WW2 Officer Criteria

[Pandabean]

Hi folks,

Got a quick question. How were officers selected during the Second World War? Could you freely sign up or had you to be an educated man?

The reason I ask is I have a WW2 photograph of an officer and I am not sure who it is yet but none of the family were educated or considered of the upper classes, apart from one or two individuals but that was way before the War.

I know that WW2 records are not released and not much research goes into them due to the time when it was.

Thanks,
Andy

[bleckie]

Hi Andy
From my little knowledge
Durring a period of conflict there is a distinct possiblity that someone could attain high rank having started as a private soldier.
It depends what you mean by educated at the start of the second world war most people could read and write that was probably all that was rrequired.
A soldier if he was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time could be selected on the basis of what others had seen of him during conflict be selected to attend a commisioning board.
One of the more recent ones is through the link below.

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/edito ... -20692387/

Yours Aye
BruceL

[Hibee]

Hi Andy

In the UK, the Second World War was the first conflict where is was fairly common to be able to "rise through the ranks", although officers remained primarily recruited through Sandhurst and the like.

Hibee

[Currie]

Hello Andy,

The National Library of Scotland has put their WW1 and WW2 MOD Army Lists on the Internet Archive. Lists of officers, surname and initials, rank, seniority date, and unit, I think. http://www.archive.org/search.php?query ... publicdate

Alan

[Montrose Budie]

The strength of the British Army was as follows -

31 Dec 1939 - 14,202 Officers, 312,309 Other ranks
31 Dec 1940 - 22,882 Officers, 443,457 Other ranks
31 Dec 1941 - 36,548 Officers, 642,188 Other ranks

In 1936, it was decided that the R[oyal] M[ilitary] A[cademy] should be amalgamated with the Royal Military College at Sandhurst.

Before this decision was put into effect, both establishments closed on mobilisation in September 1939, as, in the light of experience during the First World War, no regular commissions were to be granted in time of major war. The senior cadets of both establishments were commissioned at once. The juniors were called up into the Territorial Army as private soldiers. They were then dispersed to various Officer Cadet Training Units, according to the arm or branch for which they were intended

The major failure in the first years of WW2 was the selection of officers for the army. There were insufficient volunteers and high failure rates during training.

In April 1942 a new selection process was created where volunteers attended a 3 day War Office Selection Board that involved assessments, interviews and group command tasks instead of the previous system of short interviews.

This proved to be an excellent system, and reflected a major change in British military thinking: that leadership ability was not necessarily a matter of inheritance, some considered it 'socialism'. However, the British Army remained committed to the view that junior officers were leaders first and technicians second, and also considered that the RAF put it the other way around!

Successful candidates were then sent to an OCTU (Officer Cadet Training Unit) where they were very quickly trained to be officers, or rejected as unsatisfactory....................

mb

[Pandabean]

Thanks folks. Really helpful information

Just typical, I can't find the photo now. As far as I know there was no other insignia other than the Lt Pips and that he was in a Kilt so it was a Scottish Regiment, so it may be harder trying to ID him.

Thanks again.

Andy

[bleckie]

Hi Andy

Try the london gazette using just the family name

All promotions and commisions were gazetted

http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/search

you may be lucky

Yours Aye
BruceL

[Pandabean]

Bruce,

It may take a while considering the name is Johnston. Unless it would let me search by first name and location?

Any tips on how to search it in the best way possible?

Cheers,
Andy

[Pandabean]

One that does pop up.....

Inniskilling Fus.
Actg. C.Q.M.S. Robert JOHNSTON (143981)
to be 2nd Lt. 7th Sept. 1940.

No idea of the reginment though. Robert was from East Lothian, out by Haddington.


Ahhh, seems to be an Irish Regt.

[bleckie]

Hi Andy

This is the one you want commonly known as the "skins"

http://www.inniskillingsmuseum.com/

Yours Aye
BruceL