishments. Hore-Belisha was popular with the press and the people, but not so much with his
Cabinet colleagues. Wide-ranging reforms that included the dismissal of many senior Army officers soon made him unpopular in the Army. De Guingand gradually warmed to Hore-Belisha and assumed the role of a confidant. In this role he had exposure to the most senior officers in the Army and developed his skills in diplomacy. Hore-Belisha clashed repeatedly with the
Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS),
General Lord Gort, whom he had promoted to the position over the heads of sixty more senior officers and after the outbreak of war in September 1939. Hore-Belisha removed Gort by recommending him to command the
British Expeditionary Force in France, but the difficulties between the two continued, with arguments over the state of fortifications in France. The friction with Gort led to Hore-Belisha being forced to resign in January 1940.
Middle East De Guingand requested to be returned to his regiment, and on 21 January he reported to the West Yorkshire Regiment
depot, but was immediately placed on leave. On 25 February he was posted to the new staff college at
Haifa in
Palestine as an instructor. The war had created an urgent requirement for more trained staff officers, and the new staff college had been created to fill this role. When he arrived the commandant was
Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander Galloway but in August Galloway was replaced by Lieutenant-Colonel
Eric Dorman-Smith who had been an instructor at Camberley when de Guingand was there as a student. De Guingand soon became chief instructor. After a short period as Commandant of the newly formed School of Combined Operations with the rank of lieutenant-colonel, he was posted in December 1940 to the Joint Planning Staff of General Headquarters (GHQ)
Middle East Command in
Cairo where he also took on the role of secretary to the Commanders-in-Chief Committee. De Guingand was involved in the planning of
Operation Lustre, the despatch of a British and Allied expeditionary force to Greece in March 1941 in response to the failed
Italian invasion of Greece and the looming threat of German intervention. He flew over the
Aliakmon position where the British forces planned to make a stand, but this did nothing to dispel his doubts about whether the position could be held. He noted the extent of the front that would have to be held, and the ease with which a German
turning movement could be executed. On his own initiative de Guingand commenced joint planning with the
Royal Navy and
Royal Air Force (RAF) for the evacuation of the expeditionary force from Greece at an early date. The Commander-in-Chief Middle East, General Sir
Archibald Wavell, and his chief of the general staff, Major-General
Arthur Smith, were initially unaware of this activity. When Smith found out about it, he reported it to Wavell, who ordered de Guingand to cease forthwith, as he feared that it would affect the morale of the expeditionary force in Greece and become self-fulfilling. With the support of the naval and air Commanders-in-Chief de Guingand was allowed to continue with his planning, but Wavell directed that Army component was not to be informed. When the full weight of the
German invasion of Greece fell on the Allied positions, it soon became evident that the Aliakmon Line could not be held for long. The plan eventually had to be put into action, and the force was evacuated from Greece. De Guingand was appointed an
Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the
1942 New Year Honours.
Military intelligence In February 1942, Dorman-Smith, by this time Deputy Chief of the General Staff (DCGS) at GHQ, recommended de Guingand for the vacant post of Director of Military Intelligence, Middle East, with the rank of
brigadier. The appointment of de Guingand, an officer with no experience in intelligence, said much about the state of intelligence in the British Army at the time, where it was assumed that staff college training and a good brain were all that was required. Nonetheless, de Guingand ultimately proved to be very successful in this role. He selected two promising young officers at GHQ, Captain
Bill Williams and Major
James Ewart, to serve on his staff. Ewart could speak German fluently and Williams, as a trained historian, was accustomed to drawing information from disparate sources together to produce a larger picture. According to de Guingand, "Ewart and Williams were an ideal combination. They understood each other perfectly. Both had first-class brains, both were university dons and hated soldiering as a profession!" De Guingand had access to accurate intelligence through
Ultra codebreaking, but its interpretation always required skill and care. De Guingand made use of the
Long Range Desert Group to confirm reports from other sources. Indications that the Germans and Italians were about to initiate what became the
Battle of Gazala piled up in May 1942, allowing de Guingand to provide advance warning. In June 1942, he correctly predicted the
Axis capture of Tobruk. In July 1942, after the
First Battle of El Alamein, de Guingand was appointed the
Eighth Army's Brigadier General Staff (Operations) vice Brigadier
Jock Whiteley. The staff arrangements at the Eighth Army headquarters were confused; General Sir
Claude Auchinleck was both Commander-in-Chief Middle East and commander of the Eighth Army. Dorman-Smith, his DCGS in the former role, was present at Eighth Army headquarters, and as a major-general he outranked Whiteley. This created two lines of authority at the headquarters. De Guingand persuaded Auchinleck that Dorman-Smith would be more useful back in Cairo. De Guingand's General Staff branch had four GSO1s, Lieutenant-Colonel Hugh Mainwaring (operations), Lieutenant-Colonel L. M. (Spud) Murphy (intelligence), Lieutenant-Colonel
Charles Richardson (plans) and Lieutenant-Colonel
David Belchem (staff duties). To assist Murphy, de Guingand brought Williams from GHQ as the GSO2 (Intelligence).
