Belgium and France 1939−1940 inspecting men of the 2nd Battalion,
Hampshire Regiment, part of the
1st Infantry Brigade (Guards) of Alexander's 1st Division, near Bachy, France, December 1939. Following the outbreak of the
Second World War, in September 1939, Alexander brought the 1st Division to
France, where it became part of the
British Expeditionary Force (BEF) and served there for the next eight months. In May 1940, when the
German Army invaded France, he successfully led the division's
withdrawal to Dunkirk, where it was
evacuated to England, along with the rest of the BEF. Shortly after Major-General
Bernard Montgomery had been appointed to command
II Corps (and before that the
3rd Division), Alexander was, while still on the
beachhead, placed in command of
I Corps, and left the eastern mole on the destroyer
Venomous late on 2 June after ensuring that all British troops had been evacuated. In recognition of his services in the field from March to June 1940, Alexander was again
mentioned in despatches.
United Kingdom 1940−1942 After Dunkirk, Alexander returned to the United Kingdom and continued to command I Corps, now guarding the coasts of
Yorkshire and
Lincolnshire as part of
Northern Command. He was promoted acting
lieutenant-general in July 1940, and in December 1940 he was appointed to succeed
Claude Auchinleck as
General Officer Commanding-in-Chief (GOC-in-C) of
Southern Command, which was responsible for the defence of south-west England. His rank of lieutenant-general was made permanent in December 1940. and in February, after the
Japanese invasion of Burma, was sent to
India to become GOC-in-C of British Forces in Burma as a full
general. Alexander was unable to fulfil his orders to hold
Rangoon, which was abandoned on 6–7 March. He took personal charge of some small local engagements, was recalled to the United Kingdom. He was at first selected to command the
British First Army, which was to take part in
Operation Torch, the Anglo-American invasion of
French North Africa. However, following a visit in early August to
Egypt by the
British Prime Minister,
Winston Churchill, and the
Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS),
General Sir Alan Brooke, Alexander flew to
Cairo on 8 August to replace General
Claude Auchinleck, Alexander's predecessor at Southern Command in the United Kingdom, as C-in-C of
Middle East Command, the post responsible for the overall conduct of the
campaign in the desert of North Africa. At the same time, Lieutenant-General Montgomery replaced Auchinleck as GOC of the
British Eighth Army. Alexander presided over Montgomery's victory at the
Second Battle of El Alamein and the advance of the Eighth Army to
Tripoli, for which Alexander was elevated to a
Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath, and, after the Anglo-American forces of the First Army (under Lieutenant-General
Kenneth Anderson) from Operation Torch and the Eighth Army
converged in Tunisia in February 1943, they were brought under the unified command of a newly formed
18th Army Group headquarters, commanded by Alexander and reporting to
General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the
Supreme Allied Commander in the
Mediterranean theatre at
Allied Forces Headquarters (AFHQ). The American General
Omar Bradley, who fought in the Tunisian campaign, then commanding the
U.S. II Corps, credited Alexander's patience and experience with helping an inexperienced United States "field command mature and eventually come of age". The
Axis forces in Tunisia surrendered by May 1943, with some 250,000 Axis troops surrendering, the largest surrender yet in the war. Alexander telegraphed Churchill in response, stating:
Sicily and Italy 1943−1945 Dwight D. Eisenhower,
Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder, General Sir Harold Alexander,
Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham, (top row, left to right)
Harold Macmillan,
Major General Walter Bedell Smith and unidentified British officers. After the Tunisian campaign, Alexander's command became the
15th Army Group, which became responsible (under General Eisenhower) for mounting the July 1943
Allied invasion of Sicily (codenamed Operation Husky). Once again, Alexander directed two
field armies, both commanded by strong-willed characters who were not easy to control: General Montgomery's British Eighth Army and
Lieutenant General George S. Patton's
U.S. Seventh Army. The campaign did not portray Alexander at his best and he failed to grip his two commanders. Montgomery's Eighth Army found itself in a slogging match against typically skilful German opposition on the
Catanian plain and on the slopes of
