:Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig

File:Sir Douglas Haig portrait.jpg, May 1917

By the end of 1917, Lloyd George felt able to assert authority over the generals and at the end of the year was able to sack the First Sea Lord Admiral Jellicoe. Over the objections of Haig and Robertson, an inter-Allied Supreme War Council was set up.Mead 2008, p. 305. When the council was inaugurated (11 November), Lloyd George attributed the success of the Central Powers to unity and scoffed at recent Allied "victories", saying he wished "it had not been necessary to win so many of them". His speech angered several leading politicians and Derby assured Haig of his backing.Groot 1988, pp. 347–348. Haig and Pétain objected to a common command, arguing that coalitions work better when one power is dominant, which was no longer the case now that British military power had increased relative to that of France.Sheffield 2011, p. 262. Lloyd George got his wish to send British forces to Italy, after the Italian defeat at Caporetto in November.Groot 1988, p. 349. Haig knew that manpower was scarce in the BEF and at home and wrote to Robertson that an offensive at Cambrai would stem the flow of reinforcements to Italy;Sheffield 2011, p. 250. Robertson delayed the despatch of two divisions.Sheffield 2011, p. 253.

Plans for a III Corps attack at Cambrai had been proposed as far back as May. Haig had informed the War Office (5 June) that "events have proved the utility of Tanks".Mead 2008, p. 308. The plan was to trap German troops between the River Sensee and Canal du Nord, with the cavalry to seize the St Quentin Canal crossings, then exploit north-east. The first day objective was the high ground around Bourlon Wood and Haig was to review progress after 48 hours.Sheffield 2011, pp. 248–250.

The Third Army attacked at Cambrai early on 20 November with 1,000 guns (using a surprise predicted barrage rather than a preliminary bombardment) and nine tank battalions. On the first day the British penetrated {{convert|5|mi|km}} on a {{convert|6|mi|km}} front with only 4,000 casualties, limited by blown bridges and the shortness of the November day. The 51st (Highland) Division was held up at Flesquieres village, which fell the following day. Haig's intelligence chief Brigadier-General Charteris told him that the Germans would not be able to reinforce for 48 hours and James Marshall-Cornwall, then a junior intelligence officer, later an admiring biographer of Haig, alleged that Charteris refused to have reported fresh German divisions shown on the situation map as he did not want to weaken Haig's resolution.Groot 1988, pp. 350–351.

Haig visited the battlefield (21 November), inspecting the fighting at Bourlon Wood through his binoculars. He thought the attacks "feeble and uncoordinated" and was disappointed at the lack of grip by corps and division commanders and encountering 1st Cavalry Division, which had been ordered to fall back, resisted the temptation to countermand the order. At around 9 pm he decided to continue the attack on Bourlon Wood, a decision which has been much criticised but which made good military sense at the time and was supported by Byng, although the political need for a clear victory may have been a factor.Sheffield 2011, pp. 252–254. The offensive continued but with diminishing returns. Bourlon Wood fell on 23 November but German counter-attacks had begun. Haig arrived at a Third Army planning meeting (26 November) and ordered further attacks the following day but then had to bow to Byng deciding to go onto the defensive. Haig complained that the lack of extra divisions had prevented a breakthrough, a view described by one biographer as "self-deception, pure and simple".Sheffield 2011, pp. 254–255.

Some of the gains were retaken after 30 November, when the Germans made their first counter-offensive against the British since 1914, using new Sturmtruppen tactics. GHQ intelligence had failed to piece together warnings. British casualties had mounted to over 40,000 by 3 December, with German losses somewhat less. One biographer argues that the initial success at Cambrai helped to save Haig's job but another view is that the ultimate disappointment did more damage to Haig's political credibility than Passchendaele.Mead 2008, p. 309.Sheffield 2011, p. 256. Lloyd George was particularly angry at the embarrassing Cambrai reverse, but Haig's support amongst the Army, the public and many politicians made sacking him impossible; a plan that Haig be "promoted" to a sinecure, as generalissimo of British forces, was scotched when Lord Derby threatened resignation.Groot 1988, p. 353.

Asked to provide a statement to the House of Commons, Haig attributed the German success to "one cause and one alone ... lack of training on the part of junior officers and NCOs and men", a verdict supported by the court of enquiry which, at Derby's instigation, Haig ordered, although the enquiry also criticised "higher commanders" for failing to enforce defensive doctrine.Sheffield 2011, p. 255. In a later report to Robertson Haig accepted the blame, stating that the troops had been tired as a result of the attack on Bourlon Wood. Although Haig defended Charteris,Mead 2008, p. 310. he was required to dismiss him. Robertson had arrived at Haig's Headquarters with orders (signed by Derby) for his dismissal, in case Haig refused to do as he was asked. A common criticism is that Haig only accepted intelligence from Charteris (who told him what he wanted to hear) and did not cross-check it with other intelligence.Mead 2008, p. 312.

{{Further|Role of Douglas Haig in 1918}}

Over lunch at 10 Downing Street with Derby and Lloyd George in January, Haig predicted that the war would end within a year because of the "internal state of Germany".Groot 1988, p. 355. Haig left the War Cabinet with the impression that he thought the Germans would launch small attacks on the scale of Cambrai.Sheffield 2011, pp. 259–260. Haig recommended that the British draw in German reserves by renewing the offensive around Ypres, which did not meet with political approval.Sheffield 2011, p. 260.Groot 1988, p. 356. By now Haig's 1917 offensives were being criticised in the press and in Parliament, where J.C. Wedgwood openly demanded a change of command.Sheffield 2011, p. 257.Groot 1988, pp. 358–361. The purge of Haig's staff continued, with the removal of Maxwell (Quartermaster-General) and Lt-Gen Launcelot Kiggell as BEF Chief of Staff.Sheffield 2011, p. 258.

In January the Cabinet Minister Jan Christiaan Smuts and the Cabinet Secretary Maurice Hankey were sent to France to discreetly see whether any of the Army Commanders were willing to replace Haig – none were.Groot 1988, p. 360. At the Supreme War Council at Versailles Haig and Pétain complained of shortage of troops, but Haig's political credibility was so low that Hankey wrote that they "made asses of themselves". It was agreed that an Allied General Reserve be set up, under Foch with Henry Wilson as his deputy; Haig was reluctant to hand over divisions and argued against a common command, claiming that it would be "unconstitutional" for him to take orders from a foreign general, and that he did not have the reserves to spare. Milner thought Haig's stance "desperately stupid".Sheffield 2011, p. 263.

Lloyd George proposed that the CIGS be reduced to his pre-1915 powers (i.e. reporting to the Secretary of State for War, not direct to the Cabinet) and that the British military representative at the Supreme War Council in Versailles be Deputy CIGS and a member of the Army Council (i.e. empowered to issue orders to Haig). He offered Robertson a choice of remaining as CIGS with reduced powers or else accepting demotion to Deputy CIGS at Versailles. Derby summoned Haig to London, expecting him to support him in backing Robertson. In a private meeting with Lloyd George, Haig agreed with Robertson's position that the CIGS should himself be the delegate to Versailles, or else that the Versailles delegate be clearly subordinate to the CIGS to preserve unity of command. However, he accepted that the War Cabinet must ultimately make the decision, and according to Lloyd George "put up no fight for Robertson" and persuaded Derby not to resign. Haig thought Robertson egotistical, coarse, power-crazed and not "a gentleman" and was unhappy at the way Robertson had allowed divisions to be diverted. Henry Wilson now became CIGS, with Rawlinson as British military representative at Versailles.Groot 1988, pp. 363–366. Although Haig had been suspicious of Wilson, they gradually established a warily respectful relationship.Sheffield 2011, pp. 264–265.

By March 1918 Germany's Western Front armies had been reinforced by the release of troops from the Eastern Front.Groot 1988, p. 369. At this point British troops were tired and weakened, and British divisions had been cut in size from 12 battalions to 9.Sheffield 2011, p. 268. Allied intelligence did not fall for German deceptions that they might attack in Italy or the Balkans, but thought that the main attack might fall in the Cambrai-St Quentin sector.Sheffield 2011, p. 261. Haig inspected the Fifth Army (7–9 March) and noted widespread concerns, which he shared, at lack of reserves. As late as 17 March, Cox, who had replaced Charteris as Intelligence Chief, predicted that the German Offensive was not yet immediately imminent. By 20 March, deployment of German trench mortars had been reported by deserters, and British artillery began some spoiling fire.Sheffield 2011, p. 267.

