British general who commanded the Allied intervention force at Arkhangelsk in 1918–1919, later Chief of the Imperial General Staff
An Edinburgh-born artillery officer who fought in the Second Boer War and commanded a brigade on the Western Front, he was attached in September 1918 to the Allied Expeditionary Force in northern Russia and given its command in November. At Arkhangelsk, his first independent command, he travelled the Northern Dvina for over a year to hold his scattered international forces together, once narrowly escaping assassination. As the Red Army gained the upper hand he had to leave the Whites to their fate in late 1919, handing the withdrawal to Rawlinson. Commanding the North Persia Force in 1920, he installed Reza Khan at the head of the Persian Cossack Brigade; he was Chief of the Imperial General Staff in 1939–1940 and became Baron Ironside of Archangel in 1941.
Also known as: William Edmund Ironside · Lord Ironside
Activities and affiliations
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1899–1940
United Kingdom state institutionsMain
Military command
Career Timeline
- 1899–1902Joined the Royal Artillery; served in the Second Boer War
- 1914–1918Staff officer on the Western Front; commander of the 99th Brigade in 1918
- 1918–1919Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in northern Russia (Arkhangelsk)
- 1920Supervised the Romanian withdrawal from Hungary; commander of the North Persia Force
- 1939–1940Chief of the Imperial General Staff, then Commander-in-Chief, Home Forces
- 1940Field marshal