John Gough (VC)
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Brigadier-General Sir John Edmond Gough (25 October 1871 – 22 February 1915), was a
British Army The British Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of the United Kingdom. the British Army comprises 73,847 regular full-time personnel, 4,127 Brigade of Gurkhas, Gurkhas, 25,742 Army Reserve (United Kingdom), volunteer reserve perso ...
officer and a recipient of the
Victoria Cross The Victoria Cross (VC) is the highest and most prestigious decoration of the Orders, decorations, and medals of the United Kingdom, British decorations system. It is awarded for valour "in the presence of the enemy" to members of the British ...
, the highest award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and
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forces.


Early military career

Gough, known as "Johnnie", was the son of General Sir Charles Gough, and nephew of General Sir Hugh Gough, both of whom won the
Victoria Cross The Victoria Cross (VC) is the highest and most prestigious decoration of the Orders, decorations, and medals of the United Kingdom, British decorations system. It is awarded for valour "in the presence of the enemy" to members of the British ...
(VC) during the Indian Mutiny in 1857. This gave the family the rare distinction of holding the VC simultaneously by father, brother and (father's) son. He was also the younger brother of General Sir Hubert Gough (1870–1963), who led the
British Fifth Army The Fifth Army was a field army of the British Army during World War I that formed part of the British Expeditionary Force (World War I), British Expeditionary Force on the Western Front (World War I), Western Front between 1916 and 1918. The arm ...
on the Western Front during the First World War. Gough was, after graduating from the
Royal Military College, Sandhurst The Royal Military College (RMC) was a United Kingdom, British military academy for training infantry and cavalry Officer (armed forces), officers of the British Army, British and British Indian Army, Indian Armies. It was founded in 1801 at Gre ...
, commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Rifle Brigade (The Prince Consort's Own) on 12 March 1892, and promoted to
lieutenant A lieutenant ( , ; abbreviated Lt., Lt, LT, Lieut and similar) is a Junior officer, junior commissioned officer rank in the armed forces of many nations, as well as fire services, emergency medical services, Security agency, security services ...
on 6 December 1893. He served in British Central Africa in 1896, the Sudan in 1898, and took part in the Occupation of Crete (1898–99). Promoted to
captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader or highest rank officer of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police depa ...
on 5 December 1898, he served in the
Second Boer War The Second Boer War (, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, Transvaal War, Anglo–Boer War, or South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer republics (the South African Republic and ...
from 1899 until 1902, and received a
brevet rank In military terminology, a brevet ( or ) is a warrant which gives commissioned officers a higher military rank as a reward without necessarily conferring the authority and privileges granted by that rank. The promotion would be noted in the of ...
of
major Major most commonly refers to: * Major (rank), a military rank * Academic major, an academic discipline to which an undergraduate student formally commits * People named Major, including given names, surnames, nicknames * Major and minor in musi ...
on 29 November 1900. After the war ended in June 1902, Gough was among a number of officers who left
Cape Town Cape Town is the legislature, legislative capital city, capital of South Africa. It is the country's oldest city and the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. Cape Town is the country's List of municipalities in South Africa, second-largest ...
on the in late July, arriving in
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the following month. In late 1902 he left the United Kingdom for
Berbera Berbera (; , ) is the capital of the Sahil, Somaliland, Sahil region of Somaliland and is the main sea port of the country, located approximately 160 km from the national capital, Hargeisa. Berbera is a coastal city and was the former capital of t ...
, to be a
staff officer A military staff or general staff (also referred to as army staff, navy staff, or air staff within the individual services) is a group of officers, enlisted, and civilian staff who serve the commander of a division or other large milita ...
in a flying column in the Somaliland Field Force, serving in
British Somaliland British Somaliland, officially the Somaliland Protectorate (), was a protectorate of the United Kingdom in modern Somaliland. It was bordered by Italian Somalia, French Somali Coast and Ethiopian Empire, Abyssinia (Italian Ethiopia from 1936 ...
during the Third Somaliland Expedition. He was seconded from his regiment in order to attend the
Staff College, Camberley Staff College, Camberley, Surrey, was a staff college for the British Army and the presidency armies of British India (later merged to form the Indian Army). It had its origins in the Royal Military College, High Wycombe, founded in 1799, which ...
from 1904–05, was back in Somaliland in 1909, then returned to the college as an influential lecturer on war studies from 1909 to 1913. He was promoted to colonel in December 1909.


