Maurice Sarrail (6 April 1856-23 March 1929) was a French Army general who commanded the French 3rd Army at the First Battle of the Marne and led an expedition to Salonika, Greece during World War I. Sarrail was ostracized by the predominantly Catholic, conservative, and monarchist officer corps due to his socialist beliefs.
Biography[]
Maurice Sarrail was born in Carcassonne, France on 6 April 1856, and he graduated from St. Cyr in 1877 and served in the French Army, becoming commandant of the St. Maxient Infantry Military School in 1901. He was promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel in 1902, served as Military Commandant of the Palais Bourbon from 1904 to 1906, became a Colonel in 1905, a Brigadier-General in 1908, and General de Division in 1911 after his friend Joseph Caillaux formed a socialist government. After a left-wing government came to power in 1914, he was due to replace Joseph Joffre as commander-in-chief of the French Army, but the outbreak of World War I postponed this promotion. Instead, he commanded the VI Corps during the Battle of the Frontiers and later rose to command the French 3rd Army at the First Battle of the Marne. In 1915, Joffre replaced Sarrail, causing political uproar. In 1915, Prime Minister Rene Viviani shored up his coalition government by appointing Sarrail to command an Entente expedition sent to Salonika, Greece to fight on the Eastern Front. By December 1915, he was in command of 150,000 troops, and, in January 1916, he was granted command of all Allied forces in Macedonia. Despite a number of offensives, he failed to defeat Bulgaria or prevent the Central Powers from overwhelming Serbia in 1915 and Romania in 1916. He was dismissed in December 1917, but he was appointed High Commissioner of the Levant (serving from 1924 to 1925), suppressing a Syrian revolt. He died in 1929 at the age of 72.