Chief of staff to Montgomery When Montgomery was appointed to command the Eighth Army in August 1942 he summoned de Guingand to meet him. He later wrote Montgomery had sent a request to the new Commander-in-Chief Middle East, General Sir
Harold Alexander, that several officers be sent out from the UK, including Brigadier
Frank Simpson, who had served as his
chief of staff in the
3rd Division during the
Battle of France in 1940 and at
V Corps and
XII Corps in the UK. Montgomery warned de Guingand that he might be replaced, but that if this occurred, he would attempt to secure him a good position in the UK. He recommended that de Guingand take over as
Director of Military Intelligence (DMI) at the
War Office. In the event, owing to the death of another officer, the War Office decided that Simpson could not be spared from his duties as deputy director of Military Operations, and de Guingand served as Montgomery's
chief of staff for the rest of the war. Although common in other armies, the concept of a chief of staff was foreign to the British Army, where a staff was divided into separate general and administrative staff branches; at the Eighth Army headquarters the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) was Brigadier Sir
Brian Robertson, with Lieutenant-Colonel
Miles Graham as his deputy. Under the chief of staff system, one officer was responsible for both operations and administration. This was a system that Montgomery strongly favoured; he had served as chief of staff of the
47th (1/2nd London) Division during the
Great War.
Claude Pelly;
Air Vice Marshal Harry Broadhurst; General Sir
Bernard Montgomery; and
Admiral Sir
Bertram Ramsay. Montgomery moved the Eighth Army headquarters from
Ruweisat Ridge back to
Borg El Arab on the Mediterranean coast, about south west of
Alexandria, where it was collocated with that of the
Desert Air Force. De Guingand held a daily staff meeting at 07:00. He maintained personal contact with Robertson at Rear Army Headquarters and briefed Montgomery every night at 21:00 in the latter's map lorry.
Ultra intelligence decrypted an appreciation by the German commander,
Generalfeldmarschall Erwin Rommel, that indicated that he intended to attack in late August. The
full moon needed for a major night movement was on 26 August, and a prohibition on reconnaissance near the
Qattara Depression indicated that a flanking attack near there was likely. Montgomery fortified Alam el Halfa ridge and brought in the
44th (Home Counties) Division to defend it. De Guingand and Williams concocted a ruse whereby they prepared a fake "going" map indicating that an area of soft sand near the ridge was suitable for vehicles but it is uncertain as to whether the Germans were fooled. In any event, the German attack, delayed for several days by fuel shortages, was repulsed in the
Battle of Alam el Halfa. De Guingand urged that the Eighth Army carry out an immediate counter-attack but Montgomery did not consider that it was ready for this and passed up the opportunity in favour of a
set piece battle. Over the following weeks, de Guingand oversaw the preparations for the attack. When the preparations were complete, Montgomery decided that de Guingand looked tired and sent him back to Alexandria for a rest. De Guingand returned on 22 October. Contrary to his usual practice of locating himself at Main Headquarters (HQ) and paying daily visits to Montgomery at the forward Tactical Headquarters (Tac HQ), de Guingand established a small command post on the coast road near Tac HQ and those of
X Corps and
XXX Corps, which would be carrying out the operation. He took Richardson with him, leaving Mainwaring in charge back at Main HQ. The
Second Battle of El Alamein commenced at 02:00 on 24 October. Progress was initially good but by 02:00 the following night de Guingand was sufficiently disturbed by reports indicating the attack on the southern corridor had faltered to call an 03:30 conference at Tac HQ with the corps commanders, Lieutenant-Generals
Oliver Leese (XXX Corps) and
Herbert Lumsden (X Corps). De Guingand had to wake Montgomery, something that he later recalled he only had to do a few more times in the entire war. Montgomery agreed with de Guingand's evaluation of the situation. Operations on the southern corridor were suspended, and the forces there pulled back. By 29 October, the
Prime Minister,
Winston Churchill had become concerned at the lack of progress and sent Alexander and the
Minister-Resident for the Middle East,
Richard Casey to investigate. Montgomery convinced Alexander that matters were well in hand but de Guingand had to call on his diplomatic skills to dissuade Casey from sending a cable to London indicating that the outcome of the battle was still in doubt. It was won on 2 November and two days later de Guingand dined with Montgomery and
General der Panzertruppe Wilhelm Ritter von Thoma, the commander of the
Afrika Korps, who was now a
prisoner of war. Churchill ordered that church bells be rung throughout the kingdom to celebrate the victory. For his part in the battle, De Guingand received an immediate award of the
Distinguished Service Order on 5 November 1942.
