Henry Wells (general)

Lieutenant General Sir Henry Wells, KBE, CB, DSO was a senior officer in the Australian Army. He served as Chief of the General Staff from 1954 to 1958. In retirement, Wells was a director of several companies. He died in 1973, aged 75, and was buried in Cessnock, Victoria.

About Henry Wells (general) in brief

Lieutenant General Sir Henry Wells, KBE, CB, DSO was a senior officer in the Australian Army. He served as Chief of the General Staff from 1954 to 1958. In retirement, Wells was a director of several companies. He died in 1973, aged 75, and was buried in Cessnock, Victoria. He was the youngest of seven children to Arthur Wells, a draper, and his wife Elizabeth. Wells entered the Royal Military College, Duntroon, in February 1916, where he was a keen sportsman. In December 1919, he was commissioned as a lieutenant and posted to England for further training. In May 1940, Wells transferred to the Second Australian Imperial Force for active service during the Second World War. In March 1941, he arrived in Greece with an advance party of Lieutenant General Sir Thomas Blamey’s I Corps staff. On 10 April, a plan was formulated to withdraw Greek and Commonwealth troops from their positions in the Verria pass of the Vermion Mountains to the River Aliakmon. To carry this out, BlameY despatched Wells to coordinate the movement of the 12th Greek Division west to its new position. On 24 April 1941, Wells embarked from Greece along with the remainder of the British Headquarters and I Corps during the withdrawal. He later received the Distinguished Service Order for his leadership at El Alamein. Wells was later appointed an Officer of the Order of the Empire for his services in Greece in 1941. In 1953 he was made Commander-in-Chief, British Commonwealth Forces Korea from 1953 to 1954, serving during the last days of the war.

In 1958 he was appointed as the first Chairman, Chiefs of Staff Committee, a position marking him as the professional head of the Australian Military. He retired from the army in 1959, when he was 75 years old. Wells’ career culminated with his appointment as the First Chairman of the Chiefs Of Staff Committee in March 1958, a role he held until his retirement in 1959. He also served as the Chief of Staff of the Royal Australian Air Force from 1958 to 1959. Wells served in a variety of staff and instructional positions before the outbreak of World War II. In 1943, he served in the New Guinea Campaign with the headquarters of II Corps and later in the Borneo campaign with I Corps. In 1946 he was promoted to major general and appointed Deputy Chief ofThe General Staff. In 1948, he became the first Australian general to hold the post of Chief ofthe General Staff, a post he held for five years. In 1959, he died in retirement at the age of 75; he was survived by his wife, Lorna Irene Skippen, and two sons. He is buried at Cess nock, in Victoria, Australia, and is survived by a son and a daughter. He had a son, Peter, who served in World War Two with the 7th Division in Greece and North Africa. Wells also served in South West Pacific theatre as a brigadier.

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