Ronald Weeks, 1st Baron Weeks

The Lord Weeks
Born	13 November 1890
Died	19 August 1960 (aged 69)
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service/branch	British Army
Rank	Lieutenant-General
Battles/wars	World War I World War II
Awards	Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath Commander of the Order of the British Empire Distinguished Service Order Military Cross & Bar

Lieutenant-General Ronald Morce Weeks, 1st Baron Weeks KCB, CBE, DSO, MC & Bar, TD (13 November 1890 – 19 August 1960) was a British Army General during the Second World War.

Military career

Lady Weeks, wife of Lieutenant General Sir Ronald Weeks, Deputy Chief of Imperial Staff, walking with Commander E R Micklem, CBE, Managing Director of Vickers Armstrong, at the Vickers Armstrong Yard in Barrow-in-Furness.

Weeks was commissioned into the South Lancashire Regiment of the Territorial Army in 1913.^[1] He served in the Rifle Brigade during the First World War and then retired from military service in 1919.^[1]

He was re-employed during the Second World War initially as Chief of Staff for the Territorial Division and then as a Brigadier on the General Staff of Home Forces in 1940.^[1] He was appointed Director General of Army Equipment in 1941 and Deputy Chief of the Imperial General Staff in 1942.^[1] He then became Deputy Military Governor and Chief of Staff of the British Zone for the Allied Control Council in Germany in 1945; in that capacity he was involved in negotiations to avoid the Berlin Blockade.^[2] He retired from the Army later that year.^[1]

He was awarded the Military Cross in 1917,^[3] and a Bar to the Military Cross in 1918.^[4] He was appointed to the Distinguished Service Order (DSO) in 1918,^[5] made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1939^[6] and a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) in 1943.^[7]

Later life

After the war Weeks became Chairman of Vickers.^[8] In 1956 he was raised to the peerage as Baron Weeks, of Ryton in the County Palatine of Durham.^[9]

Family

Lord Weeks had two daughters: The Hon. Pamela Rose Weeks (1931–)^[10] and the Hon. Venetia Daphne Weeks (1933–).^[11] Pamela married Henry Walter Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax (1928–) and Venetia married Sir Peter Troubridge (1927–1988).

Lord Weeks died in August 1960, aged 69, when the barony became extinct.

References

1. Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives
2. Berlin Airlift: The Salvation of a City By Jon Sutherland, Diane Canwell, Page 11 Pelican, 2008, ISBN 978-1-58980-550-7
3. The London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 29886. p. 43. 1 January 1917.
4. The London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 30813. p. 8767. 26 July 1918.
5. The London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 30450. p. 27. 1 January 1918.
6. The London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 34585. p. 8. 2 January 1939.
7. The London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 36033. p. 2419. 2 June 1943.
8. Rotol-Messier Apprentices Rewarded Flight, 20 May 1955
9. The London Gazette: no. 40827. p. 4025. 10 July 1956.
10. The Peerage.com
11. The Peerage.com