Steve Weir: New Zealand's Master Gunner

Cyril Ettrick (Steve) Weir is one of a small group of New Zealand military leaders in the Second World War who remain largely unknown to modern generations of New Zealanders. This is surprising as Weir was one of New Zealand's most capable military commanders whose achievements were unique among the Commonwealth armies in the Second World War. As well as ably commanding the Divisional Artillery throughout the key actions of the North African campaign and Italy, he was Freyberg's choice to temporarily command 2 New Zealand Division in September 1944 - in preference to the infantry brigadiers who were the natural choices to relieve him. Weir later went on to be appointed commander of 46 British Division; becoming the only Dominion officer during the Second World War to command a British Army division.

Weir was one of the few professional officers in the New Zealand Division who had soldiered on during the inter-war years in the face of official apathy and sometimes public disdain for the military. Too young to have served in the First World War, Weir lacked the personal battlefield experience of many of his peer officers, yet he quickly rose from command of a field regiment to an acting corps commander of artillery in the 8th Army, in little over two years. It was as the commander of New Zealand's Divisional Artillery during the 1942-43 North African campaign, however, that Weir arguably made his greatest impact. Learning from the setbacks incurred in the desert fighting of 1941, Weir went on to mould the New Zealand Artillery into an effective divisional entity and introduce several artillery techniques that contributed significantly to the success of the 8th Army over the Axis forces in North Africa, particularly at the turning point of the campaign - El Alamein in October/November 1942.

This study aims to determine the extent of Weir's influence on the development of artillery techniques in this theatre. These include the 'Stonk' and the 'Murder' defensive fire techniques, which are credited to Weir, along with other innovations such as the re-introduction of the creeping barrage and the use of army groups of artillery in the later battles of the North African campaign. The study concludes that Weir was a major innovator as an artillery commander who ultimately had a significant influence on the outcome of the war in the desert, and that he was undoubtedly one of the 8th Army's most successful and effective commanders of artillery in the North African campaign.