Germany launched an attack, "Michael" (21 March 1918), with a force larger than the entire BEF and enjoying superiority of 5:1 over Hubert Gough's Fifth Army, which were spread thinly over line recently taken over from the French.Groot 1988, p. 376. Haig was initially calm on 21 March, as owing to the communications of the time GHQ was "an information vacuum" where news often took over a day to reach him, and spent much of the day entertaining foreign dignitaries including the US War Secretary. The Third Army retreated as planned from the Flesquieres Salient. With three-quarters of the 50-mile front under attack, the British troops fought hard and the Germans failed to reach their first-day objectives.Sheffield 2011, p. 269. However, lacking reserves Gough had to retreat behind the Crozat Canal. 22 March saw the Fifth Army retreat to the Somme; Haig still anticipated further German attacks in Champagne or Arras. The Germans did not initially realise the importance of Amiens as an objective.

Haig did not speak to or visit Gough until 23 March. That day Haig arranged for reserves to be sent down from Flanders. Formal orders were issued to the Fifth Army to maintain contact with the Third Army to their north and the French to their south.Sheffield 2011, pp. 270–271. After initial optimism, Tim Travers has written of "panic" setting in amongst senior officers at GHQ on 23 March,Sheffield 2011, p. 275. and there is evidence that a retreat towards the Channel Ports may have been considered.Travers 1992, pp. 54, 66–70.

Haig had a GHQ Reserve which was massed in the north, 72 hours' march away, to protect the Channel Ports. The French Commander-in-Chief, Pétain, agreed to place two French armies under Fayolle as a reserve in the Somme valley, but could not agree to Haig's request to send 20 French divisions to Amiens.Travers 1992, pp. 66–67.

24 March was "probably the most traumatic day (Haig) had endured since" First Ypres in 1914. Half of BEF supplies came into Le Havre, Rouen and Dieppe and passed by train through Amiens, making it a major choke point.Sheffield 2011, p. 272. Planning that winter had left open the question of whether the BEF would retreat southwest or form "an island" around the Channel Ports through which Haig's armies drew the other half of their supplies. A retreat on the ports does not seem to have been decided until some days after 21 March.Travers 1992, pp. 69–70.

This is one of the occasions where doubt has been cast on the authenticity of Haig's diary. For example, Haig's typed diary – probably based on notes prepared in April – describes Pétain as "almost unbalanced and most anxious", claiming that after attending a Cabinet meeting in Paris, where he had been ordered to "cover Paris at all costs",Sheffield 2011, p. 273. he threatened to retreat on Paris, leaving the British right flank uncovered. Tim Travers argues that Pétain said at the meeting that he would only retreat on Paris if Haig retreated on the Channel Ports, and that Pétain had come away satisfied that Haig would not break contact. In a postwar exchange of letters with Haig Pétain denied that he had ordered a retreat on Paris or had threatened Haig that he might, a recollection which Herbert Lawrence appears to have supported.Travers 1992, pp. 66–68. It has been suggested that Haig and Lawrence may simply have misunderstood his intentions, and that any factual errors in Haig's diary were honest if mistaken recollections.

Haig's letter of 25 March, sent via Weygand, asked for 20 French divisions to cover the southern British flank as the BEF fought its way back "covering the Channel Ports".Sheffield & Bourne 2005, p. 8. The letter is ambiguous and does not specifically mention a retreat "to" the ports. Sheffield argues that orders to Third Army were not a precursor to retreat but "a means to an end", pointing to orders for, if needs be, a counterattack onto the northern flank of the German attackers, and also argues that although GHQ had a duty to consider contingency plans, unlike in 1940, evacuation was never actually likely.Sheffield 2011, p. 279. Wilson claimed that Haig suggested Pétain be appointed Allied generalissimo (which is not consistent with Haig's later claim that Pétain was unwilling to help the British) and that he proposed Foch over Haig's objections.Travers 1992, p. 68.

At the Doullens Conference (26 March), Haig accepted the appointment of Foch to coordinate reserves of all nationalities wherever he saw fit. In his typed diary Haig claimed much of the credit for Foch's appointment and to have insisted that he have wider powers over Pétain than Clemenceau had wanted to grant him. Milner, who represented the British government at Doullens, recorded that Clemenceau was unhappy with Pétain's recent efforts, but claimed that he himself had persuaded Haig to accept the appointment of Foch; Haig's official biographer Duff Cooper gave Haig the credit but commented that the idea had probably occurred to several participants simultaneously.Gollin, 1964, pp. 505–507.

After a German offensive near Arras ("Mars", 28 MarchSheffield 2011, p. 277.) was beaten back, between 29 and 31 March the Germans pushed on Amiens. A Canadian brigade took part in an action at Moreuil Wood. Attacks on 4 April (Villers-Bretonneux, east of Amiens) and 5 April on the Third Army front were beaten back by British and Australian forces, although contingency plans were still being prepared to cover Rouen and Le Havre in case Amiens fell.Sheffield 2011, p. 278.

{{Quote box

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|quote=To ALL RANKS OF THE BRITISH ARMY IN FRANCE AND FLANDERS

Three weeks ago to-day the enemy began his terrific attacks against us on a fifty-mile front. His objects are to separate us from the French, to take the Channel Ports and destroy the British Army.

In spite of throwing already 106 Divisions into the battle and enduring the most reckless sacrifice of human life, he has as yet made little progress towards his goals.

We owe this to the determined fighting and self-sacrifice of our troops. Words fail me to express the admiration which I feel for the splendid resistance offered by all ranks of our Army under the most trying circumstances.

Many amongst us now are tired. To those I would say that Victory will belong to the side which holds out the longest. The French Army is moving rapidly and in great force to our support.

There is no other course open to us but to fight it out. Every position must be held to the last man: there must be no retirement. With our backs to the wall and believing in the justice of our cause each one of us must fight on to the end. The safety of our homes and the Freedom of mankind alike depend upon the conduct of each one of us at this critical moment.

(Signed) D. Haig F.M. Commander-in-Chief British Armies in France, 11 April.

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Lloyd George demanded Haig sack Gough, and when Haig was reluctant he was given a direct order to do so by Derby. Haig offered to resign; Lloyd George wanted to accept, but the other ministers, and Henry Wilson, thought there was no obvious successor.

During the second major German offensive, "Georgette" in Flanders (9 April), Haig issued his famous order that his men must carry on fighting "With Our Backs to the Wall and believing in the Justice of our Cause" to protect "the safety of our homes and the Freedom of mankind".Bullock, 2009, p67 - illustration of the Order, with notes by Bullock, whose first day in the Front Line was the day it was issued, and who brought it back as a souvenir Just as "Michael" had swept over the Cambrai and the Somme battlefields, won at such cost by Haig's own offensives in previous years, this one swept over Passchendaele although not Ypres itself. The offensive threatened Hazebrouck, "the Amiens of the north", a key railhead through which supplies were brought from the Channel Ports.Sheffield 2011, p. 282.

Foch had earlier refused to send four French divisions to Flanders but now redeployed Maistre's Tenth French Army to the Somme sector, freeing up British forces. During a renewed attack (17 April) Foch drew attention to the valour of the British at First Ypres and refused to send further French reinforcements so as to keep a strategic reserve. 24 April saw a further unsuccessful German attack at Villers-Bretonneux near Amiens, featuring the first tank-to-tank combat. Haig was suspicious of Foch's request to move British divisions to the French sector to free up French reserves, worrying that this might lead to "a permanent Amalgam" of French and British forces. At a meeting on 27 April meeting the dispute was smoothed over, and British IX Corps moved to the French sector.Sheffield 2011, p. 288. On 30 April Ludendorff called a halt to the Flanders offensive.Sheffield 2011, pp. 284–285.

Although some American divisions were now serving with the British forces, Haig thought Pershing "very obstinate and stupid" for refusing to integrate US troops with Allied units. At Abbeville (2 May) it was agreed that in the event of renewed attack British forces would retreat south if necessary and abandon the Channel Ports rather than lose touch with the French.Sheffield 2011, p. 289.

The near-debacle of March 1918 was an object of political controversy. Repington wrote that it was "the worst defeat in the history of the Army". Bonar Law claimed in a House of Commons debate (23 April) that Haig and Pétain had agreed the extension of the British line, which was not wholly true as in January 1918 the Supreme War Council had ordered a longer extension than Haig and Pétain had agreed between themselves in December 1917.Groot 1988, p. 357. Lloyd George was accused (in the Maurice Debate of 9 May 1918 in the House of Commons) of having hoarded troops in the UK to make it harder for Haig to launch offensives. Lloyd George misled the House of Commons in claiming that Haig's forces were stronger (1.75 million men) at the start of 1918 than they had been a year earlier (1.5 million men) – in fact the increase was caused by an increase of 335,000 in the number of labourers, and Haig had fewer combat infantry holding a longer stretch of front.Hart 2008, p. 229. Haig had opposed Maurice in taking his concerns into public, but was disappointed at how Lloyd George was able to get off the hook with a "claptrap speech".Groot 1988, p. 379. Maurice believed he had saved Haig from dismissal.Sheffield 2011, p. 290.

