SIR CHARLES WARREN.
WHEN the formation of the first four Divisions of the South African Field Force was announced, and it transpired that, among the General Officers selected for Divisional commands, Lieutenant-General Sir Charles Warren, notwithstanding his extensive and peculiar knowledge of local conditions and requirements, was not included, no one who "knows these things" was greatly surprised. Sir Charles Warren is emphatically a strong man, and, like a good many other strong men, he is apt to conduct himself in a controversy with a vigour which is not only resented by his opponents but is not always pleasing to impartial onlookers. It is a pity, of course, that what is after all a form of independence should militate against an officer's professional advancement, but it is "human nature" that it should do so, and a general who acquires the reputation of being "a difficult man to get on with" must expect to be occasionally left out in the cold. Happily for Sir Charles Warren, more than four Divisions soon became necessary in South Africa, and, when the command of a fifth was offered to and accepted by him, everyone was gratified that personal considerations had not long delayed the employment in this troublous campaign of one of the most capable and level-headed officers in our Army.
Sir Charles Warren was born on February 7th, 1840, and entered the Royal Engineers in December, 1857. In his early days he was chiefly engaged in connection with the exploration and survey of Palestine. His first experience of active service was in the South African War of 1877-9. He went through the Kaffir Campaign with great distinction, winning three mentions in Despatches and a brevet Lieutenant-Colonelcy. Returning to England, he was appointed to an Instructorship in Surveying at the Chatham School of Military Engineering. He held this post from 1880 to 1884, but was called away in 1882 for special service under the Admiralty in connection with the murder of Professor Palmer, who had been sent out at the time of Arabi Pasha's rebellion to' negotiate with the Bedouin tribes in the Sinaitic Peninsula. In November, 1884, Sir Charles Warren was sent out to South Africa, where he did excellent service as a military administrator, and in 1885 saved the British Government an infinity of trouble and expense by his admirable conduct of the expedition against the Boer filibusters in Bechuanaland. Having organized a suitable colonial force, Warren marched into Bechuanaland and, by skilful strategy and the exercise of great tact, simply pressed the filibusters back over the border without entering into a single engagement. The result of this thoroughly well-conducted little expedition was the conversion of Bechuanaland into a British Colony, which has been easily and quietly administered ever since, with the exception of the transient troubles attendant on the present war.
From 1889 to 1894 Sir Charles Warren was in military command of the Straits Settlements, first as Colonel on the Staff and afterwards as Brigadier-General. His tenure of this appointment was not a particularly happy one, owing to some disagreement with the civil authorities, in which the tinge of acerbity in the General's temper was somewhat conspicuously revealed. In 1895 Sir Charles Warren became Major-General in command of the Thames District, headquarters Chatham, and in 1897 was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant-General. He landed in South Africa in command of the Fifth Division of the Field Force in December, 1899, and at once proceeded to join Sir Redvers Buller on the banks of the Tugela, and to assist in the latter's strenuous efforts to relieve the beleaguered garrison of Ladysmith.
Thema: Celebrities of the Army (Gelesen 10246 mal)