Relieved of Command

Relieved of Command speaks of little conflicts, not of grand strategy. The men who are written about were dedicated, loyal, brave, and well-trained. They simply did not achieve what was expected of them. Chance played a great part in their undoing -- history will give them but a footnote -- yet chance favored others.

In this monograph, the author has attempted to tell of several who were "relieved of command" -- both a routine rostering change or, as more commonly thought, a pejorative action. With some, the results could have been foreseen; with others, the relief was unexpected.

This fragmentary listing of combat-command general officers who were relieved while commanding brigades, combat commands, divisions, or corps will serve to illustrate that relief of a subordinate, though not commonplace, did happen.

Benjamin S. Persons is a consulting civil engineer and geologist in Atlanta, Georgia. An ROTC student from the Georgia Military Academy and Georgia Institute of Technology, he was commissioned second lieutenant on infantry at 19. During World War II he served through activation and training as an anti-tank platoon leader in the 42nd Infantry (Rainbow) Division. Before the Division departed for France, Persons transferred to the Division Engineers. He led a 2nd Battalion, 232nd Infantry, engineer platoon in combat in France, Germany, and Austria, and was awarded the Bronze and Silver Stars.

Returning to the Georgia Institute of Technology, Persons received his degree in civil engineering and entered practice with Dames & Moore in California. He later worked in Illinois and established the firm's engineering practice in the Southeast, then managed the firm's offices in Australia and the Pacific.