Bertie Fisher


Sir Bertie Drew Burdett Fisher, KCB, CMG, DSO was a British Army General during World War II.

Military career

Fisher was commissioned into the 17th Lancers as second lieutenant on 23 May 1900, and served in the Second Boer War, during which he was promoted to lieutenant on 29 July 1901. Following the end of the war, he returned from Cape Town to England in the SS Maplemore in August 1902.
He went to the Staff College in 1911. In 1913 he learned to fly and became a General Staff Officer in the Military Aeronautics Department at the War Office.
He served in World War I initially as a Brigade Major in the 6th Cavalry Brigade, which formed part of the British Expeditionary Force and then as a General Staff Officer in 1st Cavalry Division. He was appointed Commanding Officer of the Leicestershire Yeomanry in 1915 and the Commander of 8th Infantry Brigade in 1918.
After the War he was Commanding Officer of the 17th Lancers at the time of their amalgamation with 21st Lancers in 1922.
He then became Commander of 2nd Cavalry Brigade in 1923 and Commandant of the Senior Officer School in 1927. He was then a Brigadier on the General Staff at Aldershot Command from 1930 and Director Recruiting and Organisation at the War Office from 1932. He became Commandant of the Royal Military College Sandhurst in 1934 and retired in 1938.
He was recalled from retirement during World War II to be General Officer Commanding-in-Chief for Southern Command from 1939 to 1940 when he retired again.
He lived in Basingstoke in Hampshire.

Family

He married Majorie Frances Boyd and together they went on to have two sons.