Eric Dorman-Smith

Eric Dorman-Smith was born in 1895. He joined the British Army and was stationed in India on the outbreak of the Second World War.

In 1940 he became commandant of the Middle East Staff College where he gave military advice to General Archibald Wavell and General Claude Auchinleck. In April 1942 he became Director of Military Operations in Cairo and acting deputy chief of staff to the 8th Army.

On 6th August 1942, Dorman-Smith was sacked along with Auchinleck and never held any important military positions again. Eric Dorman-Smith died in 1969.

Primary Sources

(1) Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz (1947)

Last spring the Germans had constructed huge tents in an open space in the Lager. For the whole of the good season each of them had catered for over 1,000 men: now the tents had been taken down, and an excess 2,000 guests crowded our huts. We old prisoners knew that the Germans did not like these irregularities and that something would soon happen to reduce our number.