Health issues and personal life Recurrent problems with gallstones struck de Guingand several times, often at crucial junctures and had the doctors had their way his tenure as the Eighth Army chief of staff would have been a short one. "The reaction of the
bon viveur to his illnesses was unusual", Richardson later wrote, "he could not be called a
hypochondriac, as there were very real, but he seemed to take an obsessive interest in their manifestations, and had an irrational faith in his many pills, and developed close friendships with his assorted medical advisors, so much so he was often in doubt whose advice to accept". During a visit to XXX Corps HQ near
Benghazi on 21 November, he was struck down with excruciating pain and evacuated to a hospital in Cairo. The medical authorities recommended three months' sick leave in South Africa. De Guingand anticipated spending the rest of the war as a "
base wallah" but Montgomery flew to Cairo to see him on 8 December and asked de Guingand when he felt he would be fit to join him again. De Guingand said he thought he would be fine in two to three weeks, so Montgomery went and spoke to the doctors and the medical board's verdict was changed from three months to three weeks. While on leave in Cairo, De Guingand married Arlie Roebuck Stewart, the Australian daughter of
Brisbane businessman Charles Woodhead, on 17 December 1942. She was the widow of a fellow officer in the West Yorkshire Regiment, Major Hugh Dalzell Stewart, who had been killed in the
Battle of Keren in 1941 and had been working in Cairo for an intelligence organisation. They had one child, a daughter called Marylou who was born in 1944, but the marriage ended in divorce in 1957. De Guingand returned to duty as chief of staff of the Eighth Army on 15 January 1943. He was advanced to
Commander of the Order of the British Empire on 26 February "in recognition of outstanding services during the operations resulting in the capture of Tripoli" at the conclusion of the
Western Desert campaign. When the first attack of the
Battle of Mareth failed on 20 March, the Eighth Army was confronted by its first setback since Auchinleck had been replaced. Montgomery told his staff "Send for Freddie". De Guingand and Montgomery discussed what could be done to retrieve the situation and resolved to strengthen the left hook manoeuvre being carried out by the
2nd New Zealand Division (Lieutenant-General
Bernard Freyberg).
Air Vice Marshal Harry Broadhurst then came up with an innovative proposal to clear the way using fighters and forty light bombers. The attack was successful; the
Mareth Line was breached and
Gabès was captured on 29 March. For his part in the campaign, de Guingand was
mentioned in despatches on 24 June 1943.
Italy , shortly before handing over command of the Eighth Army to prepare for the Normandy invasion in England. Left to right: de Guingand,
Air Vice Marshal Harry Broadhurst, Montgomery, Lieutenant-Generals
Bernard Freyberg,
Charles Walter Allfrey and
Miles Dempsey While the Eighth Army was still engaged in the
Tunisian campaign, planning was in train in
Algiers and Cairo for
Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of
Sicily. Unable to devote much time to it but concerned at how it was progressing, Montgomery decided that de Guingand would go to Cairo as his deputy, in charge of the planning group known as Force 545. In view of his new status and increased responsibility, de Guingand was granted the local rank of
major-general. He arrived in Cairo on 15 April. On taking over the planning for Operation Husky, he became concerned that it called for a series of dispersed landings based on the assumption that the German and Italian forces would not mount a fierce resistance. This ran contrary to the Eighth Army's experience with them in the North African campaign. Montgomery listened to de Guingand's appreciation on 23 April and then sent a message to the
Supreme Allied Commander,
General Dwight D. Eisenhower in Algiers, urging that the invasion plan be changed to concentrate the landings. Montgomery flew back to Tunisia on 26 April. His message had not been not received warmly in Algiers and Alexander had called a conference to discuss it. Montgomery fell ill, so he asked de Guingand to attend in his place. De Guingand's plane landed at
El Adem to refuel. On attempting to take off, it crashed. The aircraft was a write-off but none of those on board were killed. De Guingand suffered a series of fractures and a concussion. He was unconscious for several hours and was flown back to Cairo in an ambulance plane. Staff officers retrieved his briefcase containing the invasion plans for Operation Husky from his wife's flat in Cairo. After consulting some X-ray images, the doctors gave him two weeks' sick leave. Eventually Montgomery managed to convince
Major-General Walter Bedell Smith, Eisenhower's chief of staff, of the merit of his plan and Smith was able to convince Eisenhower on 3 May. With the notable exception of