By late spring the BEF had taken just over 300,000 casualties. Battalions had had to be brought in from the Middle East. Haig spent time touring his forces in May.Sheffield 2011, p. 286. Haig's wife reported rumours that he was to be brought home as Commander-in-Chief, Home Forces; when Wilson denied the rumours to Haig, Haig recorded that "no one has been chosen yet!" to replace him.Sheffield 2011, p. 280.

A third major German offensive against the French on the Aisne ("Bluecher"), starting on 27 May, overwhelmed Hamilton-Gordon's IX British Corps which had been sent there to refit after being involved in "Michael" and "Georgette". At a conference at Versailles (1 June) there was friction between Haig, who was worried that the Germans would attack his sector again, and Foch, who demanded that the US divisions trained by the British be moved to his sector to release French divisions. Foch moved French forces down from Flanders, but there was further friction at a meeting in Paris about Foch's request to move British reserves south.Groot 1988, p. 381. Haig threatened to appeal to the British government if he felt Foch was demanding too many British troops, so it was agreed that Haig and Foch should meet more frequently, and in time they developed a good working relationship.

Cooperation improved when the Germans launched their "Gneisenau" Offensive on 9 June. Lloyd George and Milner gave their full support to Foch on moving four British divisions.Groot 1988, p. 382. They told Haig that he should consider himself subordinate to Foch for the time being.Groot 1988, p. 385.

With another German attack imminent, Herbert Lawrence was asked (Haig was on leave in England) to send eight divisions – he sent only two. Haig thought this was breaching an agreement of 1 July that covering Paris and the Somme was to take priority. Wilson consulted the War Cabinet then told Haig to "exercise his judgement" about holding the British line. Haig felt that they would take credit for Foch's victory but might dismiss him if disaster befell the British forces. The German "Peace Offensive" began against the French at Rheims on the same day. Haig eventually agreed that the French could use XXII Corps if necessary "for exploitation".Sheffield 2011, pp. 291–292.

File:The Official Visits To the Western Front, 1914-1918 Q9205.jpg, French President Raymond Poincaré and Haig at GHQ at Montreuil, 7 August 1918]]

In July and August the Germans were defeated at the Second Battle of the Marne and Amiens. The latter victory was described by General Erich Ludendorff as "The Black Day of the German Army" after mass surrenders of German troops. On 11 August Haig, contrary to the wishes of Marshal Foch, insisted on a halt to the Amiens offensive and launched a new attack on 21 August between the Scarpe and the Ancre. As with his previous offensives in 1916 and 1917, Haig encouraged his subordinates to aim for ambitious objectives, in this case a thrust from Albert to Bapaume, and this time with more success than in previous years.Hart 2008, pp. 360, 364. On 10 September Haig, on a brief visit to London, insisted that the war could end that year and asked Lord Milner (Secretary of State for War) to send all available men and transportation.Hart 2008, p. 421. Milner afterwards shared with Wilson his concerns that Haig would embark on "another Passchendaele".Groot 1988, p. 390.

Haig's forces continued to enjoy much success, but when they began to advance towards the Hindenburg Line Haig received a supposedly "personal" telegram from the CIGS Henry Wilson (31 August), warning him that he was not to take unnecessary losses in storming these fortifications. Haig, surmising that the War Cabinet were not forbidding him to attack but might dismiss him if the assault failed, telegraphed Wilson back that they were a "wretched lot" and wrote that attacking the Germans now would be less costly than allowing them time to regroup.

File:The Cooperation of the Allied Forces on the Western Front, 1914-1918 Q7179.jpg inspecting the Gordon Highlanders, 1918]]

There is some dispute over how much direct operational control Haig maintained at this time, Tim Travers in particular arguing that he allowed his Army Commanders a very free hand, whilst Ferdinand Foch was exerting ever-greater influence over strategy. Haig was irritated that Foch insisted that Plumer's Second Army remain part of an Army Group commanded by the King of the Belgians, so that the French and Belgians could take credit for liberating Brussels.Groot 1988, pp. 392–394.

File:BEF commanders and chiefs of staff 1918.jpg, Sir Douglas Haig, Sir Henry Rawlinson. Middle row, left to right: Sir Julian Byng, Sir William Birdwood, Sir Henry Horne. Back row, left to right: Sir Herbert Lawrence, Sir Charles Kavanagh, Brudenell White, Percy, Louis Vaughan, Archibald Montgomery-Massingberd, Hastings Anderson.]]

Germany first requested an Armistice after the penetration of the Hindenburg Line at its strongest point, St Quentin/Cambrai, on 28 September, and the almost simultaneous capitulation of Bulgaria,Groot 1988, p. 391. and discussions continued until the ceasefire on 11 November. When consulted on terms for an armistice in October, Haig stated that "Germany is not broken in the military sense. During the last weeks her forces have withdrawn fighting very bravely and in excellent order".{{sfn|Liddell Hart|1930|pp=383–384}} In private correspondence Haig was more sanguine. In a mid-October letter to his wife he stated that "I think we have their army beaten now".{{rp|316}} Haig noted in his diary for 11 November that the German army was in "very bad" condition due to insubordination and indiscipline in the ranks.{{rp|318}} Haig urged moderation, suggesting that Germany only be asked to give up Belgium and Alsace-Lorraine, and warning that humiliating terms might lead to a militarist backlash. Haig suspected Wilson, a staunch Unionist, of wanting to prolong the war as an excuse to subdue southern Ireland by bringing in conscription there.Groot 1988, p. 393. The collapse of Austria-Hungary encouraged the politicians to demand stricter terms (although less strict than Foch or Pershing would have liked) and Germany was required to evacuate the Rhineland as well. However, once Germany had accepted the strict armistice terms, Haig suggested Germany be split into independent states at the peace treaty.Groot 1988, p. 400.

Whereas the French, American and Belgian armies combined captured 196,700 prisoners-of-war between 18 July and the end of the war, Haig's forces, with a smaller army than the French, engaged the main mass of the German Army and captured 188,700 prisoners. British daily casualty rates (3,645 per day) were heavier during this period than at the Somme (2,950) or Passchendaele (2,121),{{cite web|url=http://www.westernfrontassociation.com/great-war-on-land/71-gen-ls/130-british-military-leaders-great-war-terraine.html/|title=British Military Leadership in the First World War|publisher=Western Front Association|date=8 July 2008|access-date=22 June 2013|archive-date=22 June 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130622022917/http://www.westernfrontassociation.com/great-war-on-land/71-gen-ls/130-british-military-leaders-great-war-terraine.html/|url-status=dead}} because British forces were attacking across the line, instead of being rotated through a single offensive.Hart 2008, p. 364. The military historian, Gary Sheffield, called this, the so-called Hundred Days Offensive, "by far the greatest military victory in British history".

{{Further|British Army during World War I#Discipline}}

As commander-in-chief, one of Haig's responsibilities was to give the final signature to the death warrants of British and Commonwealth soldiers (but not Australian—these went to the Governor-General of Australia) who had been first sentenced to death by Field General Court Martial. Although the book Shot at Dawn (1983), which began the campaign for pardons, says that it is "quite incorrect" to hold Haig solely responsible as he was part of a legal process, by the late 1990s Haig was perhaps best known to the general public because of publicity which implied him to be a brutal disciplinarian—this was not the view of contemporaries.Bond & Cave 2009, pp. 196, 215. Of the 3,080 men sentenced to death in all theatres,Corrigan 2002, p. 229. 346 were executed, 266 (77%) were for desertion, 37 for murder and 18 for cowardice.Corrigan 2002, p. 230. Just over 250 of the executions took place during Haig's time as Commander-in-Chief, but only executed men's records survive, so it is hard to comment on the reasons why men were reprieved.Bond & Cave 2009, p. 196.

