Papers of Gen Sir Charles John Cecil Grant, KCB, KCVO, DSO (1877-1950)

Reference code: GB99 KCLMA Grant

Title: GRANT, Gen Sir Charles John Cecil (1877-1950)

Dates of creation of material: 1805-1946

Level of description: item level

Extent: 0.01m³ or 1 box of papers

Introduction

• Biographical history
• Provenance
• Scope and content
• Arrangement
• Conditions of access and use
• Related material

Brief List

• 1 Correspondence and papers, mainly relating to the life and career of Lt Gen Sir Robert Grant, 1805-1903

• 2 Correspondence of Gen Sir Charles John Cecil Grant, 1914-1946

• 3 Copy diary entries and notes written by Charles John Cecil Grant whilst a Liaison Officer at French General Headquarters during World War One, 1918

INTRODUCTION

BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY

Gen Sir Charles John Cecil Grant; born 1877, son of Robert Grant; 2nd Lt, Coldstream Guards, 1897; Lt, 1898; served Second Boer War, South Africa, 1899-1902; Adjutant, 1 Bn Coldstream Guards, 1902-1905; Capt, 1903; Bde Maj, Brigade of Guards, 1909-1912; General Staff Officer, Grade 3, War Office, 1912-1913; Maj, 1913; served World War One, 1914-1918; Bde Maj, 3 Infantry Bde, BEF (British Expeditionary Force),1914; General Staff Officer, Grade 2, General Headquarters, 1914-1915; General Staff Officer, Grade 1, and temporary Lt Col, 12 Div, 1915-1917; Brevet Lt Col, 1916; General Staff Officer, 3 Army, 1917; temporary Brig Gen commanding 1 Infantry Bde, 1917-1918; Brig Gen, General Staff, attending General Headquarters French army as Liaison Officer between Gen Sir Henry Hughes Wilson, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, and French Marshal Ferdinand Foch, Commander in Chief Allied Armies, 1918-1919; Brevet Col, 1919; Lt Col commanding 3 Bn, Coldstream Guards, 1919-1921; temporary Col, General Staff, Egypt, 1921-1925; Col, 1922; commanding, 137 (Staffordshire) Bde, Territorial Army, Northern Command, 1925-1927; commanding, 8 Infantry Bde, Southern Command, 1927-1930; Maj Gen, 1930; General Officer Commanding, 53 (Welsh) Div, Territorial Army, Western Command, 1930-1932; General Officer Commanding, London District, 1932-1934; Lt Gen, 1934; Gen, 1937; General Officer Commanding in Chief, Scottish Command, and Governor of Edinburgh Castle, 1937-1940; retired, 1940; Col, The King's (Shropshire Light Infantry), 1930-1946; died 1950.

Lt Gen Sir Robert Grant, GCB; born 1837; father of Charles John Cecil Grant; educated Harrow and Royal Military Academy, Woolwich; 2nd Lt Royal Engineers, 1854; Lt, 1854; transferred to Jamaica Command, West Indies, 1857-1858; Fort Adjutant at Belise, British Honduras, 1858-1859; Aide de Camp to Lt Gen Sir William Fenwick Williams, Commanding Officer of British forces, North America, 1859-1865; 2nd Capt, Royal Engineers, 1860; passed Staff College, 1861; Capt, 1867; Deputy Assistant Adjutant General, Royal Engineers, Army Headquarters, 1871-1876; Maj, 1872; Commander, Royal Engineers, Aldershot Command, 1877-1880; Lt Col, 1878; Commander, Royal Engineers, Plymouth Sub-district, Devon, 1880-1881; Commander, Royal Engineers, Woolwich District, 1881-1883; Col, 1882; Commander, Royal Engineers, Northern British District, 1884-1885; Commander, Royal Engineers, First Sudan Expedition, Egypt, 1885; Deputy Adjutant General, Royal Engineers, Army Headquarters, 1886-1891; temporary Maj Gen, 1889; temporary Lt Gen and Maj Gen, 1891; Inspector General of Fortifications, 1891-1898; Lt Gen, 1897; retired, 1903; Commissioner of Royal Hospital, Chelsea, 1903; died 1904.

PROVENANCE

The collection was originally part of the Pitchford Manuscripts, mainly created by the Ottley family of Pitchford Hall, Shropshire, to which Victoria Alexandrina Grant, Charles John Cecil's mother, was heiress. The bulk of the Pitchford Mss were deposited in the National Library of Wales by Charles John Cecil Grant from 1932 onwards. In 1963, the residue of the family papers, still kept at the Hall, were listed for the Historical Manuscripts Commission, and, with the exception of the military documents, which were placed in the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives in 1980, transferred to the National Library of Wales in 1985.

SCOPE AND CONTENT

The collection contains correspondence to both Charles John Cecil Grant and his father, Lt Gen Sir Robert Grant. The earlier material comprises some nineteenth century military documents, including standing orders, despatches and a paper by Lt Gen Sir Frederick Sleigh Roberts on Russia, probably collated by Archibald Philip Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery, 1805-1921. There is also material relating to the life and career of Robert Grant, 1885-1903, and correspondence from Gen Rt Hon Sir Redvers Henry Buller, notably a letter commiserating with Grant on the death of his son at Spion Kop during the Second Boer War, South Africa, 1900.
The later material relating to Charles John Cecil Grant includes a file of letters written to his father-in-law, Rosebery, whilst on active service on the Western Front during World War One, especially concentrating on the issues of general conscription and the concentration of resources on the Western Front. In addition, there are copy diary entries and notes written by Grant describing the events of Mar-Nov 1918 during his service as a Liaison Officer between Gen Sir Henry Hughes Wilson, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, and French Marshal Ferdinand Foch, Commander in Chief, Allied Armies on the Western Front. As well as general correspondence from military friends and acquaintances, there is a significant series of letters from Lt Gen Sir Oliver Hargreaves Leese, 3rd Bt, Commander in Chief of 8 Army, describing military operations in Italy during 1944, and a file of letters, 1919-1948, mainly from French Gen Maxime Weygand and his wife Renée Weygand, including Weygand's comments on the possible methods of enforcing the Versailles Treaty, 1919, and letters following the death of French Marshal Ferdinand Foch, 1929.

ARRANGEMENT

Arranged in sections as in the Brief List below.

CONDITIONS OF ACCESS AND USE

Access

Open, subject to signature of reader's undertaking form.

Copyright

Copies, subject to the condition of the original, may be supplied for research use only. Requests to publish original material should be submitted to the Trustees of the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, attention of the College Archivist.

Language

Mostly English, with some correspondence in French.

RELATED MATERIAL

Related units of description

Related papers held at the Centre are those of Lt Gen George Sidney Clive, (Ref: GB99 KCLMA Clive G S), FM Sir John Greer Dill, and Gen Sir John Theodosius Burnett-Stuart.

Associated material

A few items relating to the Grant family may be found in the Pitchford Manuscripts, held by the National Library of Wales at Aberystwyth. The majority of the papers of Archibald Philip Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery, 1860-1927, are held in the Department of Manuscripts at the National Library of Scotland, though there is a great deal of correspondence in record offices throughout Great Britain. The papers of Gen Sir Oliver William Hargreaves Leese, 3rd Bt, are at the Imperial War Museum, London.

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