Major General Sir Charles Vere Ferrers Townshend was a British Imperial soldier who led an overreaching military campaign in Mesopotamia during the First World War, which led to the defeat and destruction of his command.
Background
Charles Townshend was born on February 21, 1861 in London, England, United Kingdom. The son of a railroad clerk and of an Australian woman who brought no dowry, Townshend grew up poor, but as a member of the famous Townshend family, he was very ambitious and nourished high hopes of inheriting one day the family title and the family estate at Raynham Hall in Norfolk, as the son of the marquess had no children.
Education
A descendant of Field Marshal George Townshend, 1st Marquess Townshend (his great great grandfather) and of families of clergyman and school-masters, Charles Townshend was educated at Cranleigh School and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. On graduation from Sandhurst, he was granted a commission with the Royal Marine Light Infantry in 1881.
Career
Young Townshend joined the Royal Marines in 1881 and three years later took part in the campaign to relieve General Gordon at Khartoum; in 1886 he joined the Indian army. Townshend became an unabashed careerist, changing units and armies as opportunity afforded. Over the next quarter century, he wrangled no fewer than four appointments to India, four at home in England, two in South Africa, and one in Egypt. In 1905 he even undertook a stint as military attaché in France, becoming an ardent admirer of the French military in general, and of Ferdinand Foch in particular. Townshend was promoted major in 1895, brevet colonel a decade later, and brigadier general in 1911. War found him at Pindi in August 1914.
Major General Townshend fired off countless entreaties for front command, and in April 1915 he was given the Sixth (Indian) Division under Sir John E. Nixon. The two commanders intended to seize Basra, drive 2,000 kilometers up the Euphrates River to Baghdad, and take over the oil wells in the region. Somehow, they "forgot" that there were no docks at Basra, no railways to transport their supplies, no hospital facilities, and that it was the hottest time of the year. Undaunted, in May Townshend embarked upon his famous "regatta" up the flooded Tigris to Amara. After a brief rest owing to illness, on September 29 he led his forces into Kut el Amara, taking almost 2,000 Turkish casualties. The Cabinet in London, desperate for some success in the Moslem world after the disastrous Dardanelles expedition, decided that a side show in Mesopotamia might restore its prestige; Nixon was promised reinforcements and encouraged to advance on Baghdad. Townshend declined to await succor and instead marched ahead on his own. The Turks fought a rearguard action at Ctesiphon, covering Baghdad. With supplies running low as the waters in the Tigris fell rapidly, Townshend was forced to halt at Azizieh, sixty miles beyond Kut.
The two divisions promised by London never arrived; Nixon awaited supplies at Basra. Superior Turkish forces, commanded by the German Field Marshal Colmar von der Goltz, drove Townshend back to Kut where, after repulsing three assaults by General Nur-ed-Din, he was invested by December 8. Various attempts at rescue were repulsed with the loss of 24,000 casualties, and the Turks declined a British bribe of £2 million for the release of Townshend's army at Kut. With many soldiers actually dying of starvation, the egotistical Townshend finally capitulated on April 29, 1916.
Nearly 10,000 Anglo-Indian soldiers were marched through the desert heat to Baghdad, then paraded around the Holy City and publicly caned and whipped. Many of them were never heard from again. Townshend fared much better, being interned on Prinkipo Island, near Constantinople. He was knighted in absentia in October 1917 for his "dash" at Kut el Amara. One year later, the Turks released him so that he could act as their "intermediary" at Mudros, where an armistice was signed on October 30, 1918.
Townshend failed to obtain further military command and in November 1920 turned to politics, being elected as independent conservative from the Wrekin district of Shropshire. He proved ineffective and did not stand for reelection. Two trips to Angora in 1922 and 1923 brought him into contact with Kemal Pasha, but the Cabinet had no need of his services as an "expert" on Turkey. Townshend died in Paris on May 18, 1924.
Connections
After Omdurman, he went to France and on 22 November 1898 married Alice Cahen D'Anvers in a Church of England ceremony at Chậteau de Champs, despite the fact she was Jewish.