Orde Charles Wingate

Major General Orde Charles Wingate, according to Wikipedia, was "a senior British Army officer known for his creation of the Chindit deep-penetration missions in Japanese-held territory during the Burma Campaign of the Second World War.

Wingate was an exponent of unconventional military thinking and the value of surprise tactics. Assigned to Mandatory Palestine, he became a supporter of Zionism, and set up a joint British-Jewish counter-insurgency unit. Under the patronage of the area commander Archibald Wavell, Wingate was given increasing latitude to put his ideas into practice during the Second World War. He created units in Abyssinia and Burma.

At a time when Britain was in need of morale-boosting generalship, Wingate attracted British Prime Minister Winston Churchill's attention with a self-reliant aggressive philosophy of war, and was given resources to stage a large-scale operation..." Wingate was considered by some to be instrumental in the formation of the Israel Defense Forces.

Military

Training 1921-1927

In 1921, when he was 18, Orde was accepted at the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich, which was the Royal Artillery's officers' training school. It is shared in his wiki that for minor offense, first-year students were subjected to a form of discipline that involved " being stripped and forced to run a gauntlet of senior students, all of whom wielded a knotted towel which was used to hit the accused on his journey along the line. On reaching the end, the first-year would then be thrown into an icy-cold cistern of water.When it came time for Wingate to run the gauntlet, for allegedly having returned a horse to the stables too late, he walked up to the senior student at the head of the gauntlet, stared at him and dared him to strike. The senior refused. Wingate moved to the next senior and did the same; he too refused. In turn, each senior declined to strike; coming to the end of the line, Wingate walked to the cistern and dived straight into the icy-cold water."

In 1923, Wingate earned his Royal Artillery officer's commission, and was posted to the 5th Medium Brigade at Larkhill on Salisbury Plain. He was promoted to Lieutenant in 1925, and sent to the Royal Military School of Equitation in 1926 to advance his cavalry skills.

Sudan 1928-1933

His father's cousin, Sir Reginald "Rex" Wingate, a retired army general who had been governor-general of the Sudan (1899-1916) and high commissioner of Egypt (1917-1919) influenced Orde to take a course in Arabic at the School of Oriental Studies in London (1926-1927) which he passed with a mark of 85%. In Sept. 1927, he obtained six months leave to "mount an expedition" in the Sudan, he traveled by bicycle thru France, Germany, then Czechoslovakia, Austria and Yugoslavia to Genoa, Italy where he took a boat to Egypt. Then from Cairo he travelled to Khartoum. In April 1928 he was posted to the East Arab Corps, serving the area of Roseires and Gallabat on the borders of Ethiopia, where the SDF patrolled to catch slave traders and ivory poachers, and is credited for changing the method to ambushes.

In March 1930, Orde was given command of a company of 300 soldiers with the local rank of "Bimbashi" (Major), and enjoyed it, but was known for antagonizing other officers with his "aggressive and argumentative" personality. He was granted the local rank of Captain on April 16, 1930. At the end of his tour, he mounted a short expedition into the Libyan desert to investigate the lost army of Cambyses (second King of Kings of the Archaemenid Empire 530-522 B.C.), and search for the mythical oasis of Zerzura. Supported by equipment from the Royal Geographic Society (founded 1830), his findings were published in what is now The Geographical Journal in April 1934. It is noted that although they did not find the oasis, Orde saw it as "an opportunity to test his endurance in a very harsh physical environment, and also his organisational and leadership abilities". His service in Sudan was concluded on April 2, 1933.

Return to the U.K. 1933-1936

Upon his return to the U.K., Orde was posted back to Bulford on Salisbury Plain. From Jan. 13, 1935 he was seconded to the Territorial Army as the adjutant of the 71st (West Riding) Field Brigade, with a temporary rank of Captain. He was promoted to the substantive rank of Captain on May 16, 1936 and vacated the appointment as adjutant on Sept. 8.

Palestine and the Special Night Squads

In Sept. 1936, Orde was assigned to a staff officer position in the British Mandate of Palestine, and became an intelligence officer. This is where he became politically involved with a number of Zionist leaders defending themselves against a campaign of attacks by Palestinian Arab guerillas. He used Kibbutz En Harod as a military base in honor of the biblical judge Gideon who fought in that area. Orde formulated the idea of "raising small assault units of British-led Jewish commandos armed with grenades and light infantry small arms to combat the Arab revolt" and presented it to Commander Wavell who approved it. Orde then created the "Special Night Squads" comprised of British and Jewish volunteers, and he trained, commanded and accompanied them on their patrols, and his units frequently ambushed Arab saboteurs who were attacking oil pipelines of the Iraq Petroleum Company, and raiding border villages. In 1938, Orde was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for his methods. His deepening political involvement in Palestine concerned his superiors who ultimately resulted in him being transferred back to Britain in 1939.