During the war, Haig suffered from toothache and sent for a Parisian dentist. Consequently, within months the British Army had hired a dozen dentists and, by the end of the war, there were 831. This led to the formation of the Royal Army Dental Corps in 1921.{{cite magazine|first=Stephanie|last=Pain|url=https://www.newscientist.com/channel/being-human/mg19325942.200-histories-cant-bite-cant-fight.html |title=Histories: Can't bite, can't fight (preview only)|magazine= New Scientist|issue=2594|date= 10 March 2007|pages= 50–51|access-date=22 June 2013}}

File:Warmemorialstjohn's (cropped).jpg in St. John's, Newfoundland. (Memorial Day 1 July 1924)

File:Haiggravedryburgh.jpg

Haig died in London from a heart attack on 29 January 1928, and was given an elaborate funeral on 3 February.The Times, 4 February 1928, pp. 14–16.{{cite web |title=Douglas Haig – London Remembers |url=http://www.londonremembers.com/subjects/lord-douglas-haig |website=londonremembers.com |access-date=24 November 2013}} "Great crowds lined the streets ... come to do honour to the chief who had sent thousands to the last sacrifice when duty called for it, but whom his war-worn soldiers loved as their truest advocate and friend." The gun-carriage that had carried the Unknown Warrior to his grave in 1920 took Haig's body from St Columba's Church, where it had been lying in state, to Westminster Abbey. Three royal princes followed the gun-carriage and the pall-bearers included two Marshals of France (Foch and Pétain). The cortege was accompanied by five guards of honour, representing the Royal Navy, the Irish Guards, the Royal Air Force, the 1st French Army Corps, and the Belgian Regiment of Grenadiers. After the service at the Abbey, the procession re-formed to escort the body to Waterloo station for the journey to Edinburgh, where it lay in state for three days at St Giles's Cathedral.

Haig was buried at Dryburgh Abbey in the Scottish borders, the grave being marked with a plain stone tablet in the style of the standard headstones of the Imperial War Graves Commission issued to British military casualties in the First World War.{{cite web |title=Legion pays tribute to Earl Haig |date=15 September 2020 |url=http://www.thesouthernreporter.co.uk/news/legion-pays-tribute-to-earl-haig-1-2971622 |publisher=Southern Reporter}}

The Earl Haig Memorial, an equestrian statue in Whitehall commissioned by Parliament and sculpted by Alfred Frank Hardiman, aroused some controversy and was not unveiled until just before Armistice Day in 1937.'[http://www.henry-moore-fdn.co.uk/matrix_engine/content.php?page_id=5607 A Kick in the Teeth] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090112165450/http://www.henry-moore-fdn.co.uk/matrix_engine/content.php?page_id=5607 |date=12 January 2009 }}' by Nicholas Watkins.

{{Main|Reputation of Douglas Haig}}

File:Haig monument in Edinburgh Castle.jpg. The statue was commissioned by Sir Dhunjibhoy Bomanji of Bombay.{{cite web|url=http://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/download/meetings/id/21244/relocation_of_earl_haig_statue|title=Relocation of Earl Haig Statue – Edinburgh Council [PDF DOC]}} It was in full view near the Castle entrance, but now relatively hidden in a back courtyard at the entrance to the National War Museum.{{Cite news|url=https://www.thesouthernreporter.co.uk/news/renovated-earl-haig-monument-rededicated-1-1534508|title=Renovated Earl Haig monument rededicated|access-date=2 June 2018|language=en}}]]

After the war Haig was praised by the American General John J. Pershing, who remarked that Haig was "the man who won the war".Gordon Corrigan, Mud, Blood and Poppycock, p. 204. His funeral in 1928 was a huge state occasion. However, after his death he was increasingly criticised for issuing orders which led to excessive casualties of British troops under his command on the Western Front, earning him the nickname "Butcher of the Somme".

Winston Churchill, whose World Crisis was written during Haig's lifetime, suggested that greater use of tanks, as at Cambrai, could have been an alternative to blocking enemy machine-gun fire with "the breasts of brave men".Churchill 1938, p. 1220.Bond 2002, p. 43. Churchill also wrote that although the Allied offensives up until August 1918 had been "as hopeless as they were disastrous", "Haig and Foch were vindicated in the end".Churchill 1938, pp. 1374–1375. Churchill admitted to Lord Beaverbrook that "subsequent study of the war has led me to think a good deal better of Haig than I did at the time. It is absolutely certain there was no one who could have taken his place."Sheffield 2011, pp. 365–366.Reid 2006, p. 499. Churchill's essay on Haig in Great Contemporaries, written after Haig's death, was slightly more critical, noting the government's refusal to offer Haig employment after 1920, his emphasis on the Western Front and his lack of the "sinister genius" possessed by the truly great generals of history.Churchill 1937, p. 223.

File:Field Marshal Douglas Haig death mask, Edinburgh Castle.jpg

Lloyd George was more critical in his War Memoirs, published in 1936. He described Haig as "intellectually and temperamentally unequal to his task", although "above the average for his profession—perhaps more in industry than intelligence". Lloyd George's biographer John Grigg (2002) attributed his vitriol to a guilty conscience, that he had not intervened to stop the Passchendaele Offensive. John Terraine, writing of the "shrill venom" with which Lloyd George sought to "exculpate himself", called the memoirs "a document as shabby as his behaviour at Calais".Terraine 1977, p. 341.

B. H. Liddell Hart, a military historian who had been wounded during the First World War, went from admirer to sceptic to unremitting critic. He wrote in his diary:

{{blockquote|[Haig] was a man of supreme egoism and utter lack of scruple – who, to his overweening ambition, sacrificed hundreds of thousands of men. A man who betrayed even his most devoted assistants as well as the Government which he served. A man who gained his ends by trickery of a kind that was not merely immoral but criminal.Geoffrey Norman, Military History Magazine, Vol. 24, No. 4, June 2007, p. 41.}}

John Laffin, an Australian military historian who had served in the Second World War, commented unfavourably on Haig:

Haig and other British generals must be indicted not for incomprehension but for wilful blunders and wicked butchery. However stupid they might have been, however much they were the product of a system which obstructed enterprise, they knew what they were doing. There can never be forgiveness.Laffin 1988, p. 168.

One of Haig's defenders was the military historian John Terraine, who published a biography of Haig (The Educated Soldier) in 1963, in which Haig was portrayed as a "Great Captain" of the calibre of the Duke of Marlborough or the Duke of Wellington. Terraine, taking his cue from Haig's "Final Despatch" of 1918, argued that Haig pursued the only strategy possible given the situation. Gary Sheffield stated that although Terraine's arguments about Haig have been much attacked over forty years, Terraine's thesis "has yet to be demolished".

Australian historian Les Carlyon wrote that while Haig was slow to adapt to the correct use of artillery in sufficient quantities to support infantry attacks and was generally sceptical that such doctrine had much place in military theory, he was fully supportive of excellent corps and field commanders such as Herbert Plumer, Arthur Currie and John Monash, who seem to best grasp and exercise these concepts, especially later in the war. Carlyon also wrote that there was a case to answer, for his support of more dubious commanders such as Ian Hamilton, Aylmer Hunter-Weston and Hubert Gough.Carlyon, Les. 2006. The Great War, Pan MacMillan.

Critics, including Alan Clark and Gerard De Groot, argue that Haig failed to appreciate the critical science of artillery and that he was "unimaginative", although de Groot added that he has had the misfortune to be judged by the standards of a later age.Groot 1988, p. 407. Paul Fussell, a literary historian, wrote in The Great War and Modern Memory:

File:Earl Haig Memorial, Whitehall, London, UK - 20130629-01.jpg

although one doesn't want to be too hard on Haig ... who has been well calumniated already ... it must be said that it now appears that one thing the war was testing was the usefulness of the earnest Scottish character in a situation demanding the military equivalent of wit and invention. Haig had none. He was stubborn, self-righteous, inflexible, intolerant—especially of the French—and quite humourless ... Indeed, one powerful legacy of Haig's performance is the conviction among the imaginative and intelligent today of the unredeemable defectiveness of all civil and military leaders. Haig could be said to have established the paradigm.Paul Fussell. 1975. "The Great War and Modern Memory".

Military historian John Bourne wrote that Haig, although not familiar with technological advances, encouraged their use. He also rejected claims that Haig was a traditionalist and focused only on cavalry tactics.Bond 2009, p. 4. Cavalry represented less than three per cent of the BEF in France by September 1916, whilst the British were the most mechanised force in the world by 1918, supported by the world's largest air force. The Tank Corps was the world's first such force and some 22,000 men served in it during the war. The Royal Artillery grew by 520 per cent and the engineers who implemented combined arms tactics grew by 2,212 per cent. Bourne wrote that this hardly demonstrates a lack of imagination.Bond 2009, p. 5. Other historians, notably John Keegan, refused to accept that the British Army underwent a "learning curve"; despite this example, Bourne wrote that there "is little disagreement among scholars about the nature of the military transformation".Bond 2009, pp. 5–6. Popular "media opinion" had failed to grasp that under Haig, the British Army adopted a modern style of war in 1918.Bond 2009, p. 6.

