Looking for some information on promotion exams in the British Army during the interwar period. I've being going through the the 1932 Examination of Army Officers for Promotion as well as officer service files and a few of questions come to mind: 1) I'm assuming the exams changed each year. For example, the question on tactics for captains involves a battalion acting as a rear guard. I assume in previous and subsequent years these questions changed to reflect all manner of army operations at the battalion level. (The question for lieutenants is a company level tactical problem.) 2. The document covers the (b) exams (lieutenants) and (d) exams (captains). While going through officer service files, it identifies that officers took promotion exams (a) - (d). Anyone happen to know what the (a) and (c) exams covered? 3. Finally, after the (a) - (d) exams, I don't believe majors and above had to take additional promotion exams. Promotion was determined by their respective regiment. Majors could go to Senior Officers' School but unlike staff college it did not have an entrance exam.
Hello Nick, Knowing someone who was commissioned in the late 1940's, I asked if he could remember the promotion exam system of that time, perhaps indicative of the evolution of your interests. The descriptors (a), (b), (c) and (d) brought no recollection, but memory gave four requisites: Firstly, a short course with a pass/fail exam or test in Military Law, taken as a subaltern, enabling a successful candidate to participate in due course as a member of Courts Martial (after experience of one 'In Attendance', or a learning capacity). Secondly, an exam to qualify for promotion from Lieutenant to Captain - including tactical, navigation, signals and field administration tests (casualty arrangements, resupply, service support and other elements) - does this chime with your (b)? Thirdly, a Staff College candidacy exam taken by suitably recommended and qualified officers, usually (senior) Captains or Majors. Individuals should normally have been marked on a list as potential candidates at least two years before taking the exam, but there could be exceptions (the most notable one which comes to my mind was Wavell (some years previously) who went to Staff College as a twenty something relatively junior subaltern, when most in his peer group were 32 year plus senior Captains, or Majors). Fourthly, a Captain to Major promotion exam, necessary for non-Staff College graduates (the significant majority) to become Majors (and attain Field Officer grade) and undertake GSO2 staff appointments. Does this chime with your (d)? Passing a promotion exam enabled substantive advancement in due course, rather than immediately generating promotion. Promotion to Lieutenant Colonel normally required a mix of Regimental and apposite Staff experience based recommendations. It was rare, but possible, for 'high fliers' to go straight from Lieutenant Colonel to Brigadier.
Thanks for you response. I've attached the table of contents from the document cover I previously attached. Here's what I have for the (b) and (d) exams. Lieutenants - B Exams Organization, Regimental Duties in Peace and Military Law (b) (i) Development and Constitution of the British Empire. Imperial Military Geography (b)(ii) Military History, Marlborough's Campaigns/Egypt and Palestine (b)(iii) Tactics and Administration of Troops in the Field, Map Reading and Field Works (b)(iv) Captains - D Exams Organization, Regimental Duties in Peace and Military Law (d) (i) Development and Constitution of the British Empire. Imperial Military Geography (d)(ii) Military History, Marlborough's Campaigns/Egypt and Palestine (d)(iii) Tactics and Administration of Troops in the Field, Map Reading and Field Works (d)(iv) Essays (d)(v) I'm not sure what the (a) and (c) exams are though. They are listed in service files and (a)/(b) and (c)/(d) were normally taken in the same year. These were separate from the SC entrance exam which I believe was a completely different exam. Exemption from the (d) exam for those with psc makes sense to me but in the group of officers I'm looking at a number of SC graduates did take the (c)/(d) exams.
The cover you posted is the booklet with the year's questions and the DS answers. I have a copy of the 1935 Staff College Exam Questions and DS comments and scanned some from the years pre 1914. The RUSI Library has a collection of question booklets for all sorts of promotion exams. The pass level for captain to major is lower than for staff college selection - When I sat the exam in 1984 the same exam was for both promotion and staff selection. About 25% passed at staff level and 75+% for promotion. You could sit the exam on two years for staff selection but repeat ad nauseum for promotion. You had to be pretty dumb not to reach Major in the British Army, hence the nick name of Captain Mark "Foggy" Phillips...(Foggy as in thick and wet) I was fascinated by both the questions and approach to the answers. In 1935 candidates were invited to put forwards their ideas for the composition of an armoured division; debate whether horses still had a place in the armed forces and explain what they would do if placed in command of a brigade sized force sent to maintain order and preserve European lives in an Asian city e.g. Shanghai. (The DS notes that some candidates failed to appreciate that a brigade is far too small to take over a city of a quarter of a million inhabitants without their active co-operation.) The military history questions for the 1914 staff college exam were set with on the theme of the Waterloo campaign of 1815 or the seven days campaigns of 1862. One question invited candidates to explain whether, given the choice, Napoleon or Robert E Lee would have found more use for a telephone system or an aeroplane.