Ethiopia

Orde was commander of an anti-aircraft unit in Britain at the start of WWII, and after several proposals for the creation of a British Jewish army in Palestine, the forementioned Commander Wavell, then of the Middle East Command in Cairo invited him to return to Sudan to begin operations against Italian operation forces in Ethiopia. Under the British commander William Platt in Sudan, he created a Special Operations Executive (SOE) force composed of British, Sudanese and Ethiopian soldiers known as the "Gideon Force" in honor of he who "defeated a large force with a tiny band of men". Veterans of the Haganah SNS were also invited to join the group, and from Feb. 1941 with the blessing of the Emperor of Ethiopia they reconquested Abyssinia with challenging Italian forts and their supply lines, and Orde was temporarily promoted as a Lieutenant Colonel. With no more than 1,700 men they took the surrender of 20,000 Italians toward the end of the campaign, and he was demoted back to a Major.

Burma

After a bout of malaria, a treatment of which, combined with setbacks from the mission to Ethiopia, caused him to attempt suicide, but another officer saved his life, and he was sent back to Britain to recuperate. On Feb. 27, 1942, he was sent to Rangoon, and was promoted again to Colonel, and was ordered to organize guerilla units to fight behind Japanese lines, but the subsequent collapse of Allied defenses in Burma stalled this and he flew back to India in April where he started promoting ideas for "jungle long-range penetration" units, which Commander Wavell granted him the Indian 77th Infantry Brigade which was eventually renamed the Chindits. By Aug. 1942, he had set up a training center at Dhana in Madhya Pradesh, and "attempted to toughen up the men by having them camp in the Indian jungle during the rainy season" which backfired when 70% went absent from duty due to illness, and many had to be replaced in Sept. 1942 from other personnel in the army.

The original Chindit operation of 1943, which was to be coordinated with the field army, was officially cancelled when the larger offensive was scrapped, but Orde persuaded Wavell to allow him to bring a team into Burma nonetheless, and that became Operation Longcloth, which resulted initially in destruction of a main railway, but deeper into Burma caused eventual withdrawal. See Tony Redding's 2011 War in the Wilderness. The mission was "widely regarded as the toughest sustained Allied combat experience of the Second World War", according to the author's summary of the book. Responses to this mission varied from British and Indian army officers who questioned the effect of convincing the Japanese to rework their approach, whereas Winston Churchill and others in London praised the unit, and the Japanese eventually admitted that the Chindits successfully disrupted their operations in the first half of 1943.

The mission's successes became a propaganda tool used to argue to the army and civilians that the Japanese could be beaten, and Wingate released a highly critical report of his soldiers, which was passed along to Winston Churchill who invited him to London for talks. Orde was invited then to the Quebec Conference where he was invited to explain his ideas on deep penetration warfare to the Combined Chiefs of Staff, which impressed them enough to approve larger-scale deep-penetration attacks, and he was promoting to the rank of acting Major General on Sept. 18, 1943.

After his meeting with Allied leaders, Orde contracted typhoid by drinking water from a flower vase in a Cairo hotel while on his way back to India, and it prevented him from taking a more active role in training of the new long-range jungle forces, and the second mission was almost cancelled for lack of troop transport, but Col. Philip Cochran of the 1st Air Commando Group offered 150 gliders to haul supplies, which were also able to move troops into Burma, along with some fore-promised C-47 transport aircraft, which ultimately disrupted a pre-planned Japanese invasion of India under the code name of Operation Thursday.

Childhood and education

Orde was born Feb. 26, 1903 at Nainital, in Uttarakhand, India. Nainital is in the Kumaon foothills of the outer Himalayas, located 177 miles from the state capital Dehradun, and 214 miles from New Delhi, the capital of India. Most of Orde's childhood was spent in England. His parents were:

Parents

• Col. George Wingate (b. 1852 Kensington, Middlesex, Eng. - d. 1936 Godalming, Surrey, Eng.). He retired from the Indian Army in 1905, with honors including the Companion of the Most Eminent Order of the Indian Empire (CIE). Credited as the founder of Central Asia Mission.
• Mary Ethel Stanley Browne Wingate (b. 1867 Woolwich, Kent, Eng. - d. 1943 Woking, Surrey, Eng.)

Grandparents

Paternal

• Rev. William Wingate (b. 1808 Glasgow, Scot. - d. 1899 Paddington, London, Eng.). According to FindAGrave he was the eldest son of Andrew and Margaret C. (Miller) Wingate. First wife was Janet "Jessie" Buchanan Wingate (1813-1838). He was educated at the University of Glasgow, and at the age of 21, he became partner in his father's mercantile business. After the death of his first wife, when he was the age of 30, he became an elder of St. George's Tron Parish of the Church of Scotland, in Glasgow, whose minister, Dr. Robert Buchanan, was his cousin. Influenced by a friend, Robert Wodrow, a member of the Jewish Mission Committee, he became interested in Judaism, traveling to Berlin to study German and Hebrew. In 1842, he joined pioneer missionaries in Budapest. In 1843, he became a member of the Free Church, and was ordained that same year, and served in Jassy, Hungary until Jan. 1852 when the Austrian government expelled all missionaries. In latter years, he labored in London as an independent, unsalaried missionary to the Jews. His house became a centre of Jewish mission influence, and was a member of many institutions and committees connected with leading them to Christ worldwide.
• Margaret Wallace Torrance Wingate (b. 1824 Kilmarnock, Ayr, Scot. - d. 1909 Christchurch, Dorset, Eng.), daughter of James Torrance (b. 1781 Ayrshire, Scot.), who was a cotton hand loom weaver in 1841 in Greenholm.

