THE LONDON FLAGSHIP
I
While our naval forces were thus playing their parts in several areas,
the work of creating the central staff of a great naval organization was
going forward in London. The headquarters for controlling extensive
naval operations in many widely dispersed areas, like the headquarters
of an army extending over a wide front, must necessarily be located far
behind the scene of battle. Thus, a number of remodelled dwelling-houses
in Grosvenor Gardens contained the mainspring for an elaborate mechanism
which reached from London to Washington and from Queenstown to Corfu. On
the day of the armistice the American naval forces in European waters
comprised about 370 vessels of all classes, more than 5,000 officers,
regulars and reserves, and more than 75,000 men; we had established
about forty-five bases and were represented in practically every field
of naval operations. The widespread activities of our London
headquarters on that eventful day presented a striking contrast to the
humble beginnings of eighteen months before.
From April to August, 1917, the American navy had a very small staff
organization in Europe. During these extremely critical four months the
only American naval representatives in London, besides the regular Naval
Attache and his aides, were my personal aide, Commander J. V. Babcock,
and myself; and our only office in those early days was a small room in
the American Embassy. For a considerable part of this time we had no
stenographers and no clerical assistance of our own, though of course
the Naval Attache, Captain W. D. MacDougall, and his personnel gave us
all the assistance in their power. Commander Babcock had a small
typewriter, which he was able to work with two fingers, and on this he
laboriously pounded out the reports which first informed the Navy
Department of the seriousness of the submarine situation. The fact that
Commander Babcock was my associate during this critical period was a
fortunate thing for me, and a still more fortunate thing for the United
States. Commander Babcock and I had been closely associated for several
years; in that early period, when we, in our two persons, represented
the American naval forces at the seat of Allied naval activity, we not
only worked together in that little room but we lived together. Our
office was alternately this room in the American Embassy and our
quarters in an hotel. I had already noted Commander Babcock's abilities
when he was on my staff in the Atlantic Torpedo Flotilla and when he was
a student at the Naval War College; but our constant companionship
throughout the war, especially during these first few strenuous months
in London, gave me a still greater respect for his qualities. Many men
have made vital contributions to our success in the war of whom the
public scarcely ever hears even the name. A large part of the initiative
and thinking which find expression in successful military action
originates with officers of this type. They labour day after day and
night after night, usually in subordinate positions, unselfishly doing
work which is necessarily credited to other names than their own, daily
lightening the burden of their chiefs, and constantly making suggestions
which may control military operations or affect national policy.
Commander Babcock is a striking representative of this type. My personal
obligations to him are incalculable; and I am indebted to him not only
for his definite services, but for the sympathy, the encouragement, and
the kindly and calculated pessimism which served so well to
counterbalance my temperamental optimism.
Our relations were so close, working and living together as we did, that
I find it difficult to speak of "Babby's" services with restraint. But
there are particular accomplishments to his credit which should go down
upon this popular record. I have described the first consultations with
the British naval chiefs. These were the meetings which formed the basis
of the reports recommending the conditions upon which the American navy
should co-operate with the Allies. Commander Babcock was constantly at
my elbow during all these consultations, and was all the time
independently conducting investigations in the several departments of
the Admiralty. The original drafts of all my written and cabled
communications to the department--reports which form a connected story
of our participation in the naval war during this period--were prepared
by him.
Able as Commander Babcock was, human endurance still had its
limitations. A public-spirited American business man in London, Mr. R.
E. Gillmor, who had formerly been an officer in the navy, begged to be
accepted as a volunteer; he brought two of his best stenographers,
English girls, and personally paid their salaries for several weeks
while they were devoting all their time to the American navy.
Subsequently he was enlisted in the naval reserves and performed very
valuable services on the staff throughout nearly the entire period of
the war--until ordered to America, where his technical knowledge was
required in connection with certain important appliances with which he
was familiar. His experience as a business man in London was of great
value to our forces, and his time and energy were devoted to our service
with a zeal and loyalty that endeared him to us all.
Soon afterward a number of Rhodes scholars and other young Americans
then in Europe, G. B. Stockton, E. H. McCormick, T. B. Kittredge, P. F.
