John Philip Du Cane

Sir John Du Cane
Born	5 May 1865 South Kensington, London, England
Died	5 April 1947 (aged 81) Westminster, London, England
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service/branch	British Army
Rank	General
Commands held	XV Corps Western Command British Army of the Rhine Malta
Awards	Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath

General Sir John (Philip) Du Cane GCB (1865–1947) was a British Army general and a former Master-General of the Ordnance. He held high rank during World War I.

Military career

Du Cane was commissioned into the Royal Artillery in 1884.

He served in the Second Boer War and became Commander Royal Artillery for 3rd Division in 1911.

He served in World War I initially as a Brigadier-General on the General Staff of III Corps. In 1915, as Major-General Royal Artillery, he was Artillery Advisor at General Headquarters; Robertson, Chief of Staff to the BEF in 1915, later stated that he had laid the organisational groundwork for the massive expansion of BEF artillery during the war. He was posted to the Ministry of Munitions in 1916 and then became GOC XV Corps in 1916. In that capacity, he was closely involved in Operation Hush, a planned invasion on the Belgian coast. On 12 April 1918, against the backdrop of the German "Georgette" Offensive and Field Marshal Haig's demands for French reinforcements, he was appointed liaison officer between Haig and the Allied Generalissimo General Foch.

He was appointed Master-General of the Ordnance in 1920 and then General Officer Commanding-in-Chief for Western Command in 1923. He was General Officer Commanding-in-Chief for British Army of the Rhine from 1924 until 1927 when he became Governor and Commander-in-Chief of Malta; he retired in 1931.

He was also Aide-de-Camp General to the King from 1926 to 1930.

Books

• Harris, J.P. Douglas Haig and the First World War. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0-521-89802-7

Military offices
Preceded by Henry Horne	General Officer Commanding XV Corps 1916–1918	Succeeded by Sir Henry Beauvoir De Lisle
Preceded by Sir William Furse	Master-General of the Ordnance 1920–1923	Succeeded by Sir Noel Birch
Preceded by Sir Beauvoir De Lisle	GOC-in-C Western Command 1923–1924	Succeeded by Sir Richard Butler
Preceded by Sir Alexander Godley	Commander-in-Chief of the British Army of the Rhine 1924–1927	Succeeded by Sir William Thwaites
Government offices
Preceded by Sir Walter Congreve	Governor of Malta 1927–1931	Succeeded by Sir David Campbell