Maternal

• Capt. Charles Orde Browne (b. 1838 Uley, Gloucester, Eng. - d. 1900 Peers Court, Dursley, Gloucester, Eng.). Retired from the military. Son of Benjamin Chapman Browne (b. 1798 Ireland - d. 1853 Nunnykirk, Northumberland, Eng.) & Mary Ann Lloyd Baker Browne (b. 1803 Fulham, London, Eng. - d. 1882 Stouts Hill, Gloucester, Eng.)
• First wife (1861): Wilhelmina Frances Reeves Browne (b. 1838 Monkstown, Dublin, Ireland - d. 1863 London, Eng.), daughter of Rich Reeves.
• Second wife: Anna Maria Mitchell Browne (b. 1844 Leicester, Eng. - d. 1917 Eastbourne, Sussex, Eng.), daughter of George Monck Berkeley Mitchell (b. 1806 Rutland, East Midlands, Eng. - d. 1868 Woolwich, Kent, Eng.) & Maria Bacon Stanley Mitchell (b. 1806 Dublin, Ireland - d. 1865 Woolwich, Kent, Eng.).
  • George Mitchell's father, George Berkeley Mitchell served as a licensed curate of Mereworth Parish Church in spite of not having a degree. He also served as a curate at Tudeley & Bromley House, vicar @ All Saints & then St. Mary's, both at Leicester. In 1818, he served as a chaplain to Frederick, the Duke of York.

Siblings

Orde had six siblings:

• Rachel Orde Wingate (b. 1901 Murra, India - d. 1953 Woking, Surrey, Eng.) She never married, served as a linguist and missionary to western Asia.
• Sybil Douglas Wingate (b. 1902 Nainital, India - d. 1993 Camden, London, Eng.)
• Monica Miller Wingate
• Constance Carrick Wingate
• George Nigel F. Wingate
• William Grant Wingate, QC

In 1916, his family moved to Godalming, where Orde attended days at a school called Charterhouse.

Marriage

On the sea voyage returning from Egypt in 1933, Orde met Lorna Moncrieff Patterson, who was 16 years old and traveling with her mother. They were married on Jan. 24, 1935.

Death

On Mar. 13, 1944, Wingate flew to assess situations in three Chindit-held bases in Burma. Upon his return, he agreed to pick up two British war correspondents' request for a lift, in spite of protests from the pilot that the plane was already overloaded. While enroute from Imphal to Lalaghat, the USAAF B-25 Mitchell bomber of the 1st Commando Group in which he was flying crash into jungle hills near Bishnupur, Manipur, India, killing all ten passengers, where they were buried. Five of the ten crash victims, including both pilots, were Americans, and since all ten were charred beyond recognition, they were all exhumed in 1947 and reburied in Imphal, India, then re-exhumed in 1950 and flown to Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia, due to a three-way agreement between the governments of India, the U.K. and the U.S., and wishes of the families.

Memorials

Churchill called Wingate "one of the most brilliant and courageous figures of the second world war... a man of genius who might well have become also a man of destiny". Others considered him mad for various eccentricities and other idiosyncrasies throughout his career.

• There is a Chindit Memorial that was erected in 1990 in the Victoria Embankment Gardens, near the Ministry of Defense HQ, commemorating the Chindit special forces, as well as Wingate. The memorial was designed by architect David Price, with a sculpture of the Chinthe designed by Frank Forster, and unveiled by HRH Duke of Edinburgh. There is also a separate memorial in the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire. In Aug. 2020, to commemorate the 75th anniversary of VJ Day, and shortly before the 30th anniversary of its unveiling, the Chindit Memorial became recognized as a "Grade II Listed Building" which protects it from being demolished, extended or altered without special permission.

• To commemorate Wingate's contributions to the Zionist cause, Israel's National Centre for Physical Education and Sport was renamed the Wingate Institute in 1957.

• A square in the Talbiya neighborhood of Jerusalem bears his name.

• There is a Yemin Orde youth village near Haifa.

• A Jewish football club formed in London in 1946, the Wingate Football Club was named in his honor.

• The General Wingate Polytechnic College in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia celebrates the Gideon Force, the Ethiopian Patriots and Wingate.

• Wingate Golf Club in Harare, Zimbabwe.

• A memorial stone in his honor stands at the Charlton Cemetery in southeast London where Orde's mother's family is also buried.

PB connections

Orde's father, George, retired as a Colonel from the British Army in 1905. Early on in his military career while in India, he became open PB, and married Mary Ethel Browne after wooing her for 20 years, when he was 46. Mary's parents were also PB. When Orde was a child, he and his six siblings were raised with time set aside each day for studying and memorizing Scripture.

Sources

• initially adapted from Orde's Wiki