Royal Bertrand Lord (19 September 189921 October 1963) was a United States Army general who served in World War II.
A graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, ranked 4th in the class of 1923, Lord served as an instructor in tactics at West Point, and on construction projects including flood control on the Mississippi River and the Passamaquoddy Bay tidal power project in Maine. From 1936 to 1938 he was the head of the construction division of the Resettlement Administration and then the Farm Security Administration. During World War II he was the chief of staff of the Communications Zone in the European Theater of Operations, United States Army. He retired in 1946.
Early life
Royal Bertrand Lord was born in Worcester, Massachusetts, on 19 September 1899, the son of Edgar Harold Lord and his wife Lena Rita Lupien. He entered Brown University, from which he graduated in 1919 with a Bachelor of Science degree.
He entered the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, as an appointment from Rhode Island on 13 June 1919, and graduated on 12 June 1923, ranked fourth in his class.
Between the wars
As was usual for high-ranking graduates, Lord was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Corps of Engineers. He completed his engineer training at the Engineer School at Fort Humphreys, Virginia, and was stationed at Fort William McKinley in the Philippines from 30 May 1924 to 16 April 1926. He built barrios to house families, and erected radio towers to link the islands together.
On 5 June 1926, Lord was posted to San Francisco, California, as Assistant District Engineer of the First District. On 15 August 1926, he entered the University of California, Berkeley, from which he graduated with a degree in civil engineering. It was there that he met Elizabeth Richardson, the daughter of a Berkeley attorney, whom he married. They had a son, Willard Richardson (Dick) Lord.
Lord then became an instructor in tactics at West Point, with the rank of first lieutenant from 15 November 1927. He built new sports fields including a polo field (Howze Field) and an ice hockey arena (Smith Rink). In 1931, he helped Grover Whalen organize the Army–Navy Game, which was held at Yankee Stadium that year for the benefit of the unemployed, at the behest of President Herbert Hoover. Lord collected money from businessmen for the event in Evangeline Booth's tambourine.
Lord commanded a company of the 6th Engineer Regiment at Fort Lawton, Washington, from 19 August 1931 to 3 October 1933, then went to St. Louis, Missouri, as assistant to the district engineer on 12 October 1933, where he worked on flood control projects on the Mississippi River. He served in the office of the Chief of Engineers in Washington, DC, and then in Eastport, Maine, where he worked on the Passamaquoddy Bay tidal power project. As part of this he built the temporary Quoddy Village that housed construction workers. He was promoted to the rank of captain on 1 August 1935. He returned to Washington, DC, on 26 July 1936, and became the head of the construction division of the Resettlement Administration and then its successor, the Farm Security Administration.
World War II
On 7 November 1938, Lord assumed command of a battalion of the 3rd Engineer Regiment at the Schofield Barracks in the Territory of Hawaii. He built pillboxes and field fortifications, for which he was awarded several patents. He was promoted to major on 1 July 1940. From December 1940 to August 1941 he served as assistant director of the Bureau of Public Relations at the War Department in Washington, DC, and was promoted to lieutenant colonel in the wartime Army of the United States on 26 March 1941.
Lord did not enjoy this role, and was grateful when Vice President Henry A. Wallace, with whom he had worked at the Farm Security Administration when Wallace was Secretary of Agriculture, selected him to become Chief of Operations and assistant director of the Board of Economic Warfare. Lord served in this capacity from September 1941 to August 1942, and was advanced to the rank of colonel on 1 February 1942. This was followed by service on the War Requirement Board in the Office of the Chief of Engineers from September 1942 to January 1943.