Operation Ladbroke the airborne landing, which failed, the Eighth Army's assault on 10 July was successful. Montgomery went ashore the following day, only to find that his headquarters vehicles were missing. A sharp signal was sent to de Guingand, who managed to sort the problem out. For his services in Sicily, de Guingand was appointed
Companion of the Order of the Bath on 12 October. Even before the conclusion of the campaign in Sicily, preparations had commenced for the
Allied invasion of Italy. Once again a series of dispersed landings was contemplated, based on the expectation that Italy would soon surrender and the Germans would withdraw from Italy. The Eighth Army had a supporting role, conducting
Operation Baytown, a landing on the southern tip of Italy, while the
US Fifth Army made the main assault,
Operation Avalanche, at
Salerno. Neither Montgomery nor de Guingand was in favour of the plan, with de Guingand arguing that Baytown should be cancelled. As they feared, the Germans did resist and as the weather deteriorated in October, the Eighth Army's advance ultimately came to a halt on the
Winter Line.
North West Europe Operation Overlord When Montgomery departed from the Eighth Army in late December 1943 to assume command of the
21st Army Group in
Operation Overlord, the Allied invasion of
Normandy, he took several officers with him. These included de Guingand, Graham, Williams and Brigadier
George Richards. It was not the normal practice in the British Army for generals to take staff with them from one assignment to the next but Montgomery judged correctly that his fame as the victor of the Battle of El Alamein would overcome any objections. De Guingand and Graham were granted the acting rank of major-general on 15 January 1944, with de Guingand's promotion backdated to 1 December 1943. At 21st Army Group, de Guingand replaced Major-General
William Morgan, who went to Italy as Alexander's chief of staff. There were comments in London clubs to the effect that "the Gentlemen are out and the Players are just going in to bat." De Guingand arrived in the UK on 1 January and went over the Overlord plan with Smith the following day. The two were impressed by the amount of work that had been done by the staff of the Chief of Staff to the Supreme Allied Commander designate (COSSAC), Lieutenant-General
Frederick Morgan, but they had concerns regarding the size of the assault, its narrow frontage and the speed of the build up. Taken together, these factors made it unlikely that the port of
Cherbourg would be captured in less than two weeks but changing the plan to address these factors would require more aircraft, ships and landing craft; securing them would impose a delay. De Guingand and Smith arranged for a presentation to be given to Montgomery when he arrived and for a three-day conference at Montgomery's headquarters at
St Paul's School, London where the plan and alternatives were discussed with the COSSAC, air and naval staffs. Eisenhower arrived in the UK on 15 January and another conference was held at his headquarters at
Norfolk House on 21 January, where Montgomery's plan was tentatively accepted. Montgomery's rejection of the Overlord plan did not sit well with the COSSAC staff, who now formed part of Eisenhower's
Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF). Montgomery once wrote to the CIGS, General Sir
Alan Brooke about de Guingand, "I do not know what I should do without him as he is quite 1st class". De Guingand was indispensable to Montgomery, not only in battle but also in relations with the Americans. Montgomery was unpopular with them. In part this was due to
American nationalism, but this was only a contributing factor. Montgomery's abrasive personality, his arrogance, condescension and frequent tactlessness, often worked against him and the British cause. Recognising his own limitations and de Guingand's diplomatic skill, Montgomery would often send de Guingand to meetings in his place, but this practice could also cause resentment. In de Guingand Montgomery had a diplomatic but forceful advocate on controversial issues. De Guingand formed a close relationship with Bedell Smith, now Eisenhower's chief of staff at SHAEF and was able to smooth over many difficulties arising from Montgomery's poor relationships with many of his peers and superiors. De Guingand was highly respected by the Americans,
General of the Army Omar Bradley, who served under Montgomery's command as the commander of the
First United States Army and
US 12th Army Group, described de Guingand as
Headquarters organisation In the lead up to Operation Overlord, Montgomery left dealing with the details up to de Guingand and the staff, while he spent most of his time touring the country and talking to the troops. In his absence, de Guingand was in charge at St Paul's. He chaired the daily staff conferences and attended inter-staff meetings with his opposite numbers from the Royal Navy and RAF,
