William Jackson (British Army officer)

Sir William Godfrey Fothergill Jackson
Sir William Jackson (left) with Sir Joshua Hassan, Chief Minister of Gibraltar (right) awaiting the arrival in Gibraltar of the Charles, Prince of Wales in 1977
Born	(1917-08-28)28 August 1917 Blackpool, Lancashire
Died	12 March 1999(1999-03-12) (aged 81) Swindon, Wiltshire
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service/branch	British Army
Years of service	1937–77
Rank	General
Commands held	Northern Command Gurkha Engineers
Battles/wars	Second World War Suez Crisis Malayan Emergency
Awards	Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath Military Cross & Bar Mentioned in Despatches

General Sir William Godfrey Fothergill Jackson, GBE, KCB, MC & Bar (28 August 1917 – 12 March 1999) was a British Army officer, military historian, author and Governor of Gibraltar.

Educated at Shrewsbury School, the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, and King's College, Cambridge, William Jackson was commissioned into the Royal Engineers in 1937. He served with the British Army in Norway during the Second World War, where he was one of the first British officers to engage the enemy. His work in blowing up bridges as the British retreated from Lillehammer earned Jackson his first Military Cross (MC). He also served in North Africa, Sicily and Italy during the war. He was twice injured by a land mine. The one at Bou Arada in Tunisia placed him in bed for four months before he joined Dwight Eisenhower's headquarters, where the invasion of Sicily was being planned. He won a Bar to his MC in 1944 at the Battle of Monte Cassino in recognition of "gallant and distinguished services", and by the end of the war Jackson was in post as an acting major but was only formally promoted captain in August 1945, having been promoted to lieutenant in 1940. He was also mentioned in despatches in 1945 for his services in Italy.