There is no consensus on the speed of a learning curve. Travers blamed the management of early campaigns on the ethos of the pre-war officer corps, which was based on privilege, with a hierarchy intent on self-preservation and maintaining individual reputations. As a consequence the army was poorly positioned to adapt quickly. Travers wrote that initiative was discouraged and that the ethos of the army was pro-human and anti-technological. The offensive spirit of the infantry, quality of the soldier, rapid rifle-fire and the idea of the soldier being the most important aspect of the battlefield prevailed. The lessons of the Russo-Japanese War and the power of artillery were ignored, which caused costly tactical mistakes in the first half of the war. The tactics that Haig pursued were beyond the mobility and range of artillery, which contributed to operational failures and heavy losses. Travers also criticised Haig and enemy commanders for seeing battle as perfectly organised and something that could be planned perfectly, ignoring the concept of fog of war. Travers wrote that top-down command became impossible in the chaos of battle. The lack of attention to lower levels of command in the early years of the war created a command vacuum.Bond 2009, pp. 6–7.

Bourne considered this to be too harsh, arguing that Haig progressed along with other commanders of the Edwardian era in implementing advances in operational methods, technology and tactical doctrine. Bourne also wrote that it was difficult to reconcile the commanders of 1918 with the dogma-ridden, unprofessional, unreflecting institution depicted by Travers.Duffy 2007, pp. 320–328.Bond 2009, pp. 7–8.

Biographers Robin Prior and Trevor Wilson in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004) state:

As a result of his determination to accomplish great victories Haig too often disregarded key factors such as weather, and the condition of the battlefield, placed his objectives beyond the range which his artillery could cover and incorporated in his schemes a role for cavalry which this arm was helpless to accomplish. These shortcomings, it needs to be stressed, were not at all peculiar to Haig. ... But the outcome, too often, was British operations directed towards unrealizable objectives and persisted in long after they had ceased to serve any worthwhile purpose. The consequence was excessive loss of British lives, insubstantial accomplishment, and waning morale.Robin Prior and Trevor Wilson, "Haig, Douglas, first Earl Haig (1861–1928)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2011) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/33633, accessed 19 Jan 2015]

Haig has been criticised for the high casualties in British offensives, but historians like John Terraine argue that this was largely a function of the size of the battles, as British forces engaged the main body of the German Army on the Western Front after 1916.Terraine 1980, pp. 37, 105, 108 Although total deaths in the Second World War were far higher than in the First, British deaths were lower, because Britain fought mainly peripheral campaigns in the Mediterranean for much of the Second World War, involving relatively few British troops, while most of the land fighting took place between Germany and the USSR.Corrigan 2002, p. 70. When British forces engaged in Normandy in 1944, total losses were fewer than on the Somme in 1916, as Normandy was around half the length and less than half the size but casualties per unit per week were broadly similar.Corrigan 2002, pp. 298–300, 408. David French wrote that British daily loss rates at Normandy, in which divisions lost up to three quarters of their infantry, were similar to those of Passchendaele in 1917, while average battalion casualty rates in 1944–45 (100 men per week) were similar to those of the First World War.French 2000, p. 154.

John Terraine wrote:

{{blockquote|It is important, when we feel our emotions rightly swelling over the losses of 1914–18, to remember that in 1939–45 the world losses were probably over four times as many ... the British task was entirely different, which is why the (British) loss of life was so different: about 350,000 in 1939–45 and about 750,000 (British deaths, 1 million including the Empire) in 1914–18 ... – ... The casualty statistics of the Great War ... tell us ... virtually nothing about the quality of ... British generals. The statistics show that ... the British losses in great battles were generally about the same as anyone else's.}}

He also wrote that British perceptions were coloured by the terrible losses of 1 July 1916, during which the British Army sustained 57,000 casualties, but that it should also be remembered that the British never suffered anything like the losses of June 1916, when the Austro-Hungarian Army experienced 280,000 casualties in a week, or of August 1914, when the French Army lost 211,000 men in 16 days, or of March and April 1918, when the Germans lost nearly 350,000 men in six weeks, or 1915, when Russia suffered 2 million casualties in a year.Terraine 1980, p. 45

Total British First World War deaths seemed especially severe as they fell among certain groups such as Pals Battalions (volunteers who enlisted together and were allowed to serve together) or the alleged "Lost Generation" of public school and university-educated junior officers. British deaths, although heavy compared to other British wars, were only around half those of France or Germany relative to population.Corrigan 2002, p. 55.

Denis Winter wrote that Haig protected his reputation by falsifying his diary to mislead historians. Barring a few disputes over contentious meetings, such as the War Council of early August 1914 and the Doullens Conference of March 1918, "the overall authenticity of Haig's diary is, however, not in doubt", not least because of the frequency with which its contents have been used to criticise him.Sheffield & Bourne 2005, pp. 2, 9. John Bourne wrote that "Winter's perceived conspiracy would appear to be one of the least successful in history. The falsification of his diary seems equally inept, given the frequency with which its contents are held against the author's competence, integrity and humanity, not least by Winter himself."Bond 2009, pp. 3–5.

Winter wrote that Haig and the British Government had conspired with the Official Historian, Brigadier J. E. Edmonds, to show Haig in a better light in the Official History. These claims were rejected by a number of historians, including Robin Prior and Correlli Barnett. Barnett's comments were supported by John Hussey and Jeffrey Grey of the University of New South Wales, who wrote that:

{{blockquote|A check of the documents cited in the Heyes papers, collected for [the Australian Official Historian] C. E. W. Bean in London in the 1920s, and in the correspondence between Bean and the British Official Historian, Sir James Edmonds, not only fails to substantiate Winter's claims but reinforces still further Barnett's criticisms of (Winter's) capacity as a researcher ... includ(ing) ... misidentification of documents, misquotation of documents, the running together of passages from different documents ... and misdating of material..(including) misdat(ing) a letter by seventeen years ... to support his conspiracy case against Edmonds.{{cite magazine |url=http://www.johndclare.net/wwi3_winter_thesis.htm |title=Denis Winter's Haig: A Manufactured Fraud |magazine=Times Literary Supplement |year=1991 |access-date=22 June 2013}}}}

Donald Cameron Watt found Winter

{{blockquote|curiously ignorant of the by-no-means secret grounds on which the Cabinet Office, or rather its secretary, Lord Hankey, initiated a series of official histories of the first world war and the terms which were binding on the authors commissioned to write them.{{cite web |url=http://frontforum.westernfrontassociation.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=1254&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=15 |title=Front Forum: discussing The Great War 1914–18 |publisher=Western Front Association |access-date=22 June 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120722165227/http://frontforum.westernfrontassociation.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=1254&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=15 |archive-date=22 July 2012 |df=dmy-all }}}}

Winter wrote that Edmonds did not canvass the opinion of veterans, which was untrue – some volumes were sent to 1,000 or more officers for their comments, as well as being checked against unit diaries down to battalion level – in some cases entire chapters were rewritten (or in the case of Passchendaele, the volume was rewritten several times in the 1940s, during disputes about the roles of Haig and Hubert Gough, who was still alive). Winter quoted, out of context, Edmonds' advice to his researchers to write a draft narrative first, then invite interviewees to comment over lunch: Andrew Green, in his study of the Official History, wrote that this was done deliberately, for memories to be jogged by the draft narrative and that senior officers were more likely to be frank if approached informally.Green 2003, pp. 57–59.

Haig appeared as himself in the films Under Four Flags (1918) and Remembrance (1927).

Haig has commonly been portrayed as an inept commander who exhibited callous disregard for the lives of his soldiers. Sometimes the criticism is more against the generation of British generals which he is deemed to represent, a view aired by writers such as John Laffin (British Butchers and Bunglers of World War One) and John Mosier (Myth of the Great War). Alan Clark's book The Donkeys (1961) led to the popularisation of the phrase 'lions led by donkeys' to describe British generalship.Corrigan 2002, p. 213. A critical biographer finds "no evidence of widespread contempt for Haig; the claim that ordinary soldiers universally thought him a butcher does not accord with their continued willingness to fight".Groot 1988, p. 236.

Haig was played by Sir John Mills in the 1969 film Oh! What a Lovely War, in which much of the dialogue is taken from The Donkeys. He is portrayed as being indifferent to the fate of the troops under his command.Sheffield 2002, pp. 20–21.

In the 1989 BBC comedy series Blackadder Goes Forth, Haig, played by Geoffrey Palmer, makes an appearance in the final episode. Referring to the limited gains made during the 1915–1917 offensives, Blackadder says: "Haig is about to make yet another gargantuan effort to move his drinks cabinet six inches closer to Berlin".{{cite web |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/blackadder/epguide/four_captain.shtml |title=Blackadder Episode Guide: Captain Cook |publisher=BBC |access-date=22 June 2013}}

In the 1985 Australian television mini-series Anzacs, Haig was played by Noel Trevarthen as a cold and aloof man whose scepticism about the fighting abilities of the Australian and New Zealand troops arriving on the Western Front in 1916 was aggravated by the conduct of the Australians behind the lines. The series also portrayed British Prime Minister Lloyd George having a strong dislike of Haig and wishing to see him removed from command in 1917.

