Eric Dorman-Smith facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Eric Dorman-Smith
Eric Dorman-Smith (left) talking with General Sir Alan Brooke at El Alamein, Egypt, August 1942.
Other name(s)	Eric Dorman O'Gowan
Nickname(s)	"Chink"
Born	24 July 1895 Cootehill, County Cavan, Ireland
Died	11 May 1969 (aged 73) Cavan General Hospital, Lisdarn, County Cavan, Ireland
Buried	Kilcrow, Cootehill, County Cavan, Ireland
Service/branch	British Army Irish Republican Army
Years of service	1914–1944
Rank	Brigadier
Service number	8427
Unit	Northumberland Fusiliers
Commands held	1st Battalion, Royal Northumberland Fusiliers Staff College, Haifa 160th Infantry Brigade 3rd Infantry Brigade
Battles/wars	First World War Irish War of Independence Second World War
Awards	Military Cross Mentioned in dispatches (5)
Relations	Reginald Dorman-Smith (brother)

Brigadier Eric Edward "Chink" Dorman-Smith (born July 24, 1895 – died May 11, 1969) was an Irish officer. He served in the British Army during both the First World War and the Second World War. Later in the 1950s, after changing his name to Eric Edward Dorman O'Gowan, he became an officer in the Irish Republican Army (IRA).

During the 1920s, in the time between the two World Wars, Eric Dorman-Smith was one of the military thinkers who realized that new technology and vehicles were changing how wars were fought. He was influenced by other military experts and tried to update the British Army's methods. He held several teaching and training jobs across the British Empire. He helped with advice during the campaigns in the Western Desert from 1940 to 1941. His service in the Second World War was sometimes difficult and ended when he was removed from his command in August 1944.

Early Life and School Days

Eric Dorman-Smith was born in Bellamont Forest, Cootehill, County Cavan, Ireland. His parents had different religions. He was welcomed into the Catholic Church shortly after his birth. His younger brothers, Victor and Reggie, were baptized Protestant. His childhood friend in Cootehill was John Charles McQuaid, who later became the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin.

When he was 12, Eric went to a Catholic school in Eastbourne, England. His Irish accent and buck teeth made him stand out. He developed a stutter while trying to change his accent. After a year, he moved to another school, Lambrook, where his stutter disappeared. In 1910, he attended Uppingham School, where he became friends with Brian Horrocks, who would also become a general. Even as a student, Eric showed strong principles, standing up against unfair treatment towards his friends.

Eric's father wanted him to join the army. In December 1912, Eric took the entrance exam for the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, a famous army training school. He scored very well, earning one of the available spots. He finished his training in an excellent way, ranking 10th in his class. On February 25, 1914, he became a junior officer (second lieutenant) in the 1st Battalion of the Northumberland Fusiliers. This was just six months before the First World War began. He got his nickname "Chink" on his first night in the officers' mess. A fellow junior officer thought he looked like a chinkara antelope, which was the regiment's mascot.

Service in the First World War

"Chink" and his battalion were sent to France on August 13, 1914, shortly after Britain entered the First World War. They were among the first British troops to arrive. He fought in the Battle of Mons, where he was wounded during the retreat. Later that year, he was involved in battles at Messines, Armentières, and Ypres. He was promoted to temporary lieutenant in November and was wounded again in December. He became a full lieutenant in January 1915.

In May 1915, his battalion fought near Ypres during the Second Battle of Ypres. Even though he was wounded by shrapnel and rifle bullets, he bravely organized the withdrawal of his battalion's survivors under heavy fire. For this, he received the Military Cross (MC), a special award for bravery. He was promoted to temporary captain in June 1915 and was mentioned in official reports for his good work in January 1916. His rank of captain became permanent in August 1916. After recovering from his injuries, he taught new recruits about trench warfare. In July 1917, he returned to active service and was temporarily promoted to major. He became the second in charge of the 10th Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers, a new army unit.

In November 1917, Dorman-Smith was sent to the Italian Piave Front. From April to July 1918, he served as a senior assistant officer for the 12th Battalion, Durham Light Infantry. He was mentioned in official reports a second time in May 1918 and was again promoted to temporary major in July 1918. He finished the war in Genoa, Italy, recovering from a stomach illness. He received an extra award (a bar) for his Military Cross. After leaving the hospital, he became the commander of British troops in Milan. There, in November 1918, he met Ernest Hemingway, a famous writer who had been wounded while serving with the Red Cross. Dorman-Smith was mentioned in official reports a third time in January 1919.

