Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener Field Marshal Horatio Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener, (; 24 June 1850 – 5 June 1916), was a senior British Army officer and colonial administrator who won notoriety for his imperial campaigns, most especially his scorched earth policy against the Boers and his establishment of concentration camps during the Second Boer War, and later played a central role in the early part of the First World War. Kitchener was credited in 1898 for winning the Battle of Omdurman and securing control of the Sudan for which he was made Lord Kitchener of Khartoum, becoming a
British home army in the First World War its deployment to France at the end of May. Second-line units were required to continue providing replacement drafts to the first line until the third line became effective. Throughout its time as part of the home defences, battalion strengths in the 2nd South Midland Division fluctuated considerably. The division was still only at two-thirds strength when it fought in the Battle of Fromelles in July 1916. In May 1915, Kitchener informed the War Cabinet that the second line was so denuded of trained men as to render it unreliable for home defence. Promises made that month to General Sir Leslie