Mount Etna. Patton, resentful in his belief that he and his Seventh Army had been given a secondary role in the campaign, confronted Alexander and successfully argued for his army to be allowed to drive to the northwest and to capture
Palermo. Although initially reluctant to allow Patton such a role, Alexander eventually, but reluctantly, allowed the Seventh Army commander to have his way, although Palermo did not appear to have much strategic significance. Despite this, it turned out to be the key to unlocking the Axis forces' defences and gave the Americans an easier route towards
Messina. The brief campaign in Sicily proved largely successful, but some (with Montgomery among the loudest of the critics) believed that the campaign lacked direction - and blamed Alexander. Furthermore, although the Axis forces had been forced to withdraw from Sicily, they had managed to do so in relatively good order, crossing the
Straits of Messina into Italy. After Sicily, planning began for the
Allied invasion of Italy, which began on 3 September 1943 (the fourth anniversary of Britain's entry into the war). Montgomery's Eighth Army launched
Operation Baytown, crossing over into Calabria but initially facing little real opposition and slowly making its way up the Italian peninsula. Six days later the
U.S. Fifth Army (which, despite its name, included the
British X Corps under Lieutenant-General
Richard McCreery, under its command) under Lieutenant General
Mark W. Clark landed at Salerno as part of
Operation Avalanche, which, initially at least, started off well, before encountering heavy resistance and almost being thrown back into the sea. He supported McCreery when he refused to consider evacuation plans that Clark had been considering. Alexander was also instrumental in convincing Clark to replace the
U.S. VI Corps commander, Major General
Ernest J. Dawley - who had not performed well and whom Alexander described as "a broken reed" - with Major General
John P. Lucas. Despite the heavy casualties sustained at Salerno, the Allies managed to force the Axis forces back and, with both the Fifth and Eighth Armies now united at last, began pursuing the retreating enemy. By December 1943 progress had virtually ground to a halt as the Axis had Alexander's 15th Army Group held up at the
Winter Line (also known as the Gustav Line) and ground was gained only at the expense of heavy casualties. At around this time there were numerous Allied command changes, with Montgomery handing over the Eighth Army to Lieutenant-General
Sir Oliver Leese and departing for the United Kingdom to take up command of the
21st Army Group, which controlled all Allied land forces for the planned
invasion of Normandy, whilst General
Sir Henry Wilson replaced Eisenhower as the Supreme Allied Commander in the Mediterranean in January 1944. HQ, Italy, 15 December 1943 The fighting in Italy would continue to prove even more difficult for Alexander's forces over the following few months. Between January and May 1944, numerous Allied
attacks were repulsed at Monte Cassino (which was also bombed in February 1944, with Alexander taking responsibility for the decision to bomb it) and the
Anzio landings of January 1944 by Lucas's U.S. VI Corps began well but did not live up to expectations and eventually ended up in a stalemate, like the rest of the Italian fighting so far. Alexander had a large part in planning the landings (code-named "Operation Shingle"), and intended to draw German strength away from the Winter Line and to cut their
lines of communication. The scheme was supported by Prime Minister Churchill, who had very high expectations for Shingle. However, the operation was flawed in many ways. In particular, Alexander's plan of seizing the
Alban Hills might possibly have led to the entire Allied force (comprising only two infantry divisions, elements of the
U.S. 1st Armored Division, and other smaller units in support) being wiped out. Despite Churchill's and Alexander's intentions, the Allied forces at Anzio did not achieve the somewhat unrealistic expectations, and were essentially cut off from any support, although they did manage to lure German reserves from elsewhere, which might otherwise have been available for service on the
Eastern Front or during the impending Allied invasion of Normandy. When Eisenhower was appointed in December 1943 as Supreme Allied Commander for the planned Normandy landings, he suggested that Alexander become ground-forces commander, as he was popular with both British and American officers. Omar Bradley (who had commanded U.S. II Corps in Sicily, and later the
U.S. First Army and then the
U.S. 12th Army Group) remarked that he would have preferred to work with Alexander rather than Montgomery, as he regarded the former as "a restrained, self-effacive and punctilious soldier". Of the problems that subsequently surfaced with Montgomery's command of the Anglo-Canadian
