IV
GENERAL SIR HUBERT DE LA POER GOUGH,
K.C.B., K.C.V.O.
SIR HUBERT GOUGH was born on August i2th, 1870; the eldest son of the late Sir Charles John Stanley Gough. He was educated at Eton and Sandhurst, and, in 1889, obtained a commission in the i6th Lancers. He served in the Tirah Expedition and in the South African War. On the outbreak of the European War he commanded the 3rd Cavalry Brigade during the Retreat from Mons and the Battle of the Marne. His Brigade was one of the first to arrive at the Aisne on September i2th, 1914, and, a few weeks later, when the Cavalry Corps was formed under Sir Edmund Allenby, he was given command of the 2nd Cavalry Division. His Division was the first part of the British force to leave on October 3rd for Flanders.
In the First Battle of Ypres, when the small British Army bolted the door of the North against the German sweep, his Division played a foremost part. In General Smith-Dorrien's advance towards La Bassee it moved on the left flank, clearing out the Germans from the forest of Dieppe, the Hill of Cassel, and Hazebrouck. Along with the 1st Cavalry Division it reconnoitred the line of the Lys, and later held the front between Zandvoorde and Messines on the left of Allenby's Corps. In the great struggle of October 3oth and 3ist it had desperate fighting to hold the line, and, on November 1st, before the French XVI Corps arrived in support, it was forced back from Hollebeke and Messines.
Sir Hubert Cough's 2nd Cavalry Division was at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle, but failed to get the expected chance of going into action. Shortly after this he took command of the 7th Infantry Division and was engaged in the operations at Festubert. About the middle of July, 1915,
