Sir Douglas Haig. Part of Box 104 Boswell collection .Field Marshal Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig, KT, GCB, OM, GCVO, KCIE, ADC (19 June 1861 ? 29 January 1928) was a British senior officer during the First World War. He commanded the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) from 1915 to the end of the war. He was commander during the Battle of the Somme, the battle with one of the highest casualties in British military history, the Third Battle of Ypres and the Hundred Days Offensive, which led to the armistice in 1918