In June 1921, his regiment was sent to Ireland to help control the unrest there. His battalion was based in Carlow and patrolled Kilkenny county. He found out that his childhood nurse had married a local IRA leader. On one occasion, he helped her hide grenades on his family's property before a raid by the Black and Tans. Otherwise, he remained politically neutral, meaning he didn't take sides in the conflict.

Between the Wars: A Thinker and a Teacher

Eric's duty in Ireland ended in February 1922, and he moved to Germany with the British Army of the Rhine. He saw the problems with transport and communication after French troops entered the Ruhr region in January 1923 to make Germany pay for war damages.

In 1924, he became an instructor at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where he met Richard O'Connor. In 1927, Dorman-Smith took the entrance exam for the Staff College, Camberley, a special training school for senior officers. In one exam paper on strategy, he scored a perfect 1,000 out of 1,000 marks. Finishing this course meant he joined a network of highly trained officers. However, his impressive start might have made some future colleagues and superiors view him with suspicion. Many of his fellow students at the Staff College later became important generals in the Second World War.

In December 1928, he graduated at the top of his class. He famously burned his lecture notes, including those from Bernard Montgomery, one of the instructors. They had often disagreed, and "Chink" had even skipped Montgomery's class on "The Registering of Personality," which he thought was unnecessary for planning good strategies. He then became the first foot soldier to teach tactics at Chatham, the Royal Engineers' version of the Staff College. In 1929, he wrote a textbook on military tactics, which became an official army handbook within two years.

He was promoted to the honorary rank of major in January 1931. In July, he became a senior officer in the 6th Experimental Brigade under Archibald Wavell. Wavell, along with Richard O'Connor and Claude Auchinleck, were the most important people who influenced his career and supported him. Wavell wanted to make the army move faster and led exercises to achieve this, with Dorman-Smith's help. He encouraged Dorman-Smith to ignore old manuals and come up with new ways to fight. He became a full major in November 1933. In 1934, he was appointed to the War Office (army headquarters) with the honorary rank of lieutenant colonel. He joined forces with B. H. Liddell Hart in a strong argument against using horses in the army. He also estimated that in a major war, 25% of British injuries would be from enemy action, 25% from poor leadership and accidents, and 50% from the government's money department.

Around this time, Dorman-Smith began to clash with Alan Brooke. He saw Brooke as a perfect example of an old-fashioned horse artillery officer who didn't care much about modern warfare using machines. When he returned to the Staff College in 1936, he had to give lectures on tactics he thought were already outdated. In his free time, he worked with Philip Christison, a former student and fellow instructor, to create more modern theories for supplies, staff duties, and tactical handling. However, he was told off by Major-General Lord Gort, the Commandant of the Staff College.

After only sixteen months, instead of the usual three years, Dorman-Smith was promoted to full lieutenant colonel in April 1937. He became the commander of the 1st Battalion of his regiment, now called the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers, which was serving in Egypt. His farewell speech at the Staff College, about the success of Benito Mussolini's campaign in Abyssinia, was not well received. This was probably because he focused on the more mechanized approach of the Italian Army compared to the British Army. In Egypt, Dorman-Smith disagreed with his new command because he didn't care about polo training. He was also not impressed by their military skills. He tried, without success, to improve relations between British and Egyptian soldiers, which was another unusual campaign for this unconventional officer.

In late 1937, he went to Mersa Matruh to improve the defenses. His understanding of the land would later affect his opinion of Neil Ritchie's leadership when facing Erwin Rommel's attack in mid-1942. He seemed to realize that El Alamein would be the most important battle spot in Egypt. In March 1938, he was offered the job of head of army training for India, a job usually for a major-general. He left Egypt in May. He was promoted to honorary colonel and temporary brigadier in May, and his permanent rank became colonel in July. The regiment's history later thanked Dorman-Smith for his efforts to modernize the battalion, which helped it survive the desert campaign, though it seems they were happy to see him go.

In India, he became friends with Claude Auchinleck, who was the Deputy Chief, General Staff. They became good friends and went on hill-walks every morning. They planned to transform the Indian Army, but the start of the Second World War stopped their plans. In January 1940, Auchinleck was appointed to command IV Corps in England. In August of that year, Wavell asked Dorman-Smith to take over command of the Staff College, Haifa in Palestine.

Second World War: Middle East and North Africa

In October 1940, over a year after the Second World War began, Wavell, the top commander in the Middle East Command, asked Dorman-Smith to look into whether it was possible to attack the Italian forces who had invaded Egypt from Libya. After giving his report, he was sent as an adviser to Major-General Richard O'Connor and the Western Desert Force (WDF).

