Keyes, Geoffrey.

Keyes, Geoffrey, born 30-10-1888 in Ford Bayard, New Mexico, as a son of the U.S. Army officer, Captain Alexander S. B. Keyes and his wife, Virginia, born Maxwell Keyes. Like his father, Geoffrey Keyes enrolled as a Cadet at the United States Military Academy at West Point on 02-03-1908 and graduated on 12-06-1913 with the rank of Second Lieutenant. His first assignment was with the 6^th Cavalry Regiment , where he served until October, 1916 and participated in the Pancho Villa Expedition

  . He graduated from the Command and General Staff School in 1926 and the Army War College in 1937.  He was also head football coach for one season in 1917. compiling a record of 7–1. In 1940 he was Chief of Staff of the 2^nd Armoured Division, nickname “Hells on Wheels”  under General Charles Scott  Keyes became Commanding General of the 3^rd Armoured Division, nickname “Spearhead”  in 1942, former commander Maurice Rose

  The 3^rd  Armored Division had 231 days of combat in World War II, with a total of 2.540 killed, 7.331 wounded, 95 missing, and 139 captured. Total battle and non-battle casualties came to 16.122. From June to September 1942 he commanded the 9^th Armoured Division, nickname “Phantom”  before going to North Africa as Deputy Commanding General of the I^st Armoured Corps ,nicknamed “Old Ironsides”, under Georg Smith Patton   and son Patton Jr. The whole campaign in Normandy caused some 5.000 casualties for the 1^st  Corps.

 General Sir Bernard Montgomery  shakes hands with Lieutenant General George Smith Patton “Old Blood and Guts”  at an airport at Palermo, Sicily, July 28, 1943. Major General Geoffrey Keyes, deputy commander of Patton’s Seventh Army, (Pyramid of Power)  is stood to the far left of the picture.

From 1943 to 1945 Geoffrey was Commanding General of II Corps. The US II Corps  was a corps of the United States Army and the first US formation of any size to see combat in Europe or Africa during World War II .

He commanded the Seventh United States Army from 1945 to 1946 and the Third United States Army, nickname “Patton’s Own” from 1946 to 1947. In 1947 Keyes was appointed U.S. High Commissioner on the Allied Council for Austria.

He served as Director, Weapons Systems Evaluation Group (WSEG) from 1951-1954. Keyes retired in 1954. He died age 78, on 17-09-1967 in Walter Reed Hospital in Washington D.C. and is buried with his wife Leila, born Harrison, who died age 62, on 21-03-1956, at the US Military Academy Post Cemetery at West Point. Closeby the graves of General, “Omaha Beach” , D-Day, Assistant Division Commander of the 29^th Infantry Division, nicknamed “Blue and Gray”   Norman Cota, Lieutenant General 82^nd Airborne Division, “Slim Jim” James Gavin, and General, 7^th Army, Alexander “Sandy” Patch.