Famous Ulster Generals

General Claude Auchinleck 1884-1981

Few Ulster generals suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune more than Claude Auchinleck.

A cautious but courageous man, he paid the price of standing up to Sir Winston Churchill rather than sacrificing his forces in Africa during the Second World War.

Sacked for refusing to attack until his army was ready, he spent almost a year in the military wilderness while his successor did exactly what he had planned to do. .  wait while the ground was prepared for an assault.

Many years later Churchill acknowledged his poor judgement in standing down a man who historians have credited with effectively stopping German commander Rommel from sweeping across north Africa and into Egypt.

The Auk, as he was affectionately known, merely shrugged and accepted the apology with typical good grace.

The Auchinleck family had crossed to Ulster from Scotland in the early 1600s, putting down roots in Fermanagh.

Claude was born in 1884 while his father, an officer with the Royal Horse Artillery, was stationed at Aldershot.

He attended Wellington College before winning a place at Sandhurst Military Academy, from which he graduated in 1904, taking a commission into the 62nd Punjab Regiment.

An honest and straight-talking man - qualities which sometimes got him noticed by his superiors for the wrong reasons - he was to see action against the Turks in the Middle East during the First World War.

For a time, during the Mesopotamian campaign, he even commanded his regiment although only a captain, such was the casualty rate.

Back in India at the war's end, he rapidly rose through the ranks, becoming commander of the Meerut district in that country in 1938 as major general

In May, 1940, he was dispatched to Norway with a force made up of British, French and Polish troops but was forced to withdraw again the following month in the face of German reinforcements.

After a brief return to India, the Auk was made commander-in-chief of the British forces in the Middle East in June, 1941.

He discovered that the British equipment he was being supplied was inferior to that of the Germans facing him, particularly regarding anti-tank guns which were incapable of penetrating the panzer armour.

One tool the Auk did employ proved particular effective against the Germans, however - the Special Air Service, which operated behind enemy lines.

Among its number was the Ulster hero Blair Mayne, from Newtownards, who excelled at the rugged guerilla warfare that this role permitted him.

Resisting pressure from Churchill to order an attack, Auchinleck finally launched an offensive in November, 1941, which met with initial success before having to retreat as Rommel's Afrika Korps, reinforced and better led on the ground, inflicted a series of defeats on the British.

In June, 1942, the Auk sacked the commander of the Eighth Army and took control himself. He rapidly stabilised the line and reinforced it at El Alamein, grinding down RommelÕs attacks until the German commander was forced to call off his offensive, though the fighting rumbled on for weeks to come.

With Rommel only 70 miles from Alexandria, Churchill demanded the Auk go on the offensive but was told the army wasn't ready.

The Prime Minister flew to Egypt himself to see the situation but had already made up his mind to sack Auchinleck, replacing him with another Ulster general, Harold Alexander.

Without a posting for the best part of a year, the Auk was finally assigned to India in June, 1943.

Promoted to a field marshal at the end of the war - but later refusing a peerage - he was given the difficult task of creating the new Indian and Pakistan armies on partition.

Lord Mountbatten, however, called for his resignation in 1947 amid claims by Indians that he was favouring the Pakistanis.

Auchinleck finally retired from public service in 1968 and passed away in 1981.