Historian Correlli Barnett credits Dorman-Smith with planning Operation Compass and finding a weak spot in the Italian lines south of Sidi Barrani. He was then sent back to Haifa while the WDF successfully carried out his daring plan. In January 1941, Wavell again asked him to report to O'Connor and check the campaign's progress to figure out what lessons could be learned from its success. He stayed with the army until, in early February, the Italian 10th Army gave up near Benghazi. O'Connor sent him back to Cairo to ask Wavell's permission to advance on Tripoli. But in the meantime, Winston Churchill, the British Prime Minister, had told Wavell to send troops to help Greece, ending Operation Compass. "Chink" returned to Haifa on February 13, 1941.

In April 1941, he was temporarily appointed Brigadier General Staff (BGS), a senior staff officer role. He watched from afar as Erwin Rommel won back all the territory O'Connor had gained, and the Allied forces were pushed out of the Balkans and Greece. He sent messages to Major-General Bernard Freyberg, who was preparing the defense of Crete. His temporary job ended in May, and he returned to the Staff College, Haifa. When news arrived that Wavell would be replaced by Auchinleck as top commander in the Middle East in July, Dorman-Smith probably thought he had a chance to get a steady job closer to the fighting, but no offer was made. By December, he had decided to quit the army. Despite this, Dorman-Smith accepted an offer from Auchinleck to be a British Army liaison officer for Persia and Iraq, even though he knew it was a mostly unimportant job. In February 1942, Auchinleck sent him to check on the Eighth Army, commanded by Lieutenant-General Neil Ritchie. After many talks, Dorman-Smith concluded that Ritchie was a good staff officer but not right for his command and should be replaced. Auchinleck did not act on this. After a few more months without much happening – during which Dorman-Smith offered to quit, but Auchinleck refused – he worked on a plan for a school for senior commanders with Field Marshal Jan Smuts. On May 8, he was offered a choice of major-general positions: an unspecified role under Wavell in India or Deputy Chief of the General Staff in Cairo. "Chink" accepted the latter and was promoted to temporary major-general on June 16.

Until August 6, 1942, when he was fired, Dorman-Smith served as chief of staff (main assistant) to Auchinleck, the top commander in the Middle East. Auchinleck took over command of the Eighth Army on June 25 after Ritchie failed to stop the enemy forces effectively. Auchinleck took Dorman-Smith along to be his staff officer. Dorman-Smith's clever use of secret information from decoded messages helped them plan strategies to attack the weak points of the German forces, especially the Italian units. This proved successful in slowing down and finally stopping the German advance. The bad news from this war zone before Auchinleck took personal command led to a big problem in the government in London. Churchill and Alan Brooke, who was now the professional head of the British Army, visited Cairo in August 1942 to see the situation. They were not impressed by Auchinleck's poor grasp of public relations and decided that a new leader was needed.

The most important part of the entire desert war was when Dorman-Smith and Auchinleck finally stopped the enemy attack in a few days of tough fighting in the First Battle of El Alamein. They did this by directly and strongly controlling the tired Eighth Army. General Montgomery later used the ideas from Auchinleck and Dorman-Smith to fight and win the defensive battle at the Battle of Alam el Halfa a few weeks later.

Brooke had spoken to his former student Ritchie and other senior officers he knew. He concluded that Dorman-Smith was a poor adviser to Auchinleck.

I was beginning to be suspicious that "Chink" Dorman-Smith, one of his staff officers, was beginning to exercise far too much influence on him (Auchinleck). Dorman-Smith had a most fertile brain, continually producing new ideas, some of which (not many) were good and the rest useless.

—Alanbrooke (This diary entry was written in January 1942, when Dorman-Smith had little access to Auchinleck and had spent more time in Haifa than in Cairo.)

Major St J. Oswald, an intelligence officer at Eighth Army HQ, said Dorman-Smith was "very unusual." For his service in the Middle East, Dorman-Smith was mentioned in official reports twice more, in December 1941 and June 1943.

Service in Britain and Italy

Dorman-Smith never held any important military positions after this. He returned to the rank of brigadier in September 1942 and was soon appointed to command the 160th Infantry Brigade. This brigade was part of the 53rd (Welsh) Infantry Division, which was training in Kent for the invasion of Normandy. Another difficult meeting happened on November 20, when Churchill visited the 53rd Division and invited "Chink" to lunch. Dorman-Smith ended up arguing with the Prime Minister and gave him a lecture on military tactics. Six months later, in May 1943, Exercise Spartan was held. His brigade performed well, but there was no official recognition. To make things worse, on November 11, 1943, Dorman-Smith learned that the new commander of XII Corps was Lieutenant-General Neil Ritchie, whom he had criticized in North Africa. Believing it would be too awkward to serve directly under Ritchie, Dorman-Smith asked to be moved to a new post. As a result, on November 21, he was told to leave his command and stay on leave, though his commander made it clear it wasn't because of his efficiency.