Good, R. M. D. Richardson, H. Millard, L. S. Stevens, and J. C.
Baillargeon, joined our forces as unpaid volunteers and gave us the
benefit of their trained minds and European experience. Two of these,
Kittredge and Stockton, both valuable workers, had been serving under
Hoover in Belgium. They were all later enrolled as reserves and
continued their work throughout the war. Lieutenant Stockton performed
the arduous and important duties of chief business manager, or executive
officer, of headquarters in a most efficient manner, and throughout the
war Kittredge's previous historical training, European experience, and
fine intellectual gifts made his services very valuable in the
Intelligence Department.
Mr. Page, the American Ambassador, aided and encouraged us in all
possible ways. Immediately after my arrival in London he invited me to
call upon him and his staff for any assistance they could render. In
his enthusiastic and warm-hearted way, he said: "Everything we have is
yours. I will turn the Embassy into the street if necessary"; and
throughout the war he was a tower of strength to the cause. He gave us
his time and the benefit of his great experience and personal prestige
in establishing cordial relations with the various branches of the
British Government--and all this with such an absence of diplomatic
formality, such courteous and forceful efficiency, and such cordial
sympathy and genuine kindness that he immediately excited not only our
sincere admiration but also our personal affection.
During all this period events of the utmost importance were taking
place; it was within these four months that the convoy system was
adopted, that armed guards were placed on merchant ships, that the first
American troops were escorted to France, and that our destroyers and
other worships began arriving in European waters. In July it became
apparent that the strain of doing the work of a dozen men, which had
been continuous during the past four months, could no longer be
supported by my aide, Commander Babcock. When the destroyers and other
ships arrived, we went through their lists; here and there we hit upon a
man whom we regarded as qualified for responsible staff duty, and
transferred him to the London headquarters. This proceeding was
necessary if our essential administrative work was to be done. Among the
reserves who were subsequently assigned to our forces many excellent
staff officers also were developed for handling the work of
communications, cipher codes, and the like. When the Colonel House
Commission came over in October, 1917, I explained our necessities to
the "skippers" of the two cruisers that brought the party, who promptly
gave us all the desks and office equipment they could spare and sent
them to Grosvenor Gardens.
In August, however, additional ships and forces began to arrive from
America, and it became necessary to have larger quarters than those
available in the Embassy for handling the increasing administrative
work. At one time the British Government contemplated building us a
temporary structure near the Admiralty, but this was abandoned because
there was a shortage of material. We therefore moved into an unoccupied
dwelling near the American Embassy that seemed adapted to our needs. We
rented this house furnished, just as it stood; a first glimpse of it,
however, suggested refined domesticity rather than naval operations. We
quickly cleared the building of rugs, tapestries, lace curtains,
pictures, and expensive furniture, reduced the twenty-five rooms to
their original bareness, and filled every corner with office equipment.
In a few days the staff was installed in this five-story residence and
the place was humming with the noise of typewriters. At first we
regarded the leasing of this building as something of an extravagance;
it seemed hardly likely that we should ever use it all! But in a few
weeks we had taken the house adjoining, cut holes through the walls and
put in doors; and this, too, was filled up in an incredibly short time,
so rapidly did the administrative work grow. Ultimately we had to take
over six of these private residences and make alterations which
transformed them into one. From August our staff increased at a rapid
rate until, on the day the armistice was signed, we had not far from
1,200 officers, enlisted men, and clerical force, working in our London
establishment, the commissioned staff consisting of about 200 officers,
of which sixty were regulars and the remainder reserves.
