page_title: Bernard Freyberg, 1st Baron Freyberg
section_title: Second World War
hierarchical_section_title: Bernard Freyberg, 1st Baron Freyberg / Second World War
caption_attribution_description: English: Personnel file (1939 - 1945) of Bernard Cyril Freyberg. Served during WWII in the New Zealand Army. Recipient of the Victora Cross (Gallantry Medal). Archives New Zealand Reference: AABK 18806 W5602 1
context_page_description: Lieutenant General Bernard Cyril Freyberg, 1st Baron Freyberg, VC, GCMG, KCB, KBE, DSO & Three Bars was a British-born New Zealand soldier and Victoria Cross recipient, who served as the 7th Governor-General of New Zealand from 1946 to 1952.
  Freyberg served as an officer in the British Army during the First World War. He took part in the beach landings during the Gallipoli Campaign and was the youngest general in the British Army during the First World War, later serving on the Western Front, where he was decorated with the Victoria Cross and three Distinguished Service Orders, making him one of the most highly decorated British Empire soldiers of the First World War. He liked to be in the thick of the action—Winston Churchill called him "the Salamander" due to his ability to pass through fire unharmed.
  During the Second World War, he commanded the New Zealand Expeditionary Force in the Battle of Crete, the North African Campaign and the Italian Campaign.
context_section_description: The British Army had classified Freyberg as unfit for active service in 1937. After the outbreak of war in September 1939, he returned to its active list in December as a specially employed major-general. On being approached by the New Zealand government, Freyberg offered his services and was appointed commander of the 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force and of the 2nd New Zealand Division.
  In the chaos of the retreat from the Battle of Greece in 1941, Churchill gave Freyberg command of the Allied forces during the Battle of Crete. Although instructed to prevent an assault from the air, he remained obsessed with the possibility of a naval landing and based his tactics on it, neglecting adequately to defend the airfield at Maleme, ignoring ULTRA intelligence messages, which showed that the assault was coming by air. However, many sources consider that the intelligence given to Freyberg was vague and inadequate, and did indicate the possibility of a naval landing; this compromised his ability to respond correctly to the invasion.
  Promoted to lieutenant-general and knighted as a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire, Freyberg continued to command the 2nd New Zealand Division through the North African and Italian Campaigns of the Eighth Army. He had an excellent reputation as a divisional-level tactician. Winston Churchill, the British Prime Minister, described Freyberg as his "salamander" due to his love of fire and wanting to be always in the middle of the action. An exploding German shell wounded Freyberg at the Battle of Mersa Matruh in June 1942 but he soon returned to the battlefield. Freyberg disagreed strongly with his superior, General Claude Auchinleck, the Eighth Army commander and insisted that as a commander of a national contingent he had the right to refuse orders if those orders ran counter to the New Zealand national interest. Freyberg enjoyed a good relationship with General Bernard Montgomery, the Eighth Army commander from August 1942, who thought highly of the experienced New Zealand commander.
  In the climactic Second Battle of El Alamein (October–November 1942) the 2nd New Zealand Division played a vital part in the breakthrough by the Eighth Army; for his leadership, Freyberg was immediately promoted to Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath. During the pursuit of the Axis forces to Tunisia, where they surrendered in May 1943, he led the New Zealanders on a series of well-executed left hooks to outflank Axis defence lines. In April and May 1943 Freyberg briefly commanded X Corps.
  Freyberg was injured in an aircraft accident in September 1944. After six weeks in hospital he returned to command the New Zealand Division in its final operations, the Spring 1945 offensive in Italy, which involved a series of river crossings and an advance of 250 mi (400 km) in three weeks. By the time of the German surrender, the New Zealanders had reached Trieste, having liberated both Padua and Venice, where there was a brief standoff with Yugoslav partisans. This success earned him a third bar to his DSO in July 1945 and he was made a Commander of the United States Legion of Merit.
  Freyberg had excelled in planning set-piece attacks, such as at Operation Supercharge at Alamein, Operation Supercharge II at Tebaga Gap, and in the storming of the Senio line in 1945. The two occasions that Freyberg commanded at Corps level—at Crete and Monte Cassino—were less successful. Throughout the war he showed a disdain for danger. He showed notable concern for the welfare of his soldiers, taking a common-sense attitude to discipline and ensuring the establishment of social facilities for his men. He had become a very popular commander with the New Zealand soldiers by the time he left his command in 1945.
  Freyberg is closely associated with the controversial decision to bomb the ancient monastery at Monte Cassino in February 1944. Freyberg, commanding the troops which fought what later became known as the Second and Third Battles of Monte Cassino, became convinced the abbey, founded in 529 AD, was being used as a milit
caption: Bernard Cyril Freyberg, History Sheet of WWII Personnel File
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