Rear Admiral George Creasy and Air Vice Marshal
Philip Wigglesworth. Montgomery noticed that de Guingand was showing signs of stress and fatigue and instructed Lieutenant-Colonel
Harry Llewellyn to report to him if de Guingand was unable to carry out his duties. For the first time Montgomery's command included large numbers of American soldiers, so he asked Eisenhower to provide him with an American
aide-de-camp. Eisenhower sent him two to choose from: Captains J. R. (Ray) BonDurant and Edwin (Bill) Carver. Montgomery chose BonDurant and with Eisenhower's permission also kept Carver, who became an aide to de Guingand. The American aides accompanied them on visits to American units. A Tac HQ was organised under Major Paul Odgers, who was brought from the Eighth Army Tac HQ for the purpose. De Guingand was disturbed at this; while a Tac HQ was appropriate for a
field army commander, he was not so sure that it was the best option for the commander-in-chief of an
army group, who should have been able to function from main headquarters. De Guingand failed to convince Montgomery of this. One problem that de Guingand saw was that the most senior officers at Tac HQ were three lieutenant-colonels; the rest were all majors or below. He felt that a more senior officer was required, one that could act in his stead. De Guingand chose Colonel Leo Russell. Although Odgers liked him, Russell had an abrasive personality and no battlefield experience, which made it hard for him to earn the respect of the more operationally experienced officers at Tac HQ. He later came into conflict with Montgomery over the theft of a pig and Montgomery had him removed from Tac HQ. with his knighthood in the field by
King George VI at
Eindhoven on 15 October 1944. On
D-Day, Allied forces secured a lodgement in Normandy, but it was not as deep as planned, and the city of
Caen was not captured. The arrangements for
British logistics in the Normandy campaign worked well. De Guingand was frustrated by the separation of Main HQ and Tac HQ by the
English Channel, which meant that he was no longer in daily face-to-face contact with Montgomery, although the two spoke on a
scrambler phone. Main HQ finally moved to
Bayeux in the second half of July. For his role in Operation Overlord, de Guingand was further promoted in the Order of the British Empire when he was created a
Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire on 29 June 1944. This was an unusual (although not unprecedented) honour for a temporary major-general, particularly one who still held the substantive rank of major. He was
invested with his
knighthood in the field by
King George VI at
Eindhoven on 15 October, along with Lieutenant-Generals
Miles Dempsey and
John Crocker. De Guingand's substantive rank was advanced to colonel on 1 December.
Final campaigns When American and British relations were strained in January 1945 after the
Battle of the Bulge by Montgomery's continued advocacy of the appointment of an Allied land forces commander, Eisenhower threatened to send a signal to the Combined Chiefs of Staff indicating that there was an unbridgeable gap between him and Montgomery. De Guingand feared that Montgomery was about to be sacked. He was able to persuade Eisenhower not to send the message and was then able to persuade Montgomery to send a heartfelt and apologetic one to Eisenhower. He then arranged to meet with the war correspondents committee, which was chaired by
Alan Moorehead and expressed his reservations about the news coverage of the battle and its effect on inter-Allied relations. In March 1945, Montgomery summoned de Guingand to his caravan, where Brigadier
Ernest Bulmer, the consulting physician to the 21st Army Group, was sitting beside him. Montgomery informed de Guingand that Bulmer had rendered a professional opinion that de Guingand was exhausted and needed a rest. When de Guingand protested, Bulmer listed the reasons behind his diagnosis. Montgomery and de Guingand then rounded on Bulmer, who offered to treat de Guingand with sedatives to help him sleep, on the proviso that de Guingand check in to a hospital in Brussels for 24 hours every two or three weeks. This deal was made subject to the war ending within three months. If it did not, then de Guingand would be relieved. That night, Montgomery brought de Guingand a cup of hot
Ovaltine to help him sleep. Neither it nor the drugs had the desired effect. For his part in the campaign in Borth West Europe, de Guingand was mentioned in despatches twice more, on 9 August and 8 November 1945. His services were recognised by the Americans with the award of the
Legion of Merit in the degree of commander in April 1945 and the
US Army Distinguished Service Medal in January 1948, and by the Netherlands with the
Knight Grand Officer of the Order of Orange Nassau with Swords on 17 October 1946. ==Post war==