Major-General Sir Alfred William Fortescue Knox (30 October 1870 – 9 March 1964) was a career British military officer and later a Conservative Party politician.
Overview
Major-General Sir Alfred William Fortescue Knox (30 October 1870 – 9 March 1964) was a career British military officer and later a Conservative Party politician.
Military career
Born in Ulster, Knox joined the British Army when he attended the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from where he was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Royal Irish Rifles on 2 May 1891, and was promoted to lieutenant on 18 November 1893. He was posted to British India where he joined the 5th Punjab Infantry, became a double company commander, and was promoted to captain on 10 July 1901. He was adjutant to the Southern Waziristan Militia, and as such took part in operations in Waziristan under Major-General Charles Egerton in summer 1902, for which he was mentioned in despatches.
In 1911 Knox was appointed the British Military Attaché in then Russian Empire. A fluent speaker of Russian, he became a liaison officer to the Imperial Russian Army during First World War. During the 1917 Bolshevik coup in Russia he observed the Bolsheviks' taking of the Winter Palace on 7 November (25 October Old Style) 1917.
He wrote:
