FULLER, Maj Gen John Frederick Charles (1878-1966)

Bound typescript histories of Tank Corps battalions, brigades and groups during World War One, 1914-1918, written by Tank Corps personnel in [1918-1919]. Bound volumes of official correspondence, reports, memoranda, notes, maps, photographs, operation orders, summaries of information and other papers concerning tank strategy and tactics, 1916-1918, the Battle of Cambrai, 1917, and Tanks Corps operations, 1914-1918, dated 1917-1919. Correspondence between Fuller, M Mitzakis and various military personnel relating to the use of Canal Defence Light (CDL) tanks during World War Two, 1939-1945, dated 1946. Other papers relating to his life and military career, [1889]-1965, including letters to his parents, 1897-1921, notably covering his service in South Africa, 1899-1902, and in World War One, 1914-1918; narrative diaries covering his service in South Africa, 1901-1902, and World War One, 1914-1915; book agreements, 1919, 1956-1965; correspondence with publishers, 1956, 1961-1965; newspaper cuttings, 1945, 1952, 1965-1966, including obituaries of Fuller, 1966; papers relating to the occult, notably including letters from Aleister Crowley, 1905-[1924], and manuscript and typescript texts by Fuller and others, 1910, 1926, [1930] and 1966. Bound typescript text on Gen (William) Edmund Ironside, mainly consisting of extracts from Ironside's letters to Col Roderick MacLeod, 1927-1958, compiled by MacLeod in [1959], and 'A secret service agent in South-West Africa', a bound typescript text on Ironside's service as a British agent among the Boers in German South West Africa, 1902-1904, written by MacLeod in [1965] using Ironside's notes.

Born in 1878; educated at Malvern College and Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, 1897-1898; 2nd Lt, Oxford and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, 1898; served in South Africa, 1899-1902; attended Staff College, Camberley; served as adjutant to a territorial battalion; General Staff Officer Grade 3, 2 Army HQ, Home Forces, 1914; General Staff Officer Grade 3, 7 Corps, France, 1915; General Staff Officer Grade 2, 37 Div, 7 Corps, France, 1916; General Staff Officer Grade 2, 3 Army HQ, France, 1916; General Staff Officer Grade 2, Heavy Branch (later Tank Corps) HQ, France, 1916; General Staff Officer Grade 1, 1917; planned tank attack at Cambrai, Nov-Dec 1917; Lt Col, 1918; planned tank operations for autumn offensives of 1918; devised Plan 1919 for a full-fledged mechanised-air offensive; Chief Instructor, Staff College, Camberley, 1922; promoted Military Assistant to Chief of the Imperial General Staff, 1926; commander of an experimental brigade at Aldershot; Senior Staff Officer, 2 Div, 1927-1930; Maj Gen, 1930; retired pay, 1933; associated with Sir Oswald Moseley's Union of British Fascists, 1933-1934; became military correspondent for the London Daily Mail, 1935; died in 1966. Publications include, The star in the West: a critical essay upon the works of Aleister Crowley (Walter Scott Publishing Co, London and Felling on Tyne); Hints on training territorial infantry from recruit to trained soldier (Gale and Polden, London, 1913); Tanks in the Great War, 1914-1918 (John Murray, London, 1920); The reformation of war (Hutchinson and Co, London, 1923); Yoga. A study of the mystical philosophy of the Brahmins and the Buddhists (W Rider and Son, London, 1925); Sir John Moore's system of training (Hutchinson and Co, London, 1925; British light infantry in the eighteenth century (Hutchinson and Co, London, 1925); The foundations of the science of war (Hutchinson and Co, 1926); Imperial defence, 1588-1914 (Sifton Praed and Co, London, 1926); Atlantis: America and the future (Kegan Paul and Co, London, 1926); On future warfare (Sifton Praed and Co, London, 1928); The generalship of Ulysses S. Grant (John Murray, London, 1929); India in revolt (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1931); The dragon's teeth (Constable and Co, London, 1932); War and Western civilization, 1832-1932 (Duckworth and Co, London, 1932); Generalship: its diseases and their cure (Faber and Faber, London, 1933); Grant and Lee: a study in personality and generalship (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1933); Empire, unity and defence (Arrowsmith, Bristol, 1934); The Army in my time (Rich and Cowan, London, 1935); Memoirs of an unconventional soldier (Nicholson and Watson, London, 1936); The first of the league wars (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1936); The last of the gentlemen's wars (Faber and Faber, London, 1937); Towards Armageddon (Lovat Dickson, London, 1937); The conquest of red Spain (Burns, Oates and Co, London, 1937); The secret wisdom of the Qabalah (Rider and Co, London, 1937); Decisive battles of the United States (Hutchinson and Co, London, 1942); Decisive battles (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1939-1940); Machine warfare (Hutchinson and Co, London, 1941); Armoured warfare (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1943); Watchwords (Skeffington and Son, London, 1945); Thunderbolts (Skeffington and Son, London, 1946); Armament and history (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1946); The Second World War (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1948); The decisive battles of the Western world and their influence upon history (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1954-1956); The generalship of Alexander the Great (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1958); The conduct of war, 1789-1961 (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1961); Julius Caesar: man, soldier and tyrant (Eyre and Spottiswoode, London, 1965).

Arranged in the following sections: tank histories and bound volumes of documents concerning tank strategy and tactics, Tank Corps operations and the Battle of Cambrai; correspondence concerning Canal Defence Light tanks; early papers; letters to his parents; literary and miscellaneous; occult; later accessions.

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

Presented to the Centre by Fuller in 1965. Additional papers were purchased in 1969 and 1995.

Summary guide entry on line at http://www.kcl.ac.uk/lhcma/top.htm, and detailed catalogue available in hard copy in the Centre's reading room.

The Centre holds two additional copies of Macleod's texts on Ironside (Ref: GB 99 KCLMA Macleod 1/2 and 1/3 and GB 99 KCLMA Liddell Hart 15/14).

Special Collections Department, Rutgers State University, New Brunswick, USA, has a more substantial collection of Fuller's papers including correspondence, 1893-1966, drafts of published works and scrapbooks of newspapers and periodicals, cuttings, reviews and articles, 1920-[1966]. Royal Armoured Corps and Royal Tank Regiment Museum holds his diary, 1914-1918. The papers of Harold Montgomery Belgion at the Churchill Archives Centre, Cambridge University (Ref: BLGN) include correspondence with Fuller. The Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry Regimental Museum, Headington, holds his journal, 1917-1918. The India Office Library holds a letter to Lt Gen Sir Alexander (Stanhope) Cobbe, Secretary of Military Department, India Office, 1921, relating to the use of tanks in India (Ref: L/Mil/7/1/133). The papers of Karl Van Wieganel at the Hoover Institution, Stanford, USA, also include correspondence with Fuller.

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 Director of Archive Services.

Papers of Sir Basil Liddell Hart include correspondence with Fuller, 1920-1966 (Ref: GB 99 KCLMA Liddell Hart 1/302). The Centre also holds a quantity of Macleod's papers (Ref: GB 99 KCLMA Macleod and GB99 KCLMA Liddell Hart 15/14).

The diary of his service in South Africa formed the basis for his book The last of the gentlemen's wars (Faber and Faber, London, 1937).