{{Emblem table

|image=File:Coronet of a British Earl.svgFile:Escutcheon of Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig, 1921.svg

|escutcheon = "1st and 4th azure, a saltire between two mullets in chief and base and a decrescent and increscent in fesse argent, a bordure parted per pale argent and sable charged with three cows' heads cabossed all counterchanged (Haig), 2nd and 3rd argent, three cows' heads cabossed sable within a bordure engrailed azure, (Veitch of Stewartfield)."{{cite book |title=Debrett's peerage, and titles of courtesy, in which is included full information respecting the collateral branches of Peers, Privy Councillors, Lords of Session, etc |date=1921 |publisher=London, Dean |pages=431–432 |url=https://archive.org/details/debrettspeeraget00unse/page/430/mode}}

|crest = A rock proper.

|supporters = "Dexter, a bay horse caparisoned, thereon mounted a Private of the 7th (Queen's Own) Hussars, habited, armed and accoutred; sinister, a bay horse, caparisoned, thereon mounted a Lancer of the 17th (Duke of Cambridge's Own) Lancers, habited, armed and accoutred; all proper."

|motto = Tyde What May

}}

• 26 January 1912: Bradford{{Whatdotheyknow.com|https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/freedom_of_the_city_list_3#incoming-2135991|Email from Bradford City Council on 29 September 2022|891779|Bradford City Council|29 September 2022}}
• 15 May 1919: Dundee{{cite web|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=qRg-AAAAIBAJ&pg=6146,3940404&hl=en|title=The Glasgow Herald – Google News Archive Search|work=google.com|access-date=3 May 2015}}
• 16 June 1919: London{{cite web|url=http://www.itnsource.com/shotlist/BHC_RTV/1919/06/16/BGT407052911/?v=0|title=Haig and Beatty made freemen of the City of London|work=itnsource.com|access-date=3 May 2015}}
• 25 June 1919: Oxford{{cite web|url=http://www.oxford.gov.uk/PageRender/decCD/Freedom_of_the_city_occw.htm|title=Oxford City Council – Freedom of the city|work=oxford.gov.uk|access-date=3 May 2015|archive-date=7 November 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151107055304/http://www.oxford.gov.uk/PageRender/decCD/Freedom_of_the_city_occw.htm|url-status=dead}}
• 16 October 1919: Wolverhampton{{cite web|url=http://www.wolverhamptonhistory.org.uk/politics/local_government/wolves/freemen|title=Freemen of Wolverhampton – Wolverhampton History|work=wolverhamptonhistory.org.uk|access-date=3 May 2015|archive-date=7 May 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130507162025/http://www.wolverhamptonhistory.org.uk/politics/local_government/wolves/freemen|url-status=dead}}
• 23 January 1920: Leeds{{cite web|url=http://www.britishpathe.com/video/earl-haig-in-leeds-aka-earl-haig-receives-freedom/query/douglas+haig|title=Earl Haig In Leeds AKA Earl Haig Receives Freedom Of The City|author=British Pathé|work=britishpathe.com|access-date=3 May 2015}}
• 14 October 1922: Stirling{{cite web|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=2_Y9AAAAIBAJ&pg=2546,4374819&hl=en|title=The Glasgow Herald – Google News Archive Search|work=google.com|access-date=3 May 2015}}
• Unknown: Glasgow{{cite web|url=http://www.glasgow.gov.uk/?articleid=3564|title=Freedom of the City Recipients|publisher=City of Glasgow|access-date=3 May 2015|archive-date=23 June 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150623122008/http://www.glasgow.gov.uk/?articleid=3564|url-status=dead}}

The Argentine football club Club Atlético Douglas Haig, founded 1918, is named after Haig.{{cite news |title=El Milan de Pergamino está de vuelta |url=http://www.clarin.com/deportes/Milan-Pergamino-vuelta_0_700730183.html |newspaper=Clarín |language=es |quote=...whose name is a strange homage to Sir Douglas Haig...|access-date=22 June 2013}}

In August 1920, the Great Central Railway gave the name Earl Haig to one of their new 4-6-0 express passenger locomotives. It carried the name until October 1943.{{harvnb|Boddy|Fry|Hennigan|Proud|1963|pp=48, 53}}{{harvnb|Boddy|Brown|Fry|Hennigan|1975|pp=21, 23}}

Earl Haig Secondary School in Toronto was named after Haig.{{cite news |title=Earl Haig, A History |url=http://carpanatomy.earlhaig.ca/earl-haig-a-history |newspaper=Carpanatomy |quote=... The original school was built in honour of Field Marshal Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig (1861–1928) |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150418045722/http://carpanatomy.earlhaig.ca/earl-haig-a-history |archive-date=18 April 2015 }} A species of cottage tulip, "Marshal Haig", is named after him.{{cite book|author1=Hay, Roy |author2=Synge, Patrick M. |title=The Dictionary of Garden Plants In Colour|publisher=The Royal Horticultural Society|date=1969}} The Hundred of Haig, a cadastral unit in South Australia, was named after Haig in 1918.{{cite web |title=Search result for " Hundred of Haig (HD)" (Record no SA0028898) with the following layers selected – "Hundreds" |url=http://maps.sa.gov.au/plb/# |work=Property Location Browser |publisher=Government of South Australia |access-date=21 November 2016 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161012010923/http://maps.sa.gov.au/plb/ |archive-date=12 October 2016 }}

In the early 1920s, several years before his death, a new road of council houses in Kates Hill was named Haig Road.{{cite news |url=http://www.blackcountrybugle.co.uk/News/How-1920146s-Dudley-honoured-Nurse-Cavell-2.htm |title=How 1920's Dudley honoured Nurse Cavell |newspaper=Black Country Bugle |date=6 January 2005 |access-date=22 June 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120513193154/http://www.blackcountrybugle.co.uk/News/How-1920146s-Dudley-honoured-Nurse-Cavell-2.htm |archive-date=13 May 2012 }} Other roads named in honour of Haig include Haig Avenue in Southport (and the football ground of Southport F.C. that was situated there);{{cite web |title=History of Haig Avenue |url=http://southportfootballclub.co.uk/home/additionalpage.php?id=2 |publisher=Port Online |date=16 September 2012 |quote=The ground was renamed Haig Avenue (after Earl Haig) in 1921 |access-date=22 June 2013}} Haig Avenue in Mount Roskill, Auckland;{{cite Q|Q116775081|page=155}} Haig Road in Singapore;{{cite web |title=Haig Road |url=http://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/infopedia/articles/SIP_615_2005-01-24.html |publisher=National Library Board |date=16 September 2016 |quote=The road is named after Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Bemersyde, the commander-in-chief of the British Expeditionary Force in France from 1915 to 1918. |access-date=15 October 2017}} and General Haig Street in New Orleans.{{Cite web |date=2016-07-25 |title=Pothole of the Day: General Haig Street and Florida Boulevard |url=https://wgno.com/good-morning-new-orleans/pothole-of-the-day/pothole-of-the-day-general-haig-street-and-florida-boulevard/ |access-date=2023-08-23 |website=WGNO |language=en-US}}

{{reflist|refs=

{{cite book |last1=Beach |first1=Jim |title=Haig's Intelligence: GHQ and the German Army, 1916–1918 |date= 2013 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=9781139600521 |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/haigs-intelligence/C8E7355FE420251BF9CB60AAE202A893 |access-date=4 March 2024}}

