1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, Bernard Law Montgomery, (1887-1976)
Introduction:
Bernard Law Montgomery, (1887-1976) has been described as the finest British field commander since the Duke of Wellington, and played a major role in the Allied defeat of the Nazi Axis during the Second World War.
He entered the army in 1908 and distinguished himself during the Great War. During the Second World War he led (1939-40) a division in France, was involved in the Dunkirk evacuation, and took charge of the Dieppe commando raid of 1942 before being sent to North Africa as 8th Army commander. There his decisive victory over Rommel's Afrika Korps at El Alamein (1942) and his pursuit of the Germans across Libya and Tunisia captured the imagination of the British public, and he became a national hero, popularly known as "Monty."
He was largely responsible for the successful Allied invasion of Sicily in May 1943, and in June 1944 he commanded the Allied ground forces in the invasion of Normandy and the sweep through France and western Germany (1944-45).
After the war, Montgomery, created Viscount in 1946, was commander of British occupation forces in Germany (1945-46), chief of the British general staff (1946-48), and deputy Supreme Commander of NATO (1951-58).
Following retirement from the army he was an outspoken (if somewhat bigoted) member of the House of Lords.
Evidence :
From -- Hyam, Ronald. Empire and Sexuality - the British experience. Manchester University Press. Manchester and New York, 1990.
"In Montgomery's case there is a confusion: he was not in the least attracted to men but he was emotionally involved with small boys."
[Page 8]
"...Montgomery, a man incontestably suited for high command if not for anything else. Sex was something he largely repudiated, even during ten years of marriage, and despite (or more likely because of) his deep-rooted tenderness for boys. Montgomery [had] a relentless generosity to his pre-pubertal proteges."
[Page 14]
"What is one to make of a man who wrote letters to boys which ended 'With my fond love, Montgomery of Alamein, F.M.' ? Or indeed, who told a superannuated sixteen-year-old 'I often wish you were twelve again' ? It is clear that Montgomery was not a happy man..."
"Seeing the naked body of a boy seems to have been the limit of 'sexual aim' for him, as it had also been for General Gordon. But this a-sexual limitation was not sublimation; it is closer to what Freud called scopophilia [a variety of voyeurism]. It is also likely that Gordon and Montgomery were constrained by the legal and moral codes of their day. But, if so, that is not sublimation either; it is enforced repression."
[Page 15]
[Montgomery's] "trouble was not loving children but loving them childishly..."
[Page 16]
Montgomery speaking against lowering the age-of-consent, in the House of Lords in 1965...
"I am not very expert on girls. No doubt the noble Earl knows more about them than I do. The second category I take is the youth organisations throughout this country. I will mention just a few, about which I know quite a lot: the Boy Scouts, the Boys Brigade, the Church Lads' Brigade, the Cadet Forces, the National Association of Boys Clubs - and there are other such organisations. In Canning Town in the East End of London you have David Sheppard and his Mayflower Centre. Many London gangs come from that area. I have been there. I have sent boys from the centre to the Outward Bound schools, magnificent places for the building of character [...] I sent one boy to that school who was the leader of one of the worst London gangs. I saw him before he went, I saw him when he came back, and he was a changed boy..."
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