Marshal of the Royal Air Force Arthur William Tedder, 1st Baron Tedder, (11 July 1890 – 3 June 1967) was a Royal Air Force officer. He was a pilot and squadron commander in the Royal Flying Corps in the First World War and he went on to serve as a senior officer in the Royal Air Force (RAF) during the inter-war years when he served in Turkey, Great Britain and the Far East.

During World War II, as Air Officer Commanding of the RAF Middle East Command, Tedder directed RAF air operations in the Mediterranean and North Africa, including the evacuation of Crete and Operation Crusader in North Africa. His bombing tactics became known as the "Tedder Carpet". Later in the war Tedder took command of the Mediterranean Air Command and in that role was closely involved in the planning of the Allied invasion of Sicily and the Allied invasion of Italy. When Operation Overlord—the invasion of France—came to be planned, Tedder was appointed Deputy Supreme Commander at Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force under General Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Tedder signed the German Instrument of Surrender on behalf of the Western Allies, officially ending World War II in Europe. After the war, Tedder served as Chief of the Air Staff, in which role he advocated increased recruitment in the face of many airmen leaving the RAF, doubled the size of RAF Fighter Command and implemented arrangements for the Berlin Airlift in 1948. He also held senior positions in business and academia.

Early life

Tedder was born the son of Sir Arthur John Tedder and Emily Charlotte Tedder (née Bryson) at the Glenguin Distillery (now Glengoyne) in the Campsie Fells, north of Glasgow. His father was distinguished as the Commissioner of the Board of Customs who devised the old age pension scheme. He did not find colonial life in Fiji to his liking, and when war was declared, he returned to Britain so that he could join the regular Army. and arrived back in Britain in December. In April he attended the Central Flying School where he learned to fly and gained his 'wings'. In June 1916, Tedder served as a pilot with No. 25 Squadron RFC flying the Bristol Scout C on the Western Front. with 25 Squadron. and appointed officer commanding No. 70 Squadron RFC.

Tedder was appointed officer commanding No. 67 Squadron at RFC Shawbury on 25 June 1917 (rank relinquished on 2 April 1919).

Inter-war years

Tedder was given command of No. 274 Squadron, equipped with the Handley Page V/1500, the largest RAF bomber of its time, at RAF Bircham Newton in May 1919. Renamed No. 207 Squadron in February 1920 and equipped with DH9a bombers, the squadron was briefly deployed to Turkey in 1922–23 during the Chanak Crisis. Tedder attended the RN Staff College in late 1923 and through the spring of 1924. gaining promotion to air commodore on 1 July 1934.

In November 1936, Tedder was appointed Air Officer Commanding (AOC) RAF Far Eastern Forces he was promoted to air vice marshal on 1 July 1937 and became Director General for Research in the Air Ministry in July 1938. Shortly thereafter, Tedder was ordered by Churchill to resurrect the Takoradi air route.

Tedder was appointed as Air Officer Commanding in Chief, RAF Middle East Command on 1 June 1941, (made permanent in April 1942). He had not been Churchill's first choice for the role but when the preferred choice (Air Vice-Marshal O T Boyd) was captured, Tedder was appointed. mentioned in despatches for his services in the Middle East on 30 June 1942 and promoted to the temporary rank of air chief marshal on 3 July 1942.

thumb|right|A convalescent [[Winston Churchill meets the outgoing and incoming Supreme Commanders in the Mediterranean, Dwight D. Eisenhower, to Churchill's right, and Henry Maitland Wilson, to his left. Behind them stand (from left to right), John Whiteley, Air Marshal Arthur Tedder, Brigadier G. S. Thompson, Admiral Sir John Cunningham, unknown, Sir Harold Alexander, Captain M. L. Power, Humfrey Gale, Leslie Hollis, and Eisenhower's chief of staff, Walter Bedell Smith.]]

Tedder oversaw the buildup of the air arm in the Western Desert and, more importantly, the development of new more effective operational and administrative policies which turned it into a highly effective force which was key to the Allied victory at the decisive Battle of El Alamein in October 1942. One of his bombing tactics became known as the "Tedder Carpet". He was advanced to Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath on 27 November 1942 in recognition of his services in the Middle East.

In February 1943 Tedder took command of Mediterranean Air Command, He was awarded the American Legion of Merit on 27 August 1943 and awarded the Grand Cross of the Polish Order of Polonia Restituta on 1 October 1943. He went on to be Commander of Mediterranean Allied Air Forces, which took in an expanded group of air forces, in December 1943. Tedder was awarded the Soviet Order of Kutuzov (1st Class) on 28 August 1945 and promoted to Marshal of the Royal Air Force on 12 September 1945.

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File:Meeting of the Supreme Command.jpg|Supreme Command, Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF), London, 1 February 1944. Tedder sits to Eisenhower's right as Deputy Supreme Allied Commander

File:Zhukov reads capitulation act.jpg|Arthur Tedder (centre left) at the ceremony of the German unconditional surrender (May 1945). Standing is Soviet Marshal Zhukov reading the act of surrender.

</gallery>

After the war

Tedder took over from Charles Portal as Chief of the Air Staff on 1 January 1946. He was granted a peerage as Baron Tedder, of Glenguin in the County of Stirling on 8 February 1946 and received the American Distinguished Service Medal on 14 June 1946. In 1947 he delivered the Lees Knowles Lecture, which was then published as Air Power in War. He moved on to become chairman, British Joint Services Mission in Washington in January 1950 before retiring in May 1951. His son John would later be a professor at both the University of Dundee (as Queen's College eventually became) and at St Andrews. and vice-chairman of the Board of Governors of the BBC.

Family life

In 1915 Tedder married Rosalinde Maclardy; they had two sons and a daughter.

References

Sources

Further reading

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