Talk:William Gott

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I thought Gott was killed in a Plane Crash. I don't think he was shot down Tomdidiot 12:59, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

He was shot down in a targeted German attack made possible by the breaking of the code used in telecommunications from Cairo, which disclosed to the Germans his intended movements. This was an embarrassment to the British authorities, who misreported his death at the time as an accident. The pilot of his plane, Squadron Leader Jimmy James, survived, and gave a lecture at the Travellers Club about the whole episode recently. Chelseaboy 11:01, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

http://www.secondworldwarforum.com/2006/07/24/the-truth-behind-the-death-of-general-gott/#more-36 : Jimmy James, the pilot of the plane on which Gott died, found out later that the pilots of the German planes had been told that Gott had been on the plane that they'd just shot down even before news of it had reached the British. He concluded that the Germans had known in advance that Gott was on the plane. -- ZScarpia (talk) 11:48, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

http://www.gaiaselene.com/Scripts/rommel.htm discusses the intelligence sources used by Rommel. http://www.armchairgeneral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25828 describes how the Germans had come to possess three RAF coding machines. -- ZScarpia (talk) 12:02, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, Jimmy is a family friend of mine and has spoken of his meeting the German pilot who shot him down. The Pilot knew upon landing that the plane had contained Strafer Gott, whereas it would be several hours before the British were aware (due to the fact that Jimmy had to travel for several hours through the desert to get help!). I would say, therefore, that the speculation over "....the Germans were aware that he was on board the aircraft through signals interception but this has never been proved." can be considered proven!? --LimehouseJack (talk) 17:24, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Moved pictures

General Gott's grave at the El Alamein war cemetery. 2006

Gott being addressed by Major-General Ritchie during the Battle of Gazala.

Survivors

'...two German Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighters attacked the crashed plane, strafing it until the Bombay was totally wrecked. Everyone left onboard was killed.'

Not sure what you mean by 'everyone left onboard'. Which ones had managed to get out? Valetude (talk) 09:46, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Assessment

I've removed the quote from Agar-Hamilton, the South African official historian, because it's bollocks.
His contention “It has not been unknown for a commander to pass from disaster to disaster, but it is quite without precedent for any commander to pass from promotion to promotion as a reward for a succession of disasters” is wrong in almost every respect.
Quite apart from it not being “without precedent” (Mountbatten?) he is suggesting not only that Gott's promotions only followed some disaster in the campaign, but also that he was personally responsible in each case for that disaster; a moments reflection on his career path would show that was not the case.
He was promoted twice after reshuffles in 8th Army's high command; the logical assumption would be that those who hadn't done well would were moved, and their places taken by those who had (and only an Agar-Hamilton would think otherwise) and that is what happened. Gott, and 7th Support Group had done well in the 12 months up to July 41 (after Battleaxe) so Gott was a logical choice to command 7th Division; similarly they had done well during Crusader and in the aftermath, and was a good choice for XIII Corps.
Agar-Hamilton's opinion is no doubt coloured by the South African contingents relationship with Gott, and his with them; but as Gott was known throughout the army as being likeable and approachable, while Pienaar's reputation was for “sheer bloodymindedness” it is difficult to see Gott as being totally to blame. And as his assessment of Tobruk was that it could hold out for months, while Klopper's 2 SA Div lost the place in 24 hours, any lack of confidence he had in them would be explicable at least.
It is true he wasn't the best person to command 8th Army, but he himself said the same, and his appointment was from Churchill, not the generals. Xyl 54 (talk) 23:54, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

According to Montgomery:

"It is now clear to me that appointment of Gott to command the Eight Army at that moment would have been a mistake. I had never met him; he was clearly a fine soldier and had done splendid work in the desert. But from all accounts he was completely worn out and needed a rest. He himself knew this. He said to a mutual friend: 'I am very tired. Also we have tried every club in the bag and have failed. A new brain is wanted out here on this job; it's an old job but it needs a new brain. If they want me to do it I will try. But they ought to get someone else, a new man from England'." .

Shortly before Gott was killed he had taken on a new ADC and, with Gott's death, Montgomery subsequently took this officer on as one of his own ADC's and he remained with Montgomery from then on, but was killed in Germany in the last week of the war.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.18.173 (talk) 14:30, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

References

Comment

The comment by Michael Carver, that Gott was "too good a man to be a really great soldier" is interesting; I read somewhere (I forget where, so I can't put it in) that Gott was horrified by the slaughter of WWI and wanted above all to spare his men going through any such fighting; so that had he commanded 8th Army he would never have planned a battle like 2nd Alamein; it was Montgomery's insight (with the same WWI background as Gott) to see that was what was needed.
It's also interesting that Gott found the 8th Army attitude of “treating orders as a basis for discussion rather than instructions to be obeyed” to be a problem when he was Corps commander; so he probably wouldn't have had any more success as Army Cdr either; OTOH Montgomer dealt with it by warning everyone to stop, then jumping from a great height on the first one who tried it. I couldn't see Gott doing that... Xyl 54 (talk)

It is often the case with men like Gott that when faced with colleagues and other people who are not doing their jobs, instead of reporting them and getting them into trouble, the 'good man' will often try to do their jobs in addition to his own. That may be why Gott was 'worn out'.

Montgomery had also been through WW I (he had been at the Battle of the Somme - "30-thousand men killed before lunch!") and also was horrified by the slaughter, and he determined never to do the same himself. During the Battle of Caen he faced criticism from Tedder and others for not taking some ground that 2nd TAF wanted for its airfields. Montgomery considered he could do without the additional air support that would be provided by 2nd TAF possessing these airfields and did not consider the loss of life in taking the ground worthwhile. 2nd TAF was actually there explicitly to support Montgomery's ground forces, not to further its own aims, so Montgomery was absolutely right and Tedder and the others should have held their tongues.

He was also aware that the British soldier in 1939-45 was not the same sort of man that had been in the British Army in 1914-1918 and needed to be handled differently. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.18.173 (talk) 15:06, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Trip to Cairo

I don't want to edit directly in case I get something less than 100% correct but I seem to recall reading elsewhere that the reason Gott was on a trip to Cairo was that his condition for accepting the command was being allowed a weekend's R&R in Cairo first. I am surprised that wasn't regarded as a red flag that qualified him out of the job. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.81.196.174 (talk) 08:14, 19 February 2021 (UTC)