Victor Wallace Germains

Victor Wallace Germains (8 May 1888^[1] – 1974) was an English writer. He wrote several books on the military and foreign policy, including on Kitchener and Churchill.^[2]

Germains was born in the Fulham district of London, the son of inventor Aaron Simon "Adolph" Zalkin Germains, a Jewish emigrant from the Russian Empire. His mother was Emma Annie Levetus of Birmingham, daughter of a Moldavian Jewish emigrant, and sister of the writer Amelia Sarah Levetus.^[3][4]

In 1954, Germains wrote Crusoe Warburton, a lost world novel.^[5][6]

During World War I, Germains served as a spy in Austria.^[7]

He died in 1974 in South Africa.^[8]

Writings

As a military writer, Germains was classed by Michael Howard with Bernard Acworth and Lionel Charlton as a lesser figure typical of his time.^[9]

Books

• The Struggle for Bread, 1913 (a reply under the pseudonym "Rifleman" to Norman Angell's The Great Illusion (1910).^[10]
• The Gathering Storm, 1913 (under the pseudonym "Rifleman"
• Austria of Today: with a special chapter on the Austrian police, 1923 (later editions up to 1932)
• The Truth about Kitchener, 1925
• The "Mechanization" of War, 1927; a contribution to the "tank debate", arguing that anti-tank weapons had greater potential for development, foreword by Frederick Barton Maurice.^[11][12] The work was critical of the approach of J. F. C. Fuller, presaging later British doctrine, and was serialized abroad.^[13][14]
• The Kitchener Armies: the story of a national achievement, 1930
• The Tragedy of Winston Churchill, 1931
• Colonel to Princess. A novel., 1936. A dying princess gets a brain transplant from a colonel. He enjoys being a woman.^[15]
• Crusoe Warburton, 1954

Articles

• "(Warfare of Tomorrow part II) The Cult of the Defensive" pp. 498–502, The Living Age, February 1938
• "Not to Overlook the Infantry", pp. 233–237, The Living Age, November 1940