Sir john monash biography of christopher

Australian Army officer (1865–1931)

GeneralSir John Monash (; 27 June 1865 – 8 October 1931) was an Australian civil engineer and military commander of the First World War.

He commanded the 13th Infantry Brigade before the war and then, shortly after its outbreak, became commander of the 4th Brigade in Egypt, with which he took part in the Gallipoli campaign.

Geoffrey Serle, reader in history, has embarked upon a mammoth task - writing the full biography of the man for whom this University was named: Sir John.

Sir John Monash, who was born in Melbourne in , was the son of the late Mr Louis Monash.

Sir John Monash (), soldier, engineer and administrator, was born on 27 June in West Melbourne, eldest of three children and only son of Louis.

The son of Jewish immigrants from Prussia, he graduated from the University of Melbourne in three faculties—Arts, Law and Engineering.

General Sir John Monash was one of those remarkable people who blaze through life collecting careers.

In July 1916, he took charge of the newly raised 3rd Division in north-western France and, in May 1918, became commander of the Australian Corps, at that time the largest corps on the Western Front. According to historian A.

J. P. Taylor, he was "the only general of creative originality produced by the First World War".

Early life

Monash was born in 58 Dudley Street,^[2]West Melbourne, Victoria,^[3] to Jewish parents, both from Krotoschin in the Prussian province of Posen (now Krotoszyn, Poland).

His birth certificate records his date of birth as 23 June 1865, but that is probably