Whom did Bernard Montgomery replace as head of the Eighth Army in North Africa in 1942?
Kenneth Anderson (British Army officer) invasion of French North Africa. The first choice replacement, Lieutenant-General Sir Harold Alexander, had been almost immediately selected to replace General Sir Claude Auchinleck as Commander-in-Chief (C-in-C) of Middle East Command in Cairo, Egypt and his replacement, Lieutenant-General Bernard Montgomery, was himself redirected to the Western Desert to command the Eighth Army, following the death of Lieutenant-General William Gott, the original nominee. Anderson, therefore, became the fourth commander in no more than a week. Following the "Torch" landings, which occurred in early November 1942, although much of his troops and equipment had yet to arrive in the theatre, Anderson was
Bernard Montgomery stabilised the Allied position at the First Battle of El Alamein, but after a visit in August 1942, the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, replaced him as C-in-C with General Sir Harold Alexander and William Gott as commander of the Eighth Army in the Western Desert. However, after Gott was killed flying back to Cairo Churchill was persuaded by Brooke, who by this time was Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS), to appoint Montgomery, who had only just been nominated to replace Alexander as commander of the British First Army for Operation Torch, the invasion of French North Africa. A