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Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King's College London

DOUGLAS-SCOTT-MONTAGU, Brig Gen John Walter Edward, 2nd Baron


IDENTITY STATEMENT

Reference code(s): GB 0099 KCLMA Douglas-Scott-Montagu

Held at: Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King's College London

Title: DOUGLAS-SCOTT-MONTAGU, Brig Gen John Walter Edward, 2nd Baron

Date(s): Created 1910-1928, 1948, 1987

Level of description: Collection (fonds)

Extent: 8.5 boxes or 0.085 cubic metres

Name of creator(s):

CONTEXT

Administrative/Biographical history:

Born in 1866; educated at Eton and New College, Oxford; worked for London and South Western Railway Company; MP (Conservative) for New Forest Division, Hampshire, 1892-1905; commissioned in 4 Volunteer Bn, Hampshire Regt, 1896; commanded 4 Volunteer Bn, Hampshire Regt, 1904-1912; commanded 2 Bn, 7 Hampshire Regt, Egypt, 1914, and India, 1915; Inspector of Mechanical Transport to Government of India, 1915-1917; Adviser on Mechanical Transport Services in India, 1917-1919; member of Joint War Air Committee (Inter-Departmental Committee on the Air Service), 1916; India Office representative, Civil Aerial Transport Committee chaired by Alfred Charles William Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe, 1917; President, Air Conference, Guildhall, London, 1920; died in 1929.

CONTENT

Scope and content/abstract:

Papers relating to aviation and transport, dated 1910-1928, principally comprising papers relating to Joint War Air Committee (Inter-Departmental Committee on the Air Service) chaired by Edward George Villiers Stanley, 17th Earl of Derby, 1916, Committee on the Administration and Command of the Royal Flying Corps, 1916, and Air Boards chaired by Weetman Dickinson Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray, 1917, and George Nathaniel Curzon, 1st Earl Curzon of Kedleston, [1916]; correspondence, 1915-1916, 1920, notably including correspondence with Herbert Henry Asquith, 1916, Curzon, 1916, Derby, 1916, the Imperial Defence Committee, 1916, the Parliamentary Aviation Committee, and George Sydenham Clarke, 1st Baron Sydenham of Combe, 1916; printed books, pamphlets, memoranda, notes and texts by Douglas-Scott-Montagu and others, 1910-1920, mainly relating to aviation technology, anti-aircraft defence and the organisation of the air services; memoranda, official reports, notes and texts relating to his work as Adviser on Mechanical Transport Services to the Government of India, 1915-1919; manuscript account of service of No 1 Armoured Motor Unit, North West Frontier, India, 1915-1916, by Capt A J Clifton, 68 Durham Light Infantry, 1915-1916, dated 1917, including photographs and preface by Montagu. Other papers relating to his life and career, 1914-1926, dated 1914-[1926], 1948, principally comprising letters relating to his service with 7 Hampshire Regt in Egypt, 1914, and India, 1915; photographs and photographic negatives, 1915-1922, mainly relating to his service in India, 1915-1919. Typescript draft of A strange war. Burma, India and Afghanisatan, 1914-1919 (Sutton, Gloucester, 1988), an account of 2/5 Bn, Somerset Light Infantry and 2 Mechanical Transport Company by Chris P Mills, based on the recollections of Col B G L Rendall, the diary of Edward William Ewens and research into the Montagu papers, dated 1987.

ACCESS AND USE

Language/scripts of material: Mainly English, with one item in Italian.

System of arrangement:

Arranged by accession. The first accession is divided into the following sections: Derby Joint War Air Committee; Committee on the Administration and Command of the Royal Flying Corps and related papers; Curzon Air Board; Cowdray Air Board; printed books, manuals and pamphlets; technical notes, papers and memoranda. The second accession consists of: correspondence; speech notes; memoranda, mainly on Indian transport systems; photographs. The third accession has not yet been sorted.

Conditions governing access:

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

Conditions governing reproduction:

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.

Physical characteristics:

Finding aids:

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

Detailed catalogue

ARCHIVAL INFORMATION

Appraisal, destruction and scheduling information:

Accruals:

Archival history:

Immediate source of acquisition:

Placed in the Centre by the family in 1965, 1973 and 1979. A further accession was made in 1988.

ALLIED MATERIALS

Existence and location of originals:

Existence and location of copies:

Central Library Gillingham holds copies of some of the papers relating to his service with the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service in Kent during World War One.

Related material:

Additional papers are held at Beaulieu Palace House Archives, Beaulieu, and the Reference Library, National Motor Museum, Beaulieu. The papers of Charles Hardinge, 1st Baron Hardinge of Penhurst, at Cambridge University Library include correspondence 1915-1918. The papers of Alfred Charles William Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe, at British Library include correspondence, 1908-1921 (Ref: Add MS 62165).

Publication note:

'Documents relating to the Naval Air Service' Publications of the Navy Records Society vol 113 ([London], Royal Naval Society, 1969), edited by Capt Stephen Wentworth Roskill, contains material from the Douglas-Scott-Montagu papers.

DESCRIPTION NOTES

Note:

Decorations: KCIE, CSI

Date(s) of descriptions: Date opf compilation: Jan 1997


INDEX ENTRIES
Subjects
Anti-aircraft defence | Defence | State security
Armoured forces | Armed forces | State security
Diaries | Nonfiction | Prose | Literary forms and genres | Literature
Mechanical transport | Transport
Memoirs | Documents | Information sources
Military aviation | Air transport | Transport
Photographs | Visual materials
Public administration | Government
War | International conflicts
World War One (1914-1918) | World wars (events) | Wars (events)
International relations
Military organizations
Primary documents

Personal names
Asquith | Herbert Henry | 1852-1928 | 1st Earl of Oxford and Asquith | statesman x Oxford and Asquith | 1st Earl of
Clarke | George Sydenham | 1848-1933 | 1st Baron Sydenham of Combe | civil servant x Sydenham of Combe | 1st Baron
Clifton | A J | fl 1915-1916 | Captain
Curzon | George Nathaniel | 1859-1925 | 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston x Curzon of Kedleston | 1st Marquess
Ewens | Edward William | fl 1914-1918
Mills | Chris P | fl 1987-1988
Pearson | Weetman Dickinson | 1856-1927 | 1st Viscount Cowdray x Cowdray | 1st Viscount
Rendall | B G L | fl 1914-1919 | Colonel
Stanley | Edward George Villiers | 1865-1948 | 17th Earl of Derby x Derby | 17th Earl of

Corporate names
British Army
Indian Government
RAF | Royal Air Force x Royal Air Force
Royal Flying Corps

Places
Afghanistan | Middle East
Egypt | North Africa
India | South Asia
Myanmar | South East Asia
Northwest Frontier | Pakistan | South Asia