J. F. C. Fuller

Fuller breathed his last at the age of 87.

J. F. C Fuller was born on September 1, 1878 in Chichester, West Sussex, England. At the young age, he along with his parents shifted base to Lausanne.

At the age of eleven, Fuller however returned to England while his parents were still at Lausanne. Three years henceforth, he enrolled himself at Malvern College.

From 1897 until 1898, Fuller attended the Royal Military Academy. It was during this time that Fuller earned the nickname Boney which he retained for life.

Fuller’s career kick-started in 1899 with his appointment in the 1st Battalion of the Oxfordshire Light Infantry. He was posted to South Africa and served there till 1902.

It was during this time that Fuller took part in the Boer War. However, it was in the Transvaal that he saw his first real fighting. It was during Boer War that he was put in charge of 70 black scouts and given a 4,000-square-mile area of only partially pacified countryside to patrol.

In 1904, he was sent to India. However, he contracted enteric fever and returned to England the following year on sick leave. When he recovered from his illness, instead of returning to India, he was reassigned to units in England.

Fuller served as an adjutant to the 2nd South Middlesex Volunteers and helped form the 10th Middlesex, until he was accepted into the Staff College at Camberley in 1913.

Upon being appointed, Fuller got into trouble for trying to amend the army's sacrosanct operating handbook, the Field Service Regulations.

Fuller made an impressive contribution in the Second Boer War and World War I. His tactical thinking gave way to two important theories, first mobility was very important and second a rapid, deep, penetrating attack is far more effective than the traditional slow-paced frontal assault.

As far as his written works is concerned, Fuller’s most comprehensive work was ‘A Military History of the Western World’. In the book, he analyzed Western warfare from its beginnings through World War II.