Brigadier-General Charles FitzClarence, VC (8 May 1865 – 12 November 1914) was an Anglo-Irish recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces.

Early life

Charles FitzClarence was born in County Kildare, the son of Captain the Hon. George FitzClarence (15 April 1836 – 24 March 1894) and Maria Henrietta Scott (1841 – 27 July 1912). He had a twin brother named Edward. His paternal grandfather was the 1st Earl of Munster, an illegitimate son of William, Duke of Clarence (later King William IV of the United Kingdom).

He was commissioned as a subaltern, with the rank of lieutenant, into the 3rd (Militia) Battalion of the South Staffordshire Regiment in February 1885. In November 1886 he transferred to the Royal Fusiliers, and the Regular Army. His early career with his new regiment, however, was blighted by several bouts of illness and he spent much of his time in administrative and staff roles.

He was promoted to captain, on augmentation, in April 1898. In 1899 he volunteered to serve as a special service officer at Mafeking, South Africa and was given the duty of training a squadron of the Protectorate Regiment.

His ferocity in battle earned him the enduring nickname 'The Demon'.

He served in South Africa, being promoted from supernumerary captain to captain on augmentation in January 1901, until February 1901, at which point he transferred to the newly formed Irish Guards. He passed out from the Staff College, Camberley, which he entered as a student in January 1902, in January 1903, He then served as a brigade major of the 5th Infantry Brigade from April 1903 until 1906. Having been promoted to major in May 1904, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel and then succeeded George Colborne Nugent in command of the 1st Battalion, Irish Guards in July 1909. He had a reputation as a forward thinking soldier and took an innovative, albeit demanding, approach to training. It was noted he was "both loved and feared by his battalion". and in July went on to command the Irish Guards and regimental district again taking over Nugent.

The Great War

Promoted to the temporary rank of brigadier general in August 1914, on 27 September he replaced Brigadier-General Ivor Maxse as commander of 1st Guards' Brigade with the British Expeditionary Force (BEF). He held this command until he was killed in action on 12 November 1914.

On 4 October 1914, whilst 1st Guards' Brigade was holding trenches opposite the German line at the River Aisne, he ordered the Coldstream Guards to carry out a night time raid against a German position known as 'Fish Hook Trench'. This was the first British trench raid of the First World War. The raid was led by Second Lieutenant Merton Beckwith-Smith and was a striking local success.

He is the highest-ranking officer inscribed on the Menin Gate Memorial in Ypres, commemorating those with no known grave.

The medal

His VC is in the Lord Ashcroft VC Gallery in the Imperial War Museum, London.

Family

On 20 April 1898, at the Citadel Church, Cairo, he married Violet Spencer-Churchill (13 June 1864 – 22 December 1941), daughter of Lord Alfred Spencer-Churchill and a granddaughter of the sixth Duke of Marlborough. The couple had two children:

  • Edward Charles FitzClarence, 6th Earl of Munster (3 October 1899 – 15 November 1983)
  • Joan Harriet FitzClarence (23 December 1901 – 6 January 1971)

Notes

References

Listed in order of publication year

  • The Register of the Victoria Cross (1981, 1988 and 1997)
  • List of Irish Victoria Cross recipients (Dept of Economic Development 1995)
  • Monuments to Courage (David Harvey, 1999)
  • Irish Winners of the Victoria Cross (Richard Doherty & David Truesdale, 2000)
  • "Elegant Extracts" – The Royal Fusiliers Recipients of the VC (J. P. Kelleher, 2001)
  • Royal Fusiliers Recipients of the Victoria Cross
  • Turtle Bunbury, The Glorious Madness, Tales of The Irish and The Great War, <br> Charles FitzClarence—Kildare's Royal VC Winner, p.&nbsp;37, Gill & Macmillan, Dublin 12 (2014)
  • Spencer Jones (ed.) Stemming the Tide: Officers and Leadership in the British Expeditionary Force 1914. Helion & Co. (2013)
  • angloboerwar.com