Ragnar Garrett
Australian general
Died when: 77 years 265 days (932 months)Star Sign: Aquarius
Lieutenant General Sir Alwyn Ragnar Garrett, KBE, CB (12 February 1900 – 4 November 1977) was a senior commander in the Australian Army.He served as Chief of the General Staff (CGS) from 1958 to 1960.
Born in Western Australia, Garrett graduated from the Royal Military College, Duntroon, in 1921.He was adjutant and quartermaster in several regiments of the Australian Light Horse before undertaking staff training in England, which he completed just as the Second World War broke out.
Garrett joined the Second Australian Imperial Force soon afterwards, and commanded the 2/31st Battalion in England before seeing action with Australian brigades in Greece and Crete in 1941.
Promoted to colonel the following year, he held senior positions with I Corps in New Guinea and II Corps on Bougainville in 1944–1945.
He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for his staff work.After the war, Garrett served two terms as commandant of the Staff College, Queenscliff, in 1946–1947 and 1949–1951.
Between these appointments he was posted to Japan with the British Commonwealth Occupation Force.Promoted to major general, he took charge of Western Command in August 1951, and became Deputy Chief of the General Staff in January 1953.
He took over Southern Command as a lieutenant general in October 1954, and was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath in 1957.
As CGS from March 1958, Garrett focused on rearmament and reorganisation, initiating the Army's short-lived restructure into a "pentropic" formation.He was knighted in 1959.
After retiring from the military in June 1960, Garrett became honorary colonel of the Royal Australian Regiment, and was principal of the Australian Administrative Staff College until 1964.
He died at Mornington, Victoria, in 1977.
