| Bernard
Cyril Freyberg was born at Richmond, London, on 21 March 1889. The
youngest son of James Freyberg, a surveyor, and his wife, Julia
Hamilton, he was nicknamed ‘Tiny’ as a child. He came to
Wellington with his family in 1891 and received his early schooling
from his mother, later attending Wellington College from 1897 to 1904.
Although not academically inclined, he made his mark as a swimmer: he
was New Zealand 100 yards champion in 1906 and 1910. He also played
competitive water polo, and was a keen yachtsman. Belying his
nickname, he stood over six feet tall and had a strong physique; his
voice was unusually high-pitched.
Freyberg’s aspiration to be a
doctor died with his early departure from school, and he was
apprenticed to a Wellington dentist. He was admitted to the
Dentists’ Register of New Zealand on 22 May 1911. His first post was
as an assistant and locum tenens in Morrinsville, and he would later
practise in Hamilton and Levin.
Freyberg’s first military
involvement had been in the school cadets at Wellington College. While
in Morrinsville he was persuaded by the commander of the local
Territorial Force company, Stephen Allen, to become one of his
subalterns. He unsuccessfully sought a commission in the New Zealand
Staff Corps in 1912, and from January 1913 served as a lieutenant in a
senior cadet company.
He took part in strike-breaking
activities on the Wellington waterfront in 1913, both as a special
constable and as a stoker on a ship plying between Wellington and
Sydney. In March 1914 he left Wellington for San Francisco. After some
weeks of indecision, Freyberg
went south to Mexico, and may have been involved in the civil war then
raging in that country. Upon
hearing of the outbreak of war in Europe in August 1914, however, he
immediately set off for England.
Freyberg secured a commission in the
newly formed Royal Naval Division’s Hood Battalion. He was gazetted
as a temporary lieutenant in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, and
given command of a company. Relishing the opportunity presented by the
war (‘I am in this with all my heart’), he took part in the brief,
unsuccessful attempt to defend Antwerp in October 1914.
Early in the Gallipoli campaign in
1915 he won a DSO for swimming ashore and setting diversionary flares
at Bulair (Bolayir). He was wounded
at Helles, returning in June to
become commander of the Hood Battalion. He was badly
wounded again in July, and
eventually left the peninsula when the division was evacuated in
January 1916.
Transferring to the British Army,
Freyberg was posted to the Queen’s Royal West Surrey Regiment, but
remained seconded to the Royal Naval Division, with which he proceeded
to France in May 1916. During the final stages of the first battle of
the Somme, he so distinguished himself in the capture of Beaucourt
village that he was awarded a VC;
he was again severely wounded
in this action and evacuated to Britain.
The following is from Liddle's book on the Battle of The
Somme. Colonel
Freyberg, now leading a mixed force of men from his own
battalion, from the Drake Battalion (RND) and from the 1st
Battalion HAC, had moved on towards the second objective,
Beaucourt, before the shelling of both sides forced a
retirement to a position he ordered consolidated among the
shell holes.
The CO wanted to take
Beaucourt but the British barrage did not lift and he was
informed that this was because the situation on the left was
as yet unclear. On the right, actually at the crossing
of the Ancre, contact had been made with the 1st Battalion
Cambridge Regiment so an important link had been established
there. However, for the afternoon and night there
could be only the holding of what had been taken and the
organization of an attacking force from the men he had and
those who had joined him from his left, or were sent up to
reinforce him.
In the morning the order
to attack was given and at 7.45 Freyberg led forward a mixed
body of men from battalions of the Royal Naval Division and
from other units. The Second-in-Command of the Hood
Battalion, Major L. Montagu, in a letter written six days
later, described what happened. He saw Freyberg jump
out of his trench and wave the men on, Montagu and three men
beside him followed.
They came under heavy
small arms fire and the first wave stopped three times.
Freyberg was knocked clean over by a bullet which hit his
helmet but he got up again. "I and my runner
dived into a shell hole and waited about half a minute.
I said I would go back and get some more men out of the
trench and crawled about ten yards back to do so. Then
about a dozen men came out and I got up and waved the rest
on, they all followed. We soon got in to Beaucourt (of
course absolute ruins) and found that the Germans could not
face our men and were surrendering in hundreds.
It was an amazing sight,
they came out of their holes, tearing off their
equipment." Freyberg arranged the consolidation
of the village and there was even some opportunity for
refreshment and celebratory conversation before fearfully
heavy German shelling fell upon their immediate vicinity.
They were awaiting a counter-attack when 'I heard Freyberg
say "Goodbye Montagu" and then "Steady
Hood" and I saw he was hit and going a very bad colour.
He asked me if I had any morphine he then produced a tube
and asked me to give him some, I gave him 1/4 grain and
labelled him to say I had done so.' The CO had been
wounded in the neck and was bleeding profusely.
