Dictionary of National Biography, 1927 supplement/Grierson, James Moncrieff
GRIERSON, Sir JAMES MONCRIEFF (1859–1914), lieutenant-general, born at Glasgow 27 January 1859, was the eldest son of George Moncrieff Grierson, a merchant of Glasgow, by his wife, Allison Lyon, daughter of George Lyon Walker, of Garemount, Dumbartonshire. He was educated at Glasgow Academy, in Germany, and at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, whence he passed out fourth, and joined the Royal Artillery at Aldershot in 1878. Almost as soon as he joined he began to write military articles for the press. In 1879 he accompanied the Austrian armies in the occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and in 1880 went to the Russian manœuvres at Warsaw as correspondent for the Daily News. In 1881 Grierson joined his battery in India, but soon after his arrival became attaché in the quartermaster-general’s department at Simla. He was employed on intelligence work, and his pen was busy; for, besides contributions to the Pioneer, he produced a volume of notes on the Turkish army, an Arabic vocabulary, and a gazetteer of Egypt. When an Indian division was sent to Egypt in 1882 to take part in the operations against Arabi Pasha, he accompanied it as deputy assistant quartermaster-general, being present at the battles of Kassassin and Tel-el-Kebir. He was mentioned in dispatches, and received the medal, the khedive’s star, and the fifth class of the order of the Medjidie. Grierson returned to India and in 1883 passed first into the Staff College. His time at Camberley was broken by the Sudan campaign of 1885, in which he served as deputy assistant adjutant and quartermaster-general, being present at the battles of Hashin and Tamai, and was again mentioned. At the Staff College he finished translating Grodekoff’s Campaign in Turcomania and passed out with honours in French and Russian. On leaving he served for a time in the Russian section of the intelligence division under General (Sir) Henry Brackenbury [q.v.]. He was promoted captain in 1886, and in the following year joined a battery in India, but soon after was appointed deputy assistant quartermaster-general, first at Lucknow and then at Peshawar. In the Hazara expedition of 1888 he served as deputy assistant quartermaster-general, second brigade, was again mentioned and received the medal.
In 1889, at Brackenbury’s request, Grierson returned to the intelligence division and became head of the Russian section. Antagonism between England and Russia in Asia was then growing, and Anglo-German relations became closer. There was a distinct rapprochement between the German General Staff and the British War Office; and Grierson, whose knowledge of Germany and of the Franco-German War was very considerable, was constantly in Berlin and the frequent guest of the Emperor and of German officers. During these years he published books on the Russian, German, and Japanese armies, The Armed Strength of Russia (1886), The Armed Strength of Japan (1886), and The Armed Strength of the German Empire (1888), and also a hand-book entitled Staff Duties in the Field (1891). After a short period in 1895 as brigade-major at Aldershot he was promoted brevet lieutenant-colonel, and in 1896 was appointed military attaché at Berlin. Grierson had hitherto been a warm admirer of the Germans, but during this period his views changed. Though cordially welcomed in Berlin and well received by the Emperor, he began to see that ultimately a breach with England must come.
Early in 1900, when Lord Roberts took over the chief command of the British forces in the South African War, Grierson was sent to the front in charge of the military attachés; but on his arrival at Paardeberg in February, Lord Roberts appointed him quartermaster-general, and as such he took part in the operations in the Orange Free State at Poplar Grove, Driefontein, and the Zand river, and in the occupation of Pretoria (5 June), and in the battle of Diamond Hill (12 June), being again mentioned and receiving the Queen’s medal and four clasps. In August 1900 he was hurriedly dispatched to China as British representative on the staff of Field-Marshal Count von Waldersee, commander-in-chief of the allied forces against the Boxers, and entered Peking with him. He was of great service in smoothing the relations between the British and the Germans, but his opinion of German methods of making war was influenced unfavourably by his experience in China, where he found that jealousy of Great Britain and fear of Russia were the Germans’ leading motives.
Returning home in 1901 Grierson received a brevet colonelcy and the C.B. for his services, and spent two years with the second Army Corps, first as assistant quartermaster-general and then as chief staff officer. On the reorganization of the War Office in 1904 he became director of military operations and was promoted major-general. During the next two years perhaps the most important work of his life was performed in contributing to the foundation of British friendship with France. Spending some time in France he entered into cordial relations with many French officers and especially with Colonel Huguet, who in 1905 became military attaché in London. Between them these two men laid the foundations of co-operation between the British and French armies, and when Grierson went to command the first division at Aldershot in 1906, a post which he held till 1910, his work was carried on by his successors, Sir Spencer Ewart and (Sir) Henry Wilson. For the next eight years, with an interval on half-pay during which he took part in the coronation mission to Siam (1911) and in the official tour of Prince Henry of Prussia (1911), he was employed first at Aldershot and then (1912) as general officer commanding-in-chief, Eastern Command. In both capacities his energies were directed towards the training of troops for field warfare and especially towards securing rapidity of mobilization. The clash with Germany, which had long been foreseen by Grierson and by many other soldiers, sailors, and diplomatists, grew clearly more imminent. Had war with Germany come about as the result of the Agadir crisis (July 1911), it had been proposed that Grierson should be chief of the general staff of a British expeditionary force: but in 1914, when war was declared, he was appointed to command the second Army Corps. He only lived to land in France. He reached Havre on 16 August, and the day after his arrival he died suddenly in the train, near Amiens, of aneurism of the heart He was buried at Glasgow.
Grierson’s great knowledge of languages, his strength, energy, capacity for work, and extraordinary memory, enabled him to acquire a vast store of knowledge of his profession. One of the outstanding features of his character was his admiration of the British private soldier. He was beloved by his troops, for though strict as regards training, he spared them unnecessary duties by thinking out his problems in advance and making provision for all reasonable comfort and relaxation. His early service was chiefly on the staff, and he was in advance of his times in knowledge of staff work; but this was not his predilection. ‘I would rather command a battalion in war than be C.G.S.’, he wrote in 1914. He was of a cheerful disposition, a good musician, an amateur actor, fond of travel and society; but he really lived for his profession, and no officer was more wholeheartedly devoted to the army. He was created K.C.B. on the occasion of the coronation of George V in 1911, when he was in attendance on the German crown prince, and he was an aide-de-camp general to the King, knight of grace of St. John of Jerusalem, a commander of the legion of honour, and holder of many other foreign decorations. He was unmarried.
[The Times, 18 August 1914; War Office records; Annual Register; ‘The Times’ History of the War in South Africa, 1900–1909; D. S. Macdiarmid, Life of Sir James Moncrieff Grierson, 1928; private information.]