He was mostly unemployed for the next few months. In late April 1944, Dorman-Smith learned he would command the 3rd Infantry Brigade, part of the 1st Infantry Division fighting on the Italian Front in the Anzio beachhead. By now, his reputation was such that all senior British commanders in Italy wanted to refuse him, but Brooke overruled them. Brooke made it clear to Dorman-Smith that this was his last chance. However, Major General Ronald Penney, his new divisional commander, who had been a fellow student at the Staff College, was not happy with his new brigade commander. He greeted him with the words, "I didn't want you before and I don't want you now." They had clashed before at the Staff College, where Dorman-Smith often made fun of Penney. Penney believed "Chink" should be a staff officer, not command troops in battle, and he never changed his mind. Also, Dorman-Smith's predecessor had been very popular, causing some unhappiness among the three battalion commanders.

When Dorman-Smith arrived at the Anzio beachhead, the fighting was like the static warfare of the First World War, not the mobile fighting of the Western Desert. Soon after he arrived, the Allied forces tried to break out. Dorman-Smith's brigade led the 1st Division's advance up the western side of Italy, fighting many small battles while trying to reach the River Tiber. During most of this time, Penney was away and was replaced in late July by Major General Charles Loewen, a stranger to "Chink" but one who earned his respect. Despite this, Dorman-Smith was removed from command. This happened because it was claimed that his battalion commanders had complained about his leadership. Penney reported this to the Eighth Army, who then declared Dorman-Smith "unfit for brigade command." The reasons for his demotion are debated. He was in command of three battalions. One writer, James Hackett, said in 1984 that Dorman-Smith was asked by the divisional commander for his opinion of his superior officer, which annoyed him. The other two officers didn't leave their accounts. The only evidence is the divisional commander's report, which has some mistakes, as at least one of the three officers did not complain. Lavinia Greacen's book about Dorman-Smith shows the differences in Penney's various accounts of this event. Nevertheless, he was removed on August 13 and returned to the United Kingdom. He retired from the army after almost 30 years of service on December 14, and was given the honorary rank of brigadier.

Richard Mead said this about Dorman-Smith:

Even for a British Army which had advanced beyond recognition between 1939 and 1944, Dorman-Smith was too clever and he compounded this sin by being intolerant of those with lesser intellects and, moreover, of letting it show. It was his misfortune to be associated with failure in the Western Desert, but his antagonism of the military establishment meant that he would probably never have advanced to the heights to which his intellectual gifts would otherwise have qualified him.

Life in Ireland and Later Years

Four years after he was forced to retire from the British Army, he changed his name from Dorman-Smith to Dorman O'Gowan. He had long known that his father's family, the O'Gowans, were once a ruling family in Ulster. In 1945, he ran for a seat in Parliament for the Liberal Party in Wirral, Cheshire. He came in third place. "Chink" retired to Dublin. His wife, Eve, joined him in November 1945. They had a son, Christopher, in 1946, and a daughter, Rionagh, in 1947. He started studying in the library at University College, Dublin, after his application for a degree was turned down.

Throughout his military career, Dorman-Smith kept in touch with Ireland. He didn't inherit his family home, Bellamont Forest, until his father died in March 1948. His parents had not lived there for a long time, so the estate was run-down when he took it over. However, he had visited regularly in the 1920s and 1930s. The estate was about 11 miles (18 km) from the border and sometimes interested Irish Republicans. During one of Dorman-Smith's stays, Éamon de Valera, who seemed interested in "Chink's" views on the Irish army, made an informal visit. When two Irish Army officers visited the Staff College, Camberley, in 1927-1928, Bernard Montgomery, a senior lecturer, ordered a boycott. So, only the Commandant and Dorman-Smith welcomed them.

In 1950, he joined Clann na Poblachta, a new political party led by Seán MacBride, who had been an Irish Republican Army officer in Carlow when Dorman O'Gowan was stationed there. His ties to the UK were fading fast. In May 1951, he ran for election to the Dáil (Irish Parliament) as an independent candidate in Cavan. He received only 495 votes. He later became an advisor to the IRA Executive during the 1950s Border Campaign.

His first contact with the IRA seems to have been after their raid on the Gough Barracks in Armagh in June 1954. Chief of Staff Tony Magan visited him for discussions at Bellamont Forest. In July 1954, he spoke at a reunification rally in Manchester, making it clear he was moving away from UK policies. He became frustrated that he wasn't part of the IRA's decision-making. When a raid on Omagh went wrong, he began to realize that the IRA didn't meet his ideas of efficiency.