Award of the VC

Gough was 31 years old, and a brevet major in the Rifle Brigade (The Prince Consort's Own) during the Third Somaliland Expedition when the following event took place for which he was awarded the VC. On 22 April 1903, Gough was in command of a column on the march which was attacked by an enemy force in superior numbers, that is the Darawiish army of Diiriye Guure near Daratoleh, British Somaliland. After conducting a successful defence, then a fighting withdrawal, Gough came back to help two captains ( William George Walker and George Murray Rolland). The captains were helping a mortally wounded officer. They managed to get the wounded officer onto a camel, but then he was wounded again and died immediately. The two captains won the VC for their actions. However, Gough played down his own part in the event. It was not until late in the year that the true story came out indicating that Gough was equally deserving of recognition. He was subsequently awarded the Victoria Cross in January 1904. The
King Edward VII Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910. The second child and eldest son of Queen Victoria and ...
presented the medal to him at Buckingham Palace on 29 February 1904. Promoted from supernumary captain to captain in January 1905, he was appointed an aide-de-camp to the King in August 1907 and promoted to major in May 1908.


Curragh Incident

Prior to the outbreak of the First World War, Gough had been serving at the Staff College as a general staff officer, grade 1 (GSO1), an appointment he relinquished in January 1913 and was then placed on
half-pay Half-pay (h.p.) was a term used in the British Army and Royal Navy of the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries to refer to the pay or allowance an officer received when in retirement or not in actual service. Past usage United Kingdom In the E ...
. After being removed from half-pay in October, he was promoted to temporary brigadier general and succeeded Brigadier General Francis Davies as brigadier general, general staff (BGGS) effectively chief of staff, to Lieutenant-General Sir Douglas Haig at Aldershot Command. He played a role in the
Curragh Incident The Curragh incident of 20 March 1914, sometimes known as the Curragh mutiny, occurred in the Curragh, County Kildare, Ireland. The Curragh Camp was then the main base for the British Army in Ireland, which at the time still formed part of the ...
in March 1914, in which his brother and other cavalry officers stationed in Ireland threatened to resign rather than coerce
Ulster Protestants Ulster Protestants are an ethnoreligious group in the Provinces of Ireland, Irish province of Ulster, where they make up about 43.5% of the population. Most Ulster Protestantism in Ireland, Protestants are descendants of settlers who arrived fr ...
who had no wish to be part of an Irish state governed from Dublin. Gough accompanied his brother, who had been suspended from duty, to a meeting in London with the adjutant general, Major General Spencer Ewart, on the morning of Sunday 22 March 1914, where Hubert confirmed that he would have obeyed a direct order to move against the Ulster population. Johnnie was in the War Office on 23 March, when French ( CIGS) agreed to Hubert's demand that he amend a Cabinet document to promise that the British Army would not be used to enforce Irish Home Rule on Ulster. French may have been acting in the belief that the matter needed to be resolved quickly after learning from Haig that afternoon that all the officers of ''Aldershot'' Command would resign if Hubert were punished.


First World War

Gough went to France as a brigadier-general in mid-August 1914 with the British Expeditionary Force, as chief-of-staff to Douglas Haig's I Corps. In early 1915 he continued as Haig's principal staff officer when Haig was given command of the newly created British First Army. By February 1915, when he was made a CB, whilst working on planning for the forthcoming attack at Neuve Chapelle, Gough was chosen to command one of the British New Army divisions. This appointment was due to commence sometime in March 1915 and would have entailed his promotion to the rank of major general.


