Cyril Falls


Cyril Bentham Falls CBE was a 20th Century British military historian, journalist and academic, noted for his works on the First World War.

Early life

Falls was born in Dublin, Ireland on 2 March 1888, the eldest son of Sir Charles Falls, an Ulster landowner in County Tyrone. He received his formal education at the Portora Royal School, Enniskillen, and London University. At the age of 27 he published his first book, 'Rudyard Kipling: A Critical Study'.

World War 1

During World War 1 he received a commission into the British Army as a subaltern in the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers. He served as a Staff Officer in the Headquarters of the 36th Division and the 62nd Division during the conflict. He received the French Croix de Guerre, and was discharged from the British Armed Forces with the rank of Captain.

Military history career

Immediately after leaving the British Army Falls wrote a history of one of the Divisions that he had served with during the war, entitled 'The History of the 36th Division', which was published in 1922.
From 1923 to 1939 he was employed by the Historical Section of the United Kingdom Government's Committee of Imperial Defence, researching and writing the text of several volumes of the British Government's 'Official History of the War'.
From 1939-1945 he was the military correspondent for The Times during World War 2.
From 1946 to 1953 he held the post of Chichele Professor of Military History at All Souls College, Oxford. From the late 1940s through to the end of his life in the early 1970s he was a productive writer of military histories, publishing in-depth detailed studies as well as general works for the commercial market, his final two titles being published posthumously.
The historian Sir Michael Howard later described Falls' work 'The History of the 36th Division' as: ... containing some of the finest descriptions of conditions on the Western Front to be found anywhere in the literature of the war.

Death

Falls died in his 84th year in Walton-on-Thames, in the county of Surrey, on 23 April 1971.

Publications

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