21st Army Group, Bradley suspected they would not have occurred with Alexander in command. Brooke, however, applied pressure to keep Alexander in Italy, considering him unfit for the assignment in France. Thus Alexander remained in command of the 15th Army Group, and, with the support of numerous Allied commanders, controversially authorised the
bombing of the historic abbey at Monte Cassino (February 1944), which resulted in little advance on the German
Winter Line defences, which had managed to halt the Allied advance in Italy. It was not until the fourth attempt that the Winter Line was breached by the Allies, and Alexander's forces moved on to capture
Rome in June 1944, thereby achieving one of the strategic goals of the Italian campaign. However, the U.S. VI Corps, now under Major General
Lucian Truscott, in the Anzio beachhead, under U.S. Fifth Army commander Clark's orders, failed to follow their original break-out plan that would have trapped the
German 10th Army escaping northwards in the aftermath of the Battle of Monte Cassino, instead favouring an early and highly publicised entry into
Rome two days before the Allied landings in Normandy. Although Alexander was angry at Clark for deliberately disobeying his specific orders in order to reach Rome first, he chose to say nothing, believing that it would do nothing for the Allied cause if he were to do so. of the Mediterranean Forces, at his Headquarters in the
Palace of Caserta, Italy Alexander remained in command of the 15th Army Group, as well as of its successor, the
Allied Armies in Italy (AAI), for most of the Italian campaign, until December 1944, when he relinquished his command to Clark and took over as the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces Headquarters, responsible for all military operations in the
Mediterranean theatre. Alexander was concurrently promoted to the rank of
field marshal, though this was backdated to the fall of Rome on 4 June 1944, so that Alexander would once again be senior to Montgomery, who had himself been made a field marshal on 1 September 1944, after the end of the
Battle of Normandy. Alexander received the German surrender in Italy on 29 April 1945. As a reward for his
leadership in North Africa and Italy, Alexander, along with a number of other prominent British Second World War military leaders, was elevated to the
peerage on 1 March 1946 by
King George VI; he was created Viscount Alexander of
Tunis and of
Errigal in the
County of Donegal. and other senior Allied commanders at Anzio, Italy, 5 May 1944. Major-General
John Hawkesworth is pictured on the far right wearing a
parachutist helmet, and to the left of him is Major-General
Philip Gregson-Ellis. Throughout the war, Alexander would attain a reputation for being empathetic and considerate, and a skilled mediator; however the extent to which he was able to come up with his own ideas versus relying on others would be a matter of debate. One historian would describe him as "Not a great soldier though he was a strategist of some insight", whilst
B. H. Liddell Hart would describe him as "though highly intelligent with an open mind...fundamentally a lazy general", stating "he might have been a greater commander if he had not been so nice a man and so deeply a gentleman." Brooke felt that Alexander needed an able
chief of staff "to think for him", while Montgomery (Alexander's subordinate in North Africa, Sicily and Italy) claimed to think of Alexander as "incompetent" and believed that success was attained in Tunisia only because Montgomery lent Lieutenant-General
Brian Horrocks, the commander of
IX Corps of Anderson's First Army, to organise the
coup de grace. However,
Harold Macmillan (British Minister Resident in the Mediterranean from 1942 to 1945) was impressed by Alexander's calm and style - the general conducted dinners in his mess like those at an
Oxbridge high table, discussing architecture and the campaigns of
Belisarius, rather than the current war. Macmillan thought Alexander's urbane manner and willingness to discuss and compromise were a sensible way to maintain inter-Allied cooperation, but Alexander's reserve was such that some thought him empty of strategic ideas and unable to make decisions. Graham and Bidwell, however, wrote that Alexander's impenetrable reserve made it hard to judge whether or not he had any military ideas. They state that he was "unable or unwilling" to assert his will over his army commanders, and that Mark Clark, who often referred to Alexander scornfully as a "peanut" and a "feather duster", exploited this weakness. ==Governor General of Canada==