William Reginald Hall
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Admiral Sir William Reginald Hall (28 June 1870 – 22 October 1943) was the British Director of Naval Intelligence (DNI) from 1914 to 1919. Together with Sir Alfred Ewing he was responsible for the establishment of the Royal Navy's codebreaking operation, Room 40, which decoded the Zimmerman telegram, a major factor in the entry of the United States in World War I.
The son of Captain William Henry Hall, the first head of Naval Intelligence, Hall entered the Navy in 1884. He was promoted to Commander in 1898 and became Captain in 1905. He was an inspector of mechanical training from 1906-07; and from 1911-13 he served as Assistant Comptroller of the Royal Navy. In between he commanded the cadet training ship Cornwall, the armoured cruiser HMS Natal and the battle cruiser HMS Queen Mary in 1913-1914. He introduced many reforms, including the now standard three-watch system, in which one-third of the crew would be on shipboard duty at any one time.
His seagoing career cut short by ill-health, Hall was appointed DNI by the Admiralty in October 1914 (allegedly after some intensive lobbying by his wife (Beesly 1982)) and served in that capacity until January 1919 when he retired from active duty. It turned out to be fortituous appointment, for he was responsible for building up the naval intelligence organization during the war, encouraged codebreaking and radio-intercept efforts and provided the fleet with good intelligence, making the NID the pre-eminent British intelligence agency during the war. He also encouraged cooperation with other British intelligence organizations, such as MI5 (under Vernon Kell), MI6 (under Mansfield Smith-Cumming) and the Special Branch of Scotland Yard (under Basil Thomson). Aside from this, the DNI under his helm provided the evidence needed to arrest Roger Casement as well as the inevitable failure of the Easter Rising in 1916. Its decryptions also led to the capture of Franz von Rintelen, the German sabotage secret agent posted to New York/New Jersey.
He was knighted in 1918, perhaps partly due to his work on the Zimmerman telegram. He was promoted to Rear Admiral in 1917, then to Vice Admiral in 1922 and to full Admiral in 1926.
Upon retirement Hall served as a Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) for Liverpool West Derby from 1919 to 1923, then for Eastbourne 1925-29. As an MP, in 1919 he and a group of industrialists founded a group to counter subversive actions against free enterprise known as National Propaganda, which was later renamed the Economic League (UK). Even in the House of Commons he was still said to be involved in the Zinoviev letter affair in 1924, which led to the victory of the Conservatives in the general election of that year. In the 1920s and 1930s he travelled extensively in the United States to give lectures on intelligence gathering matters. Too old to return to active service on the outbreak of World War II, Hall nevertheless served in the British Home Guard until his death.
Hall was described by the U.S. Ambassador to the Court of St. James Walter Hines Page as a "clear case of genius", a testament to his loyalty, skill and competence, qualities needed at a such a critical period of time. On the other hand, American attaché Edward Bell described him as "a perfectly marvelous person but the coldest-hearted proposition that ever was — he'd eat a man's heart and hand it back to him."
He was known as "Blinker" on account of a chronic facial twitch, which caused one of his eyes to "flash like a Navy signal lamp". His daughter attributed this to childhood malnutrition. (He had attended a military boarding school in which the boys had to fill their bellies by stealing turnips from neighboring farms.)
[edit] External links
- The Papers of William Reginald Hall are held at Churchill Archives Centre in Cambridge and are accessible to the public.
- First World War.com - Who's Who entry
- Patrick Beesly, Room 40: British Naval Intelligence 1914-1918, Oxford University Press 1982, ISBN 0-19-281468-0
[edit] References
| Military offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Henry Oliver |
Director of Naval Intelligence 1914–1919 |
Succeeded by Hugh Sinclair |
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
| Preceded by Sir F. E. Smith |
Member of Parliament for Liverpool West Derby 1919–1923 |
Succeeded by Charles Sydney Jones |
| Preceded by Sir George Lloyd |
Member of Parliament for Eastbourne 1925–1929 |
Succeeded by Edward Marjoribanks |
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | Hall, William Reginald |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Sir William Reginald Hall |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | British Admiral, Director of Naval Intelligence 1914 to 1919; Conservative MP 1919–23, 1925–1929 |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 28 June 1870 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | |
| DATE OF DEATH | 22 October 1943 |
| PLACE OF DEATH | |