During 1955–56, his estate was used as a training ground by the IRA two weekends a year, but he was not allowed to play a role, despite wanting to help. He didn't seem to keep these contacts secret. Daphne du Maurier, the wife of his former Sandhurst assistant Frederick "Boy" Browning, wrote a story about this part of his life called "A Border-Line Case."

The British establishment seemed to dismiss him as a harmless eccentric. On December 15, 1956, after the failure of Operation Harvest, Seán Cronin visited to tell him that his usefulness to the IRA was over.

Characteristics and Reputation

Dorman-Smith was an unusual commander, and people had very different opinions of him. To some, like B. H. Liddell Hart, he was "the outstanding soldier of his generation." To others, like Field Marshals Michael Carver and Alanbrooke, he was a "bad influence" and a main reason for Auchinleck's dismissal. Montgomery called him "a menace," but despite his dislike, the Battle of Alam el Halfa was fought using a plan very similar to the one Dorman-Smith created for Auchinleck. Montgomery skillfully used the defense system that Dorman-Smith had helped plan. Carver, however, points out that Montgomery made a key change to this plan by bringing up troops that were supposed to be held in reserve to form a continuous line of defense. This reduced the need for the British Army to be highly mobile, which it wasn't, despite Dorman-Smith's efforts to change it.

A key part of Dorman-Smith's career was that he wasn't good at army politics. He made several enemies in the 1920s and 1930s who worked against him, including Penney, Montgomery, and most importantly, Brooke. Brooke said, "I had been worried for some time by Auchinleck's handling of armoured formations, mainly due to his listening to the advice of 'Chink' Dorman-Smith." Montgomery finally started the battle at El Alamein a month later than the Auchinleck-Dorman-Smith plan had suggested, which was a main reason for their dismissals.

He sued Churchill, forcing him to change The Hinge of Fate, part of his history of the Second World War, to remove an implied insult about Auchinleck's fighting spirit. Less angrily, Montgomery had to soften his criticisms of his predecessors in the Eighth Army when he published his memoirs in August 1958. When Field Marshal Sir Harold Alexander published his memoirs in 1961, "Chink" was preparing his case, but his legal team advised him to stop.

Cultural Connections

His next meeting with Hemingway after 1919 was in Paris in 1922. "Chink" was on vacation with his parents. Hemingway, living there as a freelance journalist, invited Dorman-Smith to join him and his wife, Hadley, in Montreux. They spent their days fishing and climbing mountains, which Hemingway mentioned in Green Hills of Africa. They decided to show Hadley around Milan and crossed the St Bernard Pass on foot, an adventure Hemingway wrote about in A Moveable Feast.

They met again over Christmas 1922 in Montreux, where they went luging and skiing. In early 1923, Hemingway visited Dorman-Smith in Cologne for the Toronto Star newspaper. The following summer, he visited them in Paris, where Hemingway introduced him to famous writers and artists like John Dos Passos, Gertrude Stein, James Joyce, Ford Madox Ford, and Ezra Pound. Hemingway's first book, in our time, was dedicated to Dorman-Smith and included some stories from "Chink's" memories of the Mons campaign. In March 1924, he visited Paris again and became the godfather to Ernest Hemingway's oldest son, John.

That summer, with friends, they visited the San Fermin festival in Pamplona in July and took part in the bull-running. Hemingway's 1924 poem, To Chink Whose Trade is Soldiering, shows how much he respected Dorman-Smith. However, after their next meeting in April 1926, when Dorman-Smith was with an army rugby team in Paris, they slowly grew apart. This was due to the demands of Dorman-Smith's military career and changes in Hemingway's life. They didn't meet again until Dorman-Smith toured the US in April 1950.

Family Life

Eric Dorman-Smith did not marry young. On December 29, 1927, he married Estelle Irene (née Dawson), who had been married before. They did not have children together. During his time in Haifa in 1940, he met Eve Nott, with whom he started a relationship. They married on May 17, 1949. He had a son, Christopher, and a daughter, Rionagh, and later seven grandchildren and five great-grandchildren. Dorman-Smith's youngest brother, Reginald, was the Governor of Burma when the Japanese invaded during the Second World War. His other brother, Victor, was a Royal Navy Captain.

Death

Eric Dorman-Smith died from stomach cancer on May 11, 1969, at Lisdarne hospital in Cavan. He was 73 years old.

Images for kids

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  Eric Dorman-Smith (left) talking with General Sir Alan Brooke at El Alamein, Egypt, August 1942.