Montagu had been wounded
too, another man killed and one wounded. To Montagu's
surprise, Freyberg did not die. In fact he continued
to give instructions until he asked his Second-in-Command if
he could walk to an Aid Post. Under shellfire, the two
men completed the 300 yard journey back, the worst part for
Montagu being the wounded men they passed, imploring him for
help. Freyberg's leadership and personal gallantry were to
result in the award of the Victoria Cross. Freyberg was to
make mistakes in the defence of Crete, but his own personal
bravery was not at issue.
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Returning to the front in February
1917, he was two months later appointed to command a territorial
brigade in the 58th Division – reputedly becoming the youngest
general in the British Army. In September a shell exploding at his
feet inflicted the worst of his
many wounds. When he resumed
duty in January 1918 he again commanded a brigade (in 29th Division),
performing with distinction during the German offensive of
March–April 1918. He won a bar to his DSO in September that year.
Freyberg ended the war by leading a squadron to seize a bridge at
Lessines, which was achieved one minute before the armistice came into
effect and which earned him another DSO. He had been made a CMG in
1917, and was mentioned in
dispatches no fewer than five times
during the war.
Early in 1919 Freyberg was granted a
regular commission in the Grenadier Guards and settled into peacetime
soldiering. From 1921 to 1925 he was a staff officer in the
headquarters of the 44th Division. He suffered health problems arising
from his many wounds, and as part of his convalescence he visited New
Zealand in 1921. In May 1922, at the instigation of his friend and
mentor Sir James Barrie, he was awarded an honorary degree by the
University of St Andrews. On 14 June 1922 he married Barbara McLaren
(née Jekyll), a widow with two children, at St Martha on the Hill
near Guildford; they would have one son. In the general election of
that year he stood unsuccessfully as a Liberal candidate.
After a further staff appointment,
at Headquarters Eastern Command, Freyberg was appointed to command 1st
Battalion, Manchester Regiment, in 1929. Staff appointments in
Southern Command (1931–33) and at the War Office (1933–34)
followed. In 1933 he published a treatise on logistics, A study of
unit administration. With his promotion to the rank of Major General
in 1934, at the age of only 45, he seemed headed for the highest
echelons of the army. However, medical examinations prior to a posting
in India revealed a heart problem.
Despite strenuous efforts to
surmount this, Freyberg, who was made a CB in 1936, was obliged to
retire on 16 October 1937. He became a director of the Birmingham
Small Arms Company, and secured nomination as a Conservative party
candidate for the general election scheduled for 1940. He also engaged
in property development.
On the outbreak of the Second World
War Freyberg assumed command of the Salisbury Plain Area, where he was
involved in preparing units for the British Expeditionary Force in
France. Hoping for more active involvement, he managed to have his
medical grading restored to a level that would allow active service
overseas. He had meanwhile offered his services to the New Zealand
government.
After meeting with the acting prime
minister, Peter Fraser, in November 1939, he was appointed to command
the Second New Zealand Expeditionary Force and its fighting arm, the 2nd
New Zealand Division. A visit to
New Zealand over the Christmas – New Year period allowed him to
discuss prospective problems and meet the senior officers of his new
command. Before he set out for Egypt with 2NZEF’s 1st Echelon on 5
January 1940, he was issued with a directive that clarified his role.
Although 2NZEF would serve within a British formation, Freyberg
was the servant of the New Zealand Government with
a right of veto over the use of the division. This dual responsibility
was to produce clashes with his military superiors.
Freyberg’s first task was to weld
a cohesive formation. The fact that he was, with his British Army
background, essentially an outsider was to cause tension in the upper
echelons of the force in the early stages. Moreover, he faced
difficulties in concentrating the New Zealand troops in Egypt. The 2nd
Echelon was diverted to Britain and Freyberg spent from June to
September in England. On his return to Egypt he had to assert himself
vigorously to gather his dispersed forces together. Not till early
1941 was the whole division concentrated, at which point it took part
in the ill-fated Greek campaign.
Freyberg performed well during the
evacuation to Crete, and was subsequently appointed commander of the
Allied forces there. Although the forces available were deficient in
many areas, he enjoyed a significant advantage in the form of very
detailed information of German intentions, provided through ULTRA
intelligence. Once the battle began, his preoccupation with the
possibility of a seaborne invasion hindered his response to the more
serious threat posted by the Germans’ initial airborne assault. In
particular, when the key airfield at Maleme was lost because of the
poor judgement and lethargy of some senior officers within the New
Zealand Division, Freyberg failed to respond vigorously enough, with
the result that the loss of the island became inevitable.
Following the evacuation to Egypt,
several of his subordinates criticised his performance behind his
back, both in Cairo and London. Prime Minister Peter Fraser, who had
been angered by Freyberg’s failure (due to a misunderstanding) to
consult properly with Wellington before the dispatch of the New
Zealand Division to Greece, conducted a detailed enquiry into the two
campaigns, but wisely decided that no change of command was warranted,
especially after Freyberg’s superior officers strongly endorsed him.
Despite these tribulations, Freyberg
had enhanced his standing with his division in Greece and Crete. His
concern for his troops was manifest in the lengths to which he went to
ensure their welfare, especially in setting up clubs. Those enjoying a
closer acquaintance with him grew to admire him. To one of his
subordinates he gave the impression of ‘a huge boy scout’, and
was, one of his staff officers later recalled, ‘kind, considerate,
gentle, compassionate, always ready to listen, always approachable’.
He was also loath to criticise his subordinates, exasperating his
staff officers by going out of his way to avoid doing so. He could
also be stubborn and obtuse, much to the amusement of some of his
fellow generals.
During the desert campaign of
1941–43 Freyberg, who was made a KBE and promoted to the rank of
lieutenant general in early 1942, came into his own as a divisional
commander. Earlier reticence among his officers was dissipated, and he
became an inspirational figure for the New Zealanders.
His determination to be well forward
during actions with the enemy led him to take considerable risks, and
in 1942 he was badly wounded;
Winston Churchill would later describe him as ‘the salamander of the
British Empire’. In the climactic battle of El Alamein in
October–November 1942, the New Zealand Division played a vital part
in the Allies’ final breakthrough; for his leadership of it Freyberg
was immediately made a KCB. During the ensuing pursuit of the Axis
forces across North Africa to Tunisia, where they surrendered, he led
the New Zealanders on a series of well-executed left hooks designed to
outflank successive enemy defence lines.
Freyberg adhered to his promise,
made in November 1939, to remain with the New Zealand Division rather
than accept a permanent corps appointment, for which he was eminently
qualified. Ever mindful of his role as a dominion commander, he
regarded it as his duty to conserve New Zealand’s scarce manpower.
Nowhere was his attitude more clearly apparent than at the battle of
Cassino during the Italian campaign, when he commanded the ad hoc New
Zealand Corps during February–March 1944.
He set limits to the number of
casualties that would be tolerated in attempts to take this hotly
contested strongpoint. Moreover, he was instrumental in having the
dominating monastery bombed, believing (it seems incorrectly, in
retrospect) that it was being used by the Germans for military
purposes; he would be criticised after the war for his part in this
decision.
Freyberg was injured
in an aircraft accident in
September 1944. After six weeks in hospital he returned to command the
New Zealand Division in its final operations, which involved a series
of river crossings and an advance of 250 miles in three weeks. By the
time of Germany’s capitulation, the New Zealanders had reached
Trieste, where there was, briefly, a tense standoff with Yugoslav
partisans. This success earned him a third bar to his DSO, and he was
also made a Commander of the
US Legion of Merit.
By the time he relinquished command of the division, on 22 November
1945, he had accepted an invitation to become New
Zealand’s Governor General – the first with a New Zealand
upbringing. He left London for
his new post on 3 May 1946, after being made a GCMG. His links with
the army were cut when his retirement took effect on 10 September
1946.
Freyberg was an active vice-regal
representative, visiting all parts of New Zealand and, in 1948, its
Pacific dependencies. In 1951 he was surprised by, but had no option
but to accede to, a request by Prime Minister Sidney Holland for a
dissolution of Parliament. Despite his military eminence, Freyberg was
cautious about tendering any advice on service matters to the
government, although he took a strong interest in the production of
the official history of New Zealand’s part in the recent conflict.
With some reluctance Freyberg agreed to an extension of his term by
one year; he left New Zealand on 15 August 1952. Barbara Freyberg was
made a GBE in 1953.
Freyberg was raised to the peerage in
1951, taking the title Baron Freyberg ‘of Wellington, New Zealand
and of Munstead in the County of Surrey’. He frequently sat in the
House of Lords. After becoming Deputy Constable and Lieutenant
Governor of Windsor Castle on 1 March 1953, he took up residence in
the Norman Gateway the following year. He died at Windsor on 4 July
1963 following the rupture of
one of his Gallipoli wounds, and
was buried in the churchyard of St Martha on the Hill. He was survived
by his wife and son.
- New Zealand’s greatest soldier
is commemorated in Wellington by the Freyberg Building (outside
which stands his bust) and the Freyberg Pool, and in Palmerston
North by Freyberg High School.
IAN MCGIBBON
Foster, B. J. ‘Freyberg, First Baron;
Sir Bernard Cyril Freyberg’. In An encyclopaedia of New Zealand.
Ed. A. H. McLintock. Wellington, 1966
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