}}

{{div col}}

• {{cite book |last1=Boddy |first1=M. G. |last2=Brown |first2=W. A. |last3=Fry |first3=E. V. |last4=Hennigan |first4=W. |last5=Hoole |first5=Ken |author-link5=Ken Hoole |last6=Manners |first6=F. |last7=Neve |first7=E. |last8=Platt |first8=E. N. T. |last9=Proud |first9=P. |last10=Yeadon |first10=W. B. |author-link10=Willie Yeadon |title=Locomotives of the L.N.E.R: Tender Engines – Classes B1 to B19 |others=part 2B |date=March 1975 |publisher=Railway Correspondence & Travel Society |location=Lincoln |isbn=0-901115-73-8 |oclc=655688865 }}
• {{cite book |last1=Boddy |first1=M. G. |last2=Fry |first2=E. V. |last3=Hennigan |first3=W. |last4=Proud |first4=P. |last5=Yeadon |first5=W. B. |author-link5=Willie Yeadon |editor-last=Fry |editor-first=E. V. |title=Locomotives of the L.N.E.R: Preliminary Survey |others=part 1 |date=July 1963 |publisher=Railway Correspondence & Travel Society |location=Potters Bar |oclc=505163991 }}
• {{cite book |last=Bond |first=Brian |title=The Unquiet Western Front |publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=2002 |isbn=978-0521809955 |url=https://archive.org/details/unquietwesternfr00bond }}
• {{cite book |last1=Bond |first1= Brian |last2= Cave |first2= Nigel |title=Haig – A Reappraisal 70 Years On |publisher=Pen & Sword|year=2009 |isbn=978-0850526981}}
• {{cite book |last=Bullock |first=Arthur |title=Gloucestershire Between the Wars: A Memoir |publisher=The History Press |year=2009 |isbn=978-0-7524-4793-3}}
• {{cite book |last=Carlyon |first=Les |title=The Great War |publisher=Pan MacMillan|year=2005 |isbn=978-1405037617}}
• {{cite book |last=Charteris |first=Brigadier-General John |title=Field Marshal Earl Haig |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.526597 |publisher=Cassell |year=1929 |oclc=1683342}}
• {{cite book |last=Churchill |first=Winston |title=Great Contemporaries |url=https://archive.org/details/greatcontemporar0000chur |url-access=registration |publisher=Butterworths|year=1937 |isbn=978-1935191995}}
• {{cite book |last=Churchill |first=Winston |title=The World Crisis |publisher=Odhams |year=1938 |isbn=978-0141442051}}
• {{cite book |last=Corrigan |first=Gordon |title=Mud, Blood & Poppycock |publisher=Cassell |year=2002 |isbn=978-0304366590 }}
• {{cite book |last=Davidson |first=Major General Sir J. |title= Haig, Master of the Field |publisher=Pen & Sword |location=Barnsley |year=2010 |isbn=978-1848843622}}
• {{cite book |last=De Groot |first=Gerard |title=Douglas Haig 1861–1928 |publisher=Unwin Hyman|location=London |year=1988 |isbn=978-0044401926}}
• {{cite book |last=Duffy |first=C. |title=Through German Eyes, The British and the Somme 1916 |publisher=Phoenix Books|year=2007 |isbn=978-0-7538-2202-9}}
• {{cite book |last=French |first= David |title=Raising Churchill's Army |publisher=Oxford University Press|location=London |year=2000 |isbn=978-0199246304}}
• {{cite book |last=Gollin |first=Alfred |author-link=Alfred Gollin |title=Proconsul in Politics: Lord Milner |publisher=Macmillan |year=1964 |oclc=175027}}
• {{cite book |last=Green |first=Andrew |title=Writing the Great War |publisher=Frank Cass |location=London |year=2003 |isbn=978-0714684307}}
• {{cite book |last=Haig |first=Countess |title=The Man I Knew |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.76360 |publisher=The Moray Press |year=1936 |oclc=752595381}}
• {{cite book |last=Haig |first=F–M Sir Douglas |title=Sir Douglas Haig's Despatches (December 1915 – April 1919) |url=https://archive.org/details/sirdouglashaigsd00haig |editor=Lt.-Col. J. H. Boraston |publisher=Dent |year=1919 |oclc=479257}}
• {{cite book |last=Hart |first= Peter |title=1918: A Very British Victory |publisher=Phoenix Books |year=2008 |isbn=978-0-7538-2689-8}}
• {{cite book| first=Tony| last=Heathcote|title=The British Field Marshals 1736–1997| publisher=Pen & Sword| location=Barnsley (UK)| year=1999| isbn=0-85052-696-5}}
• {{cite book |last=Hoare|first=Philip|title=Noel Coward: a biography|publisher=Sinclair-Stevenson|year=1995|isbn=978-1856192651}}
• {{cite book |last=Mead |first=Gary |title=The Good Soldier: The Biography of Douglas Haig |publisher=Atlantic Books|year=2008 |isbn=978-1-84354-281-0}}
• {{cite book |first=Charles |last=Mosley |title=Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage |edition=107 |volume=2 |publisher=Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) |year= 2003 |isbn=978-0971196629}}
• {{cite book |last=Laffin |first=John |title=British Butchers and Bunglers of World War One |publisher=Sutton |location=Stroud, Gloucs |year=1988 |isbn=978-0-7509-0179-6 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/britishbutchersb0000laff }}
• {{cite book |last1=Liddell Hart |first1=B.H. |author1-link=B.H. Liddell Hart |title=The Real War |date=1930 |publisher=Little, Brown, and Company |isbn=978-0-316-52505-3 |url=https://archive.org/details/realwar191419180000unse |access-date=28 February 2024}}
• {{cite book |last=Neillands |first=Robin |title=The Death of Glory: the Western Front 1915 |publisher=John Murray |location=London |year=2006 |isbn=978-0-7195-6245-7}}
• {{cite book |last1=Prior |first1=Robin |first2=Trevor |last2=Wilson |title=Haig, Douglas, first Earl Haig (1861–1928) |publisher=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography |location=London |edition=Oxford University Press, 2004; (online edn) January 2011 |url=http://www.oxforddnb.com./view/article/33633 |access-date=19 January 2015}}
• {{cite book |last=Reid |first=Walter |title=Architect of Victory: Douglas Haig |publisher=Birlinn |year=2006 |isbn=978-1841585178}}
• {{cite book |last=Rowlands|first=Murray|title=Aldershot in the Great War: The Home of the British Army|publisher=Pen & Sword Military|year=2015|isbn=978-1783832026}}
• {{cite book |last=Russell|first=John|title=The Haigs of Bemersyde: A Family History|url=https://archive.org/details/haigsofbemersyde00russuoft|publisher= W. Blackwood & Sons|year=1881}}
• {{cite book |last=Secrett |first=Sergeant T. |title=Twenty-Five Years with Earl Haig |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.80523 |publisher=Jarrods |year=1929 |oclc=758825316}}
• {{cite book |last=Sheffield |first=Gary |author-link=Gary Sheffield (historian) |title=Forgotten Victory: The First World War: Myths and Realities |publisher=Headline Review |year= 2002 |isbn= 978-0747264606}}
• {{cite book |last1=Sheffield |first1=Gary |author-link1=Gary Sheffield (historian) |last2=Bourne |first2=John |title=Douglas Haig War Diaries and Letters 1914–18 |publisher=Phoenix |year=2005 |isbn=978-0297847021}}
• {{cite book |last=Sheffield |first=Gary |author-link=Gary Sheffield (historian) |title=The Chief: Douglas Haig and the British Army |publisher=Aurum |location=London |year=2011 |isbn=978-1-84513-691-8}}
• {{cite book |editor-last=Sheffield |editor-first=Gary |title=In Haig's Shadow: The Letters of Major General Hugo de Pree and Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig |publisher=Greenhill Books |location=Barnsley |year=2019 |isbn=978-1-78438-353-4}}
• {{cite book |last=Terraine |first=John |author-link=John Terraine |title=Douglas Haig: The Educated Soldier |publisher=Hutchinson |year=1963 |isbn=978-0304353194}}
• {{cite book |last=Terraine |first=John |author-link=John Terraine |title=The Road to Passchendaele: The Flanders Offensive of 1917: A Study in Inevitability |publisher=Leo Cooper |year=1977 |isbn=978-0850522297}}
• {{cite book |title=The Smoke and the Fire, Myths and Anti-myths of War 1861–1945 |last=Terraine |first=J. |author-link=John Terraine |year=1992 |orig-year=1980 |publisher=Sidgwick & Jackson |location=London |edition=Leo Cooper |isbn=0-85052-330-3}}
• {{cite book |last=Todman |first=Dan |title=The Great War: Myth and Memory |publisher=Hambledon Continuum |year=2005 |isbn=978-1852855123}}
• {{cite book |last=Travers |first=Tim |title=How the War Was Won |publisher=Routledge |year=1992 |isbn=978-1-84415-207-0}}
• {{cite book |last=Winter |first=Denis |title=Haig's Command |publisher=Viking |year=1991 |isbn=978-1844152049}}

