Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig
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Field Marshal Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig, was a senior officer of the British Army. During the First World War he commanded the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) on the Western Front from late 1915 until the end of the war. He was commander during the Battle of the Somme, the Battle of Arras, the Third Battle of Ypres, the German Spring Offensive, and the Hundred Days Offensive.
Haig in 1917
Age 23 in 1885, in his hussar's uniform
Plaque marking Earl Haig's birthplace, Charlotte Square, Edinburgh
Haig with Major-General C. C. Monro (commanding 2nd Division), Brigadier-General J. E. Gough (Haig's Chief of Staff), and Major General Sir Edward Perceval (commander of 2nd Division's artillery) in a street in France, 1914.
British Expeditionary Force (World War I)
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The British Expeditionary Force (BEF) was the six divisions the British Army sent to the Western Front during the First World War. Planning for a British Expeditionary Force began with the 1906–1912 Haldane Reforms of the British Army carried out by the Secretary of State for War Richard Haldane following the Second Boer War (1899–1902).
British troops from the 4th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment) resting in the square at Mons 22 August 1914, the day before the Battle of Mons
A British trench near the Albert-Bapaume road at Ovillers-la-Boisselle, July 1916 during the Battle of the Somme. The men are from A Company, 11th Battalion, The Cheshire Regiment
The front line in 1916, British gains during the battle of the Somme are shaded blue.
The French, British, Belgian and American lines of attack, during the Hundred Days Offensive