Death

On 20 February 1915 Gough was visiting his old Battalion, the 2nd Battalion,
The Rifle Brigade The Rifle Brigade (The Prince Consort's Own) was an infantry rifle regiment of the British Army formed in January 1800 as the "Experimental Corps of Riflemen" to provide sharpshooters, scouts, and skirmishers. They were soon renamed the "Rifle ...
, in the line at Fauquissart, about 3 km north of Neuve Chapelle, about 2 km west of Aubers to luncheon at its H.Q.'s Officers' Mess before his imminent departure to the British Isles to assume the command of a new division. Whilst in the line he was hit in the
abdomen The abdomen (colloquially called the gut, belly, tummy, midriff, tucky, or stomach) is the front part of the torso between the thorax (chest) and pelvis in humans and in other vertebrates. The area occupied by the abdomen is called the abdominal ...
by a chance ricochet of a German bullet which mortally wounded him. The event was an unlucky one as the bullet that struck him was thought to have been a single shot fired from approximately 1000 yards away from somewhere in the German lines. He was conveyed to the 25th Field Ambulance at nearby Estaires, about 7 km behind the front line, where he succumbed to the wound and died in the early morning of 22 February 1915. His body was buried that afternoon in Estaires Communal Cemetery, located 7 miles to the South-West of
Armentières Armentières (; , ) is a Communes of France, commune in the Nord (French department), Nord department in the Hauts-de-France region in northern France. It is part of the Métropole Européenne de Lille. The motto of the town is ''Pauvre mais fià ...
, in Plot II, Row A, Grave No. 7. On 20 April 1915 Gough was posthumously knighted, being gazetted KCB on 22 April 1915.


Assessments

Gough was quoted as making a famous remark in November 1914 that was to be repeated as inspirational in the dark days of March 1918. "As he watched the enemy swarming over a low ridge one of his staff said the fight was decided. Gough turned with his eyes ablaze and exclaimed: 'God will never let those devils win.'" "Through Johnnie's death Haig lost a sounding board which was highly constructive yet far from uncritical. Had Johnnie gone on to command a division then it seems almost certain that, as predicted by so many contemporaries, he would have risen much further in the army. Johnnie was a convinced 'westerner' in strategic terms and a 'fighting general'. The army high command's commitment to the Western Front and to strategic offensives on that front would not have changed had Johnnie lived, but as he had demonstrated in his Staff College days he was a supreme realist and the conduct of these offensives might well have been modified by his influence with and, especially, by his ability to relate to Douglas Haig." A contemporary, General Sir George Barrow, described John Gough as "a twentieth-century Chevalier Bayard, had he lived he might have gone to the top of the British Army". To some extent
Hubert Gough General (United Kingdom), General Sir Hubert de la Poer Gough ( ; 12 August 1870 – 18 March 1963) was a senior officer in the British Army in the First World War. A controversial figure, he was a favourite of the Commander-in-chief, Commande ...
replaced his brother as Haig's sounding board.Sheffield & Todman 2004, p.76.


Memorials

There is a memorial to Gough in
Winchester Cathedral The Cathedral Church of the Holy Trinity,Historic England. "Cathedral Church of the Holy Trinity (1095509)". ''National Heritage List for England''. Retrieved 8 September 2014. Saint Peter, Saint Paul and Saint Swithun, commonly known as Winches ...
; his Victoria Cross medal is displayed at the Royal Green Jackets (Rifles) Museum, in
Winchester Winchester (, ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs N ...
, England.


See also

* List of generals of the British Empire who died during the First World War


Notes


References

* * *
Irish Winners of the Victoria Cross List of Irish Victoria Cross recipients lists all recipients of the Victoria Cross (post-nominal letters "VC") born on the island of Ireland, together with the date and place of their VC action. The Victoria Cross is the highest war honour of ...
(Richard Doherty & David Truesdale, 2000) *
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
*
Monuments to Courage David Charles Harvey (29 July 1946 – 4 March 2004) was a British historian and author. He is notable for his seminal work, ''Monuments To Courage'', which documents the graves of almost all recipients of the Victoria Cross, a task that took ...
(David Harvey, 1999) *
The Register of the Victoria Cross ''The Register of the Victoria Cross'' is a reference work that provides brief information on every Victoria Cross awarded until the publication date. Each entry provides a summary of the deed, along with a photograph of the recipient and the f ...
(This England, 1997) {{DEFAULTSORT:Gough, John 1871 births 1915 deaths Graduates of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst British Army generals of World War I Knights Commander of the Order of the Bath Companions of the Order of St Michael and St George British Army personnel of the Second Boer War British recipients of the Victoria Cross British military personnel killed in World War I Rifle Brigade officers British Army personnel of the Mahdist War British military personnel of the Third Somaliland Expedition People from Murree British military personnel of the 1898 Occupation of Crete British Army recipients of the Victoria Cross Irish recipients of the Victoria Cross British Army brigadiers Military personnel of British India Graduates of the Staff College, Camberley Academics of the Staff College, Camberley Burials in Hauts-de-France British people in colonial India John Edmond Irish officers in the British Army