I find that many people are surprised that I had my headquarters in
London. The historic conception of the commander-in-chief of a naval
force located on the quarterdeck of his flagship still holds the popular
imagination. But controlling the operations of extensive and widely
dispersed forces in a campaign of this kind is quite a different
proceeding from that of directing the naval campaigns of Nelson's time,
just as making war on land has changed somewhat from the method in vogue
with Napoleon. The opinion generally prevails that my principal task was
to command in person certain naval forces afloat. The fact is that this
was really no part of my job during the war. The game in which several
great nations were engaged for four years was a game involving organized
direction and co-operation. It is improbable that any one nation could
have won the naval war; that was a task which demanded not only that we
should all exert our fullest energies, but that, so far as it was
humanly possible, we should exert them as a unit. It was the duty of the
United States above all nations to manifest this spirit. We had entered
the war late; we had entered it in a condition of unpreparedness; our
naval forces, when compared to those which had been assembled by the
Allies, were small; we had not been engaged for three years combating an
enemy using new weapons and methods of naval warfare. It was not
unlikely that we could make some original contributions to the Allied
effort; indeed, we early did so; yet it was natural to suppose that the
navies which had been combating the submarines so long understood that
game better than did we, and it was our duty to assist them in this
work, rather than to operate independently. Moreover, this question as
to whether any particular one of our methods might be better or might be
worse than Great Britain's was not the most important one. The point was
that the British navy had developed its own methods of working and that
it was a great "going concern." The crisis was so pressing that we
simply did not have the time to create a separate force of our own; the
most cursory examination of conditions convinced me that we could hope
to accomplish something worth while only by playing the game as it was
then being played, and that any attempt to lay down new rules would
inevitably decrease the effectiveness of our co-operation, and perhaps
result in losing the war. We can even admit, for the sake of the
argument, that the Americans might have created a better organization
than the British; but the question of improving on their methods, or of
not improving on them, was a point that was not worth considering; long
before we could have developed an efficient independent machine the war
would have come to an end. It was thus our duty to take things as they
were, to plunge immediately into the conflict, and to make every ship
and every man tell in the most effective way and in the shortest
possible time. Therefore I decided that our forces should become, for
the purpose of this war, virtually a part of the Allied navies; to place
at the disposal of the Allies our ships to reinforce the weak part of
their lines; to ignore such secondary considerations as national pride,
naval prestige, and personal ambitions; and to subordinate every other
consideration to that of defeating the Hun. I have already described how
in distributing our subchasers I practically placed them at the disposal
of the Allied Council; and this represents the policy that was followed
in all similar matters.
The naval high commands were located at Washington, London, Paris, and
Rome. Necessarily London was the headquarters of the naval war. Events
which had long preceded the European conflict had made this choice
inevitable. The maritime development of four centuries had prepared
London for the role which she was now called upon to play. From all over
the world naval and maritime information flowed to this great capital as
though in obedience to the law of gravity. Even in peace times London
knew where every ship in the world was at any particular time. All other
machinery for handling this great mass of detail was necessarily
accumulated in this great city, and Lloyd's, the world headquarters for
merchant shipping, had now become practically a part of the British
Admiralty. In this war the matter of information and communications was
supremely important. Every decision that was made and every order that
was issued, even those that were the least consequential, rested upon
complete information which was obtainable, in time to be useful, only in
London. I could not have made my headquarters in Washington, or Paris,
or Rome because these cities could not have furnished the military
intelligence which was needed as a preliminary to every act. For the
same reason I could not have efficiently controlled the operations of
all our forces from Queenstown, or Brest, or Gibraltar; the staff
controlling the whole had necessarily to be located in London, and the
tactical commands at these other bases must be exercised by
subordinates. The British placed all their sources of information and
their communications at our disposal. They literally opened their doors
and made us part of their organization. I sat daily in consultation with
British naval chiefs, and our officers had access to all essential
British information just as freely as did the British naval officers
themselves. On the day of my arrival Admiral Jellicoe issued orders that
the Americans should be shown anything which they wished to see. With
all this information, the most complete and detailed in the world,
constantly placed at our disposal, and a spirit of confidence and
friendship always prevailing which has no parallel in history, it would
have defeated the whole purpose of our participation in the war had the
American high command taken up its headquarters anywhere except in
London.
Incidentally, there was an atmosphere in the London Admiralty which made
a strong appeal to anyone who is interested in naval history. Everything
about the place is reminiscent of great naval achievements. The room in
which our councils met was the same old Admiralty Board room that had
been used for centuries. In accordance with the spirit of British
conservatism, this room is almost exactly the same now, even in its
furnishings, as it was in Nelson's time. The same old wood carvings hang
over the same old fireplace; the table at which we sat is the identical
one at which Nelson must have sat many times, and the very silver
inkstand which Nelson used was used by his successors in this war. The
portrait of this great naval chieftain looked down upon us during our
deliberations. Above the fireplace is painted a huge compass, and about
the centre of this swings an arrow. This was a part of the Admiralty
equipment of a hundred years ago, though it has no usefulness now except
a sentimental one. In old days this arrow was geared to a weather vane
on the roof of the Admiralty, and it constantly showed to the chiefs
assembled in the council room the direction of the wind--a matter of
great importance in the days of sailing ships.
