Jackie Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher

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The Lord Fisher of Kilverstone
25 January 1841 – 10 July 1920

Admiral of the Fleet The Lord Fisher with Churchill, December 1914
Place of birth Ceylon
Place of death Kilverstone, Norfolk
Allegiance Flag of the United Kingdom United Kingdom
Service/branch Royal Navy
Years of service 1853 - 1909
1914 - 1915
Rank Admiral of the Fleet
Commands held Director of Naval Ordnance 1886-91
Admiral Superintendant Portsmouth 1891
Third Sea Lord and Controller 1892-97
C-in-C North America and West Indies Squadron 1897-99
Delegate Hague Peace Conference 1899
C-in-C Mediterranean Fleet 1899-1902
Second Sea Lord 1902-03
C-in-C Portsmouth 1903-04
First Sea Lord 1904-10 and 1914-15[1]
Battles/wars Crimean War (1856),
Second Opium War (1856-1860),
Anglo-Egyptian War (1882),
First World War
Awards GCB, OM, GCVO,
Grand Cordon of the Légion d'honneur,
Grand Cordon, Order of Osmanieh[2]
Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun with Paulownia
For other persons named John Fisher, see John Fisher (disambiguation).

Admiral of the Fleet John Arbuthnot "Jackie" Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher of Kilverstone,[3][4] GCB, OM, GCVO (25 January 1841 – 10 July 1920) was a British admiral known for his efforts at naval reform. He had a huge influence on the Royal Navy in a career spanning more than 60 years, starting in a navy of wooden sailing ships armed with muzzle-loading cannon and ending in one of battlecruisers, submarines and the first aircraft carriers. The argumentative, energetic, reform-minded Fisher is often considered the second most important figure in British naval history, after Lord Nelson.

Contents

[edit] Childhood and personal life

Fisher was born on 25 January 1841, the eldest of eleven children, in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). His father - Captain William Fisher, a British Army officer in the 78th Highlanders - was aide-de-camp to the governor.[5] The family owned a coffee plantation but it was not a great success.[6] With his parents unable to provide for all their children, at the age of six, he was sent to England to live with his maternal grandfather, Charles Lambe, in New Bond Street, London.[6]

[edit] Early career (1854-1869)

Fisher formally entered the Royal Navy on 12 July 1854, aged 13, on board Nelson's flagship, HMS Victory, at Portsmouth.[5] The following day, he was posted as a cadet to HMS Calcutta, an old ship of the line. She was built of wood, in 1831, with 84 smooth-bore muzzle-loading guns arranged on two gun decks, and relied entirely on sail for propulsion.[7] She had a crew of 700, and discipline was strictly enforced by the "hard-bitten Captain Stopford".[7] Fisher fainted when he witnessed his first flogging.[7] Calcutta participated in the blockade of Russian ports in the Gulf of Finland during the Crimean War, entitling Fisher to the Baltic medal, before returning to Britain a few months later.[7] The crew were paid off on 1 March 1856.[7]

On 2 March 1856, Fisher was posted to HMS Agamemnon, and was sent to Constantinople (now Istanbul) to join her.[7] He arrived on 19 May, just as the war was ending.[7] After a tour around the Dardanelles picking up troops and baggage, Agamemnon returned to England where the crew were paid off.[7]

Combat at Canton (Guangzhou) during the Second Opium War
Combat at Canton (Guangzhou) during the Second Opium War

Promotion to midshipman came on 12 July 1856 and Fisher joined a 21-gun steam corvette, HMS Highflyer, part of the China Station.[7] (Fisher was to spend the next five years in Chinese waters, seeing action in the Second Opium War, 1856-1860.) The Highflyer's captain, Captain Shadwell, was an expert on naval astronomy (subsequently being appointed a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1861) and he taught Fisher much about navigation with spectacular later results.[8]

Fisher passed his board for sub-lieutenant (the rank was called Mate at the time) on his nineteenth birthday, 25 January 1860.[8] He was transferred three months later to the steam frigate HMS Chesapeake as an acting lieutenant.[8] Shortly afterwards, Fisher had his first brief command: taking the yacht of the China Squadron's admiral - the paddle-gunboat HMS Coromandel - from Hong Kong to Canton (nowadays Guangzhou), a voyage of four days.[8] He was transferred, on 12 June 1860 to the paddle-sloop HMS Furious where he saw sufficient action to add the Taku and Canton clasps to his China service medal.[8] Furious left Hong Kong and the China Station in March 1861 and, after a leisurely voyage home, paid off in Portsmouth on 30 August.[8]

That November, Fisher sat his lieutenant's examination and passed with flying colours.[9] He received top grades in seamanship and gunnery, and achieved the highest score ever - 963/1000 - for navigation.[9] For this, he was awarded the Beaufort Testimonial, an annual prize of books and instruments but, in the meantime, he had to wait around, unpaid, until his appointment came through officially.[9] He was one of the last Royal Navy officers to receive basic training entirely at sea.[9]

From January 1862 to March 1863, Fisher returned to the payroll at the navy's principal gunnery school aboard HMS Excellent, a three-decker moored in Portsmouth harbour.[9] During this time, Excellent was evaluating the performance of the "revolutionary" Armstrong breech-loading guns against the traditional Whitworth muzzle-loading type.[9]

In March 1863, Fisher was appointed Gunnery Lieutenant to HMS Warrior, the first all-iron sea-going armoured battleship.[9] Built in 1859, she marked the beginning of the end of the Age of Sail and, coincidentally, was armed with both Armstrong breechloading and Whitworth muzzle-loading guns.[9]

Fisher returned to Excellent in 1864 as an instructor where he remained until 1869.

Whilst there he married Frances Broughton, on 4 April 1866.[10]

[edit] Commander (1869-1876)

On 2 August 1869, "at the early age of twenty-eight", he was promoted to commander.[11][12] Shortly afterwards, he was sent to Germany, to report on torpedo and mine developments.[11] Perhaps inspired by the visit, he started preparing a paper on the design, construction and management of electrical torpedoes, the cutting edge technology of the time.[11]

On 8 November, Fisher was posted as commander (second-in-command) of HMS Donegal, serving under Captain Hewett, a Crimean War Victoria Cross holder.[13] Donegal was a Conqueror-class ship of the line, with auxiliary screw propulsion. She plied between Portsmouth and Hong Kong, taking out relief crews and bringing home the crews they replaced.[13] During this time he completed his torpedoes treatise[14]

In May 1870, he transferred, again as second in command, to HMS Ocean, flagship of the China Station.[13] It was whilst he was on Ocean that he wrote an eight page memoir: "Naval Tactics", which Captain J.G. Goodenough had printed for private circulation.[15]

In 1872, he returned to England to the gunnery school Excellent, this time as head of torpedo and mine training, during which time he split the Torpedo Branch off from Excellent, forming a separate establishment for it called HMS Vernon. He was promoted to captain on 30 October 1874, aged thirty-three.[16][17]

[edit] Captain R.N. (1876-1883)

Fisher as a younger man
Fisher as a younger man
Bacon's account
  1. Sep 1876-Mar 1877 On half-pay with his family
  2. Mar 1877-Jul 1878 HMS Bellerophon Flag-Captain to the Admiral of the North-west Coast of America squadron.
  3. Jul 1878-Dec 1878 HMS Hercules
Bacon and Mackay concur.
  1. Jan 1879-Jul 1879 HMS Pallas Captain, serving in the Mediterranean Command, including an official visit to Istambul where Fisher dined with the sultan of the Ottoman Empire. He then returned to the UK.
  2. Jul 1879-Sep 1879. Leave on half-pay. He visited the Continent with his family.
  3. Sep 1879-Jan 1880 HMS Northampton
  4. Jan 1880-Oct 1881 HMS Duke of Wellington
  5. Oct 1881-Dec 1882 HMS Inflexible She was the most powerful warship of her day and a very prestigious appointment. Inflexible was assigned to the Mediterranean Fleet where she took part in the 1882 Anglo-Egyptian War, bombarding the port of Alexandria as part of Admiral Seymour's fleet.
  6. Jan-Apr 1883 Half pay.
  7. Apr 1883-Jun 1885 HMS Excellent Fisher returned to the UK to become commanding officer of Excellent.
  8. Jun-Jul 1885 HMS Minotaur

Fisher's first command was a temporary three-month one, taking HMS Pallas

During this time he became a close friend of the future King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra. He was appointed a Companion of the Bath (CB) in 1882.[18]

From 1886 to 1890, he was Director of Naval Ordnance. In this role, he met with limited success in wresting the design of naval guns from the War Office. He was appointed Aide-de-Camp to the Queen in 1887,[19] and promoted Rear-Admiral in August 1890.[20]

[edit] Admiral (1890-1902)

Fisher was superintendent of the dockyard at Portsmouth for a few months in 1891–1892 after which he became Third Sea Lord,[21][22][23][24][25] the naval officer with overall responsibility for provision of ships and equipment. He presided over the development of torpedo boat destroyers (later called destroyers), for countering torpedo boats. Torpedo boats had become a major threat as they were cheap but able to sink the largest battleships, and France had built large numbers of them. Torpedo boat destroyers were small, fast warships equipped with the then novel water-tube boilers and quick-firing small calibre guns.

Fisher was knighted in the Queen's Birthday Honours of 1894 as a Knight Commander of the Bath,[26] promoted to Vice-Admiral in 1896,[27] and put in charge of the North Atlantic and West Indies station in 1897 before heading the British delegation to the First Hague Peace Convention. Following this he was made chief of the Mediterranean station from 1899 until 1902. Unlike the North Atlantic station, this was a vital British operational command because the line of communication between India and Britain passed through the Suez Canal, which was felt to be under continuous threat from France. He was awarded the Grand Cordon, Order of Osmanieh in November 1900,[28] and promoted to full Admiral in November 1901.[29]

In 1902 he returned to the UK as Second Sea Lord in charge of personnel, and in 1903 became commander in chief of Portsmouth dockyard. As C-in-C, Portsmouth, HMS Victory became his flagship. He was appointed a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath (GCB) in 1902.[30]

[edit] First Sea Lord (1904-1910)

On 21 October 1904 (Trafalgar Day), following breakfast with the king-emperor, Edward VII, at Buckingham Palace, Fisher was sworn in as First Sea Lord, in overall operational command of the Royal Navy.[5][31][32][33][34][35] On the same day he was appointed "First and Principal Naval Aide-de-Camp to His Majesty The King".[36] In June 1905 he was appointed to the Order of Merit (OM),[37] in December he was promoted Admiral of the Fleet.[38]

Fisher was brought into the Admiralty to reduce naval budgets, and to reform the navy for modern war. Amidst massive public controversy, he ruthlessly sold off 90 obsolete and small ships and put a further 64 into reserve, describing them as "too weak to fight and too slow to run away", and "a miser's hoard of useless junk". This freed up crews and money to increase the number of large modern ships in home waters.

He was a driving force behind the development of the fast, all big-gun battleship, and chaired the Committee on Designs which produced the outline design for the first modern battleship, HMS Dreadnought. His committee also produced a new type of cruiser in a similar style to Dreadnought with a high speed achieved at the expense of armour protection. This became the battlecruiser, the first being HMS Invincible. Fisher's policy with regards to Dreadnoughts has often been misunderstood; it was not a class of ship which he favoured, as his time as admiral of the Mediterranean fleet had taught him the vulnerability of slow big gun ships to mines, torpedoes and submarines. He wanted battlecruisers to defend Britain’s colonies, and a large fleet of small ships to defend the British Isles. However, when his plans for battlecruisers met with opposition from within the service, he was forced to compromise. He also encouraged the introduction of submarines into the Royal Navy, and the conversion from a largely coal fuelled navy to an oil fuelled one. He had a long-running public feud with another admiral, Charles Beresford.

On 7 December 1909, he was created Baron Fisher, of Kilverstone.[4][39][4][5] He took the punning motto "Fear God and dread nought" on his coat of arms as a reference to Dreadnought.

[edit] Before the war (1911-1914)

He retired on 25 January 1911, his 70th birthday.[40][41]

In 1912, Fisher was appointed chairman of the Royal Commission to enquire into Liquid Fuel, with a view to converting the entire fleet to oil.[42] Classified "Secret", Fisher's Commission reported in on 27 November 1912, with two follow-up reports on 27 February 1913 and 10 February 1914.[43]

Once the First World War broke out in August 1914, Fisher was a 'constant' visitor to Churchill at the Admiralty.[44]

[edit] First Sea Lord (1914-1915)

In October 1914, Lord Fisher was recalled as First Sea Lord, after Prince Louis of Battenberg had been forced to resign because of alleged German ties. The Times reported that Fisher "was now entering the close of his 74th year but he was never younger or more vigorous".[5] He resigned on 15 May 1915 amidst bitter arguments with the First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, over Gallipoli, causing Churchill's resignation too. Lord Fisher was never entirely enthusiastic about the campaign -- going back and forth in his support to the consternation and frustration of members of the cabinet -- and all-in-all preferred an amphibious attack on the German Baltic Sea coastline, even having the shallow draft battlecruisers HMS Furious, HMS Glorious and HMS Courageous constructed for the purpose. As the Gallipoli campaign failed, relations with Churchill had become increasingly acrimonious. One of Fisher's last contributions to naval construction was the projected HMS Incomparable, a mammoth battlecruiser which took the principles of the Courageous class another step further; mounting 20-inch guns, but still with minimal armour, Incomparable was never approved for construction.

[edit] Last years (1915-1920)

Fisher was made chairman of the Government's Board of Invention and Research, serving in that post until the end of the war. In 1917 he was awarded the Japanese Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun with Paulownia.[45] His wife, Frances, died in July 1918. She was cremated and her ashes were interred in St Andrew's churchyard, adjacent to Kilverstone Hall, on 22 July.[46] Her casket was draped with Fisher's flag as Admiral of the Fleet and topped by a coronet.[10]

Fisher died of cancer on 10 July 1920,[47] and he was given a grand national funeral at Westminster Abbey. [5] His coffin was drawn on a gun-carriage through the streets of London to Westminster Abbey by bluejackets, with six admirals as pall-bearers and an escort of Royal Marines, their arms reversed, to the slow beat of muffled drums.[5][48] That evening, the body was cremated at the Golders Green crematorium.[5] The following day, Fisher's ashes were taken by train to Kilverstone, escorted by a Royal Navy guard of honour, and were placed in the grave of his wife, underneath a chestnut tree, overlooking the figurehead of his first seagoing ship, Calcutta.[5][49]

[edit] In folklore and popular culture

  • Fisher's life is celebrated in the folk song "Old Admirals" by the Scottish singer Al Stewart, and he is expressly referred to in Stewart's earlier song "Manuscript" - "Admiral Lord Fisher is writing to Churchill, calling for more dreadnoughts".
  • A reference to Jackie Fisher was hidden as an encrypted message, the Smithy code, by Mr Justice Peter Smith in the April 2006 judgment on the Da Vinci Code plagiarism case. Smith's biography in Who's Who stated that he was a "Jackie Fisher fan".

[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ Dreyer, Frederic C, The Sea Heritage p35
  2. ^ Sir John Arbuthnot Fisher at www.admirals.org.uk
  3. ^ "Baron Fisher of Kilverstone" is exactly how The Times referred to him in their obituary (July 12, 1920; pg. 9; Issue 42460; col A)
    The London Gazette no. 28317 of 14 December 1909 gives the full title—'the names, style and title of Baron Fisher of Kilverstone in the county of Norfolk.'
    Mackay, Ruddock F, Fisher of Kilverstone pub OUP, 1973 ISBN 0-19-822409-5
    Encyclopaedia Britannica: John Arbuthnot Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher of Kilverstone (British admiral)
  4. ^ a b c London Gazette: no. 28317, page 9514, 14 December 1909. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i The Times, 12 July 1920, page 9
  6. ^ a b Morris p 12
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i Mackay, pp 7-12
  8. ^ a b c d e f Mackay pp 13-28
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h Mackay pp 29-X
  10. ^ a b Bacon, Vol 1, pp 34-35.
  11. ^ a b c Mackay pp 56-X
  12. ^ London Gazette: no. 23523, page 4366, 6 August 1869. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  13. ^ a b c Mackay pp 70-X
  14. ^ "A Treatise on Electricity and the Construction and Management of Electrical and Mechanical Torpedoes, Griffin & Co., Portsmouth (1871).
  15. ^ Fisher, J. Naval Tactics, written 30 March 1871 on board Ocean at Hong Kong, printed for private circulation.
  16. ^ Mackay p 120
  17. ^ London Gazette: no. 24147, page 5200, 3 November 1874. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  18. ^ London Gazette: no. 25138, page 3794, 15 August 1882. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  19. ^ London Gazette: no. 25713, page 3368, 21 June 1887. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  20. ^ London Gazette: no. 26076, page 4282, 5 August 1890. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  21. ^ London Gazette: no. 26253, page 543, 2 February 1892. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  22. ^ London Gazette: no. 26290, page 3071, 24 May 1892. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  23. ^ London Gazette: no. 26320, page 4889, 26 August 1892. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  24. ^ London Gazette: no. 26455, page 6144, 3 November 1893. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  25. ^ London Gazette: no. 26642, page 3877, 9 July 1895. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  26. ^ London Gazette: no. 26516, page 3115, 26 May 1894. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  27. ^ London Gazette: no. 26740, page 2988, 19 May 1896. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  28. ^ London Gazette: no. 27251, page 7819, 27 November 1900. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  29. ^ London Gazette: no. 27373, page 7223, 8 November 1901. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  30. ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 27448, page 4189, 24 June 1902. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  31. ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 27994, page 963, 12 February 1907. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  32. ^ London Gazette: no. 28006, page 2001, 22 March 1907. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  33. ^ London Gazette: no. 28129, page 2937, 17 April 1908. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  34. ^ London Gazette: no. 28186, page 7467, 16 October 1908. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  35. ^ London Gazette: no. 28236, page 2321, 26 March 1909. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  36. ^ London Gazette: no. 27734, page 7263, 11 November 1904. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  37. ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 27811, page 4549, 27 June 1905. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  38. ^ London Gazette: no. 27861, page 8812, 8 December 1905. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  39. ^ Complete Peerage, XIII, p.105: "cr., 7 Dec. 1909 BARON FISHER, of Kilverstone, Thetford, co. Norfolk."
  40. ^ The Times, 25 Jan 1911; pg. 8; Issue 39491; col B
  41. ^ London Gazette: no. 28460, page 695, 27 January 1911. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  42. ^ London Gazette: no. 28632, pages 5721–5722, 2 August 1912. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  43. ^ Mackay pp 440-441
  44. ^ Mackay pp 456-8
  45. ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 30363, page 11322, 30 October 1917. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  46. ^ The Times, 24 Jul 24, 1918; pg. 9; col A
  47. ^ London Gazette: no. 32162, page 12341, 14 December 1920. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.
  48. ^ Morris, p 237
  49. ^ Morris, p 196

[edit] Further reading

  • Fisher, John Arbuthnot Fisher, Baron. Memories, by the Admiral of the Fleet, Lord Fisher. London, New York [etc.]: Hodder and Stoughton, 1919.
  • Fisher, John Arbuthnot Fisher, Baron. Records, by the Admiral of the Fleet, Lord Fisher London, New York [etc.]: Hodder and Stoughton, 1919.

[edit] External links

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v • d • e
First Sea Lords of the Royal Navy
Admiral of the Fleet
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Sir John Fisher · Sir Arthur Wilson · Sir Francis Bridgeman · Prince Louis of Battenberg · The Baron Fisher of Kilverstone · Sir Henry Jackson · Sir John Jellicoe · Sir Rosslyn Wemyss · The Earl Beatty · Sir Charles Madden, Bt · Sir Frederick Field · The Lord Chatfield · Sir Roger Backhouse · Sir Dudley Pound · The Lord Cunningham of Hyndhope · Sir John Cunningham · The Lord Fraser of North Cape · Sir Rhoderick McGrigor · The Earl Mountbatten of Burma · Sir Charles Lambe · Sir Caspar John · Sir David Luce · Sir Varyl Begg · Sir Michael Le Fanu · Sir Peter Hill-Norton · Sir Michael Pollock · Sir Edward Ashmore · Sir Terence Lewin · Sir Henry Leach · Sir John Fieldhouse · Sir William Staveley · Sir Julian Oswald · Sir Benjamin Bathurst · Sir Jock Slater · Sir Michael Boyce · Sir Nigel Essenhigh · Sir Alan West · Sir Jonathon Band