{{Div col end}}

• {{cite book |last=Hesilrige |first=Arthur G. M. |date=1921| title=Debrett's Peerage and Titles of courtesy| url=https://archive.org/details/debrettspeeraget00unse/page/431 | location=160A, Fleet street, London, UK |publisher=Dean & Son|page=431}}
• {{cite book |last=Travers |first=Tim |title=The Killing Ground: The British Army, The Western Front and The Emergence of Modern War 1900–1918 |url=https://archive.org/details/y00timo_0 |url-access=registration |publisher=Allen & Unwin |location=London |year=1987 |isbn=978-0-85052-964-7}}
• {{cite book |last=Dixon |first=Dr. Norman |title=On the Psychology of Military Incompetence |publisher=Pimlico Location=London |year=1994 |isbn=978-0712658898 }}
• {{cite book |last=Keegan |first=John |author-link=John Keegan| title=The First World War |publisher=Pimlico |location=London |year=1999 |isbn=978-0712666459}}
• {{cite book |last=Holmes |first=Richard |author-link=Richard Holmes (military historian)| title=Tommy: The British Soldier on the Western Front |publisher=HarperCollins |location=New York |year=2004 |isbn=978-0007137527 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/tommybritishsold0000holm }}
• {{cite book |last=Hochschild |first=Adam |title=To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914–1918 |location=Boston |publisher=Houghton Mifflin Harcourt |year=2011 |isbn=978-0-618-75828-9 |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780618758289 }}
• {{cite book|last=Ridley|first=Nicholas|title=Far from Suitable? Haig, Gough and Passchendaele: a Reappraisal|publisher=Helion|year=2024|isbn=978-1915113658}}

• {{cite book |last=Arthur |first=Sir George |title=Lord Haig |publisher=William Heinemann |year=1928 |oclc=1822378}}
• {{cite book |last=Blake |first=Robert |title=The Private Papers of Douglas Haig, 1914-1919 |publisher=Eyre & Spottiswoode |year=1952 |oclc=459716638}} [https://archive.org/details/privatepapersofd0000haig/page/n5/mode/2up Link]
• {{cite book |last=Charteris |first=BG John |title=Field-Marshal Earl Haig |publisher=Cassell |year=1929 |oclc=253054173}} [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.210467 Link]
• {{cite book |last=Cooper |first=Duff |title=Haig |volume=I |publisher=Faber and Faber |year=1935 |oclc=31464017}} [https://archive.org/details/haig0001unse/page/n11/mode/2up Link]
• {{cite book |last=Cooper |first=Duff |title=Haig |volume=II |publisher=Faber and Faber |year=1936 |oclc=156535867}} [https://archive.org/details/haig0002duff/page/n9/mode/2up Link]
• {{cite book |last=Harris |first=J. P. |title=Douglas Haig and the First World War |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=London |year=2008 |isbn=978-0-521-89802-7}}
• {{cite book |last=Marshall-Cornwall |first=James |author-link=James Marshall-Cornwall |title=Haig as Military Commander |publisher=Batsford |location=London |year=1973 |isbn=978-0713412147}}
• {{cite book |last=Sixsmith |first=E. K. G. |author-link=Eric Sixsmith| title=Douglas Haig |publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson |location=London |year=1976 |isbn=978-0297771494}}
• {{cite book |last=Terraine |first=John |title=Douglas Haig. The Educated Soldier |publisher=Hutchinson |location=London |year=1963 |oclc=753001138}}
• {{cite book |last=Warner |first=Philip |title=Field Marshal Earl Haig |publisher=Bodley Head |location=London |year=1991 |isbn=978-0304356454}}
• {{cite book |last=Mead|first=Gary|title=The Good Soldier: The Biography of Douglas Haig |publisher=Atlantic Books |location=London |year=2014 |isbn=978-1782392248}}

{{Commons category}}

{{Wikiquote}}

• {{Internet Archive author |sname=Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig}}
• {{Hansard-contribs | mr-douglas-haig | the Earl Haig }}
• [http://www.kcl.ac.uk/lhcma/summary/xf50-001.htm Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives]. (Retrieved 30 March 2006.)
• [http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?search=ss&sText=Douglas+Haig&LinkID=mp01964 Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig (1861–1928), Field Marshal: Sitter in 41 portraits] (National Portrait Gallery)
• Bob Bushaway [https://web.archive.org/web/20070620025046/http://www.js-ww1.bham.ac.uk/fetch.asp?article=issue1_Bushaway.pdf Haig and the Cavalry] Journal of the Centre for First World War Studies
• [http://ssa.nls.uk/film.cfm?fid=0762A GALASHIELS WAR MEMORIAL (1925)] (archive film of Field Marshal Earl Haig from the National Library of Scotland: SCOTTISH SCREEN ARCHIVE)
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20120406080146/http://scotlandonscreen.org.uk/database/record.php?usi=007-000-002-197-C&searchdb=scotscreen_scran& SCOTLAND ON SCREEN] (Earl Haig Unveils Peebles War Memorial (1922) – archive film and learning resources)
• [http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-WH1-Fran-t1-front1-d6.html Haig's signature for a book about the New Zealand Division]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20140303211250/http://www.europeana-collections-1914-1918.eu/ Europeana Collections 1914–1918] makes 425,000 First World War items from European libraries available online, including Haig's 'Order of the Day' and other manuscripts, official documents and photographs relating to Haig
• {{PM20|FID=pe/006959}}

{{s-start}}

{{s-mil}}

{{s-bef

| before = Sir Beauchamp Duff

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Chief of the General Staff (India)

| years = 1909–1912

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Sir Percy Lake

}}

|-

{{s-bef

| before = Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = General Officer Commanding-in-Chief Aldershot Command

| years = 1912–1914

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Sir Alexander Hamilton-Gordon

}}

|-

{{s-new|command

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = General Officer Commanding I Corps

| years = August – December 1914

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Charles Monro

}}

|-

{{s-new|command

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = General Officer Commanding First Army

| years = 1914–1915

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Sir Henry Rawlinson

}}

|-

{{s-bef

| before = Sir John French

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Commander-in-Chief British Expeditionary Force

| years = 1915–1919

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Sir John Asser
(as GOC British Troops in France and Flanders)

}}

|-

{{s-hon}}

{{s-bef

| before = Thomas Arthur Cooke

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Colonel of the 17th Lancers (Duke of Cambridge's Own)

| years = 1912–1922

}}

{{s-non

| reason = Regiment amalgamated

}}

|-

{{s-bef

| before = Sir Evelyn Wood

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Colonel of the Royal Horse Guards

| years = 1919–1928

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Sir William Robertson

}}

|-

{{s-new

| reason = Regiment formed

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Colonel of the 17th/21st Lancers

| years = 1922–1926

| with = Sir Herbert Lawrence

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Sir Herbert Lawrence

}}

{{s-bef

| before = Sir Charles Woollcombe

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Colonel of the King's Own Scottish Borderers

| years = 1923–1928

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Duncan Alwyn Macfarlane

}}

{{s-aca}}

{{s-bef

| before = The Marquess of Aberdeen and Temair

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Rector of the University of St Andrews

| years = 1916–1919

}}

{{s-aft

| after = Sir J. M. Barrie

}}

{{s-bef

| before = The Lord Balfour of Burleigh

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Chancellor of the University of St Andrews

| years = 1922–1928

}}

{{s-aft

| after = The Viscount Haldane

}}

{{s-reg|uk}}

{{s-new|creation

}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Earl Haig

| years = 1919–1928

}}

{{s-aft

| after = George Haig

}}

{{s-end}}

{{Rectors of the University of St Andrews}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Haig, Douglas Haig, 1st Earl}}

Category:1861 births

Category:1928 deaths

Category:Nobility from Edinburgh

Category:Military personnel from Edinburgh

Category:7th Queen's Own Hussars officers

Category:17th Lancers officers

Category:17th/21st Lancers officers

Category:King's Own Scottish Borderers officers

Category:Alumni of Brasenose College, Oxford

Category:British field marshals of World War I

Category:British Army personnel of the Mahdist War

Category:British Army personnel of the Second Boer War

Category:British Army cavalry generals of World War I

Category:Chancellors of the University of St Andrews

Douglas

1

Category:Graduates of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst

Category:Graduates of the Staff College, Camberley

Category:Knights Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire

Category:Knights Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath

Category:Knights Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order

Category:Knights of the Thistle

Category:People educated at Clifton College

Category:Rectors of the University of St Andrews

Category:Scottish generals

Category:Scottish Presbyterians

Category:Royal Horse Guards officers

Category:Members of the Order of Merit

Category:British recipients of the Croix de guerre (Belgium)

Category:Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour

Category:British recipients of the Croix de Guerre 1914–1918 (France)

Category:Knights Grand Cross of the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus

Category:Foreign recipients of the Distinguished Service Medal (United States)

Category:Recipients of the Order of the Rising Sun with Paulownia Flowers

Category:Recipients of the Order of Michael the Brave, 1st class

Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig

Category:The Royal British Legion

Category:People educated at Edinburgh Collegiate School

Category:Scottish Freemasons

Category:Peers created by George V

Category:Recipients of the Distinguished Service Medal (US Army)

Category:People of the National Rifle Association

Category:British military personnel in Egyptian service