Temporary Gentleman

Temporary Gentleman

Temporary gentlemen (sometimes abbreviated to TG) is a colloquial term referring to officers of the British Army who held temporary (or war-duration) commissions, particularly when such men came from outside the traditional "officer class". Historically the officers of the British Army were drawn from the gentry and upper middle classes and the expensive uniforms and social expectations placed on officers prevented those without a private income from joining. The outbreak of the First World War required a rapid expansion in the size of the army and a corresponding increase in the officer corps. During the war more than 200,000 additional officers were recruited, many on temporary commissions. Many of these were drawn from the lower middle and working classes. They came to be referred to as "temporary gentlemen", a term reflecting the expectation that they would revert to their former social standing after the war. At the end of the war, many were unwilling to return to their former positions on reduced salaries and there were too few managerial positions to provide full employment, resulting in considerable hardship. Some former temporary gentlemen became leading literary figures and temporary gentlemen featured in many inter-war stories, plays and films. The term was revived in the Second World War, which saw a similar increase in the number of officers holding temporary commissions. A staggered demobilisation at the war's end helped alleviate some of the issues faced by their forebears. The term continued to see use for officers commissioned from those conscripted for National Service, which lasted until 1963. It has also been used as a translation for miliciano, a term used to describe conscript officers in the Portuguese Army of the 1960s and 1970s.

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