All general orders and plans concerning the naval operations of British
and American forces came from the Admiralty, and here officers of my
staff were constantly at work. The commanders-in-chief at the various
bases commanded the combined British and American ships based on those
ports only in the sense that they carried out the general instructions
and policies which were formulated in London. These orders, so far as
they affected American forces, could be issued to the commanders-in-chief
only after American headquarters in London had vised them. Thus the
American staff held the ultimate command over all the American forces
which were based in British waters. The same was true of those at Brest,
Gibraltar, and other stations. The commanders-in-chief executed them,
and were responsible for the manner in which the forces were used in
combating the enemy. The operations of which I was the commander
extended over an immense area. The Plymouth and Queenstown forces
represented only a part of the ultimate American naval strength in
European waters and not the most important part; before the war ended,
Brest, as I shall show, developed into a greater naval base than any of
those which we maintained in the British Isles. Convoys were not only
coming across the Atlantic but they were constantly arriving from the
Mediterranean and from the South Sea, and it was the duty of
headquarters in London, and not the duty of local commanders, to route
these precious argosies, except in special cases, just before they
reached their port of destination. Not infrequently, as previously
described, it was necessary to change destinations, or to slow down
convoys, or to make any number of decisions based on new information;
naturally only the centre of information, the Admiralty convoy room,
could serve as a clearing house for such operations. The point is that
it was necessary for me to exercise the chief command of American forces
through subordinates. My position in this respect was precisely the same
as that of Generals Haig and Pershing; I had to maintain a great
headquarters in the rear, and to depend upon subordinates for the actual
execution of orders.
The American headquarters in London comprised many separate departments,
each one of which was directly responsible to me as the Force Commander,
through the Chief of Staff; they included such indispensable branches as
the office of the Chief of Staff, Captain N. C. Twining, Chief of Staff;
Assistant Chief of Staff, Captain W. R. Sexton; Intelligence Department,
Commander J. V. Babcock, who also acted as Aide; Convoy Operations
Section, Captain Byron A. Long; Anti-submarine Section, Captain R. H.
Leigh; Aviation Section, Captain H. I. Cone, and afterward,
Lieutenant-Commander W. A. Edwards; Personnel Section, Commander H. R.
Stark; Communication Section, Lieutenant-Commander E. G. Blakeslee;
Material Section, Captain E. C. Tobey (S.C.); Repair Section, Captain S.
F. Smith (C.C.), and afterward, L. B. McBride (C.C.); Ordnance Section,
Commander G. L. Schuyler, and afterward, Commander T. A. Thomson;
Medical Section, Captain F. L. Pleadwell (M.C.), and afterward,
Commander Edgar Thompson (M.C.); Legal Section, Commander W. H. McGrann;
and the Scientific Section, Professor H. A. Bumstead, Ph.D.
I was fortunate in all of my departmental chiefs. The Chief of Staff,
Captain N. C. Twining, would certainly have been a marked man in any
navy; he had a genius for detail, a tireless energy, and a mastery of
all the problems that constantly arose. I used to wonder when Captain
Twining ever found an opportunity to sleep; he seemed to be working
every hour of the day and night; yet, so far as was observable, he never
wearied of his task, and never slackened in his devotion to the Allied
cause. As soon as a matter came up that called for definite decision,
Captain Twining would assemble from the several departments all data and
information which were available concerning the question at issue, spend
a few hours studying this information, and then give his judgment--an
opinion which was invariably sound and which was adopted in the vast
majority of cases; in fact, in all cases except those in which questions
of policy or extraneous considerations dictated a different or modified
decision. Captain Twining is a man of really fine intellect combined
with a remarkable capacity for getting things done; without his constant
presence at my elbow, my work would have been much heavier and much less
successful than it was. He is an officer of such exceptional ability,
such matured experience, and such forceful character as to assure him a
brilliant career in whatever duty he may be called upon to perform. I
can never be sufficiently grateful to him for his loyalty and devotion
and for his indispensable contribution to the efficiency of the forces I
had the honour to command.
In accordance with my habitual practice, I applied the system of placing
responsibility upon my carefully selected heads of departments, giving
them commensurate authority, and holding them to account for results.
Because the task was such a great one, this was the only possible way in
which the operations of the force could have been successfully
conducted. I say, successfully conducted, because in a "business" of
this kind, "good enough" and "to-morrow" may mean disaster; that is, it
is a case of keeping both information and operations up to the minute.
If the personnel and equipment of the staff are not completely capable
of this, it is more than a partial failure, and the result is an
ever-present danger. There were men in this great war who "went to
pieces" simply because they tried to do everything themselves. This
administrative vice of attempting to control every detail, even
insignificant ones, to which military men seem particularly addicted, it
had always been my policy to avoid. Business at Grosvenor Gardens
developed to such an extent that about a thousand messages were every
day received in our office or sent from it; and of these 60 per cent.
were in code. Obviously it was impossible for the Force Commander to
keep constantly at his finger ends all these details. All department
heads, therefore, were selected because they were officers who could be
depended upon to handle these matters and make decisions independently;
they were all strong men, and it is to their combined efforts that the
success of our operations was due. You would have to search a long time
among the navies of the world before you could find an abler convoy
officer than Captain Byron A. Long; an abler naval constructor than
Captain L. B. McBride; an abler man to have charge of the finances of
our naval forces, the purchase of supplies and all kinds of material
than Captain (S.C.) Eugene C. Tobey; abler aviation officers than
Captain H. I. Cone and Lieutenant-Commander W. A. Edwards; an abler
chief of operations than Captain R. H. Leigh, or an abler intelligence
officer than Commander J. V. Babcock. These men, and others of the
fourteen department heads, acted as a kind of cabinet. Many of them
handled matters which, though wholly essential to the success of the
forces, were quite outside of my personal knowledge or experience, and
consequently they had to be men in whose ability to guide me in such
matters I could place complete confidence. As an example of this I may
cite one of the duties of Captain Tobey. Nearly all of the very
considerable financial transactions he was entrusted with were "Greek"
to me, but he had only to show me the right place on the numerous
documents, and I signed my name in absolute confidence that the
interests of the Government were secure.
All cables, reports, and other communications were referred each day to
the department which they concerned. The head of each department studied
them, attended to the great majority on his own responsibility, and
selected the few that needed more careful attention. A meeting of the
Chief of Staff and all department heads was held each day, at which
these few selected matters were discussed in council and decisions made.
The final results of these deliberations were the only matters that were
referred to me. This system of subdividing responsibility and authority
not only promoted efficiency but it left the Force Commander time to
attend to vitally important questions of general policy, to keep in
personal touch with the high command of the Allied navies, to attend the
Allied naval councils, and, in general, to keep his finger constantly on
the pulse of the whole war situation. Officers of our own and other
navies who were always coming in from the outlying stations, and who
could immediately be placed in touch with the one man who could answer
all their questions and give immediate decisions, testified to the
efficient condition in which the American headquarters was maintained.
One of our departments was so novel, and performed such valuable
service, that I must describe it in some detail. We took over into our
London organization an idea that is advantageously used in many American
industrial establishments, and had a Planning Section, the first, I
think, which had ever been adopted by any navy. I detached from all
other duties five officers: Captain F. H. Schofield, Captain D. W. Knox,
Captain H. E. Yarnell (who exchanged places afterward with Captain L.
McNamee of the Plans Section of the Navy Department), and Colonel R. H.
Dunlap (of the Marines), who was succeeded by Colonel L. McC. Little,
when ordered to command a regiment of Marines in France. These men made
it their business to advise the Commander-in-Chief on any questions that
might arise. All were graduates of the Naval War College at Newport, and
they applied to the consideration of war problems the lessons which they
had learned at that institution. The business of the Planning Section
was to make studies of particular problems, to prepare plans for future
operations, and also to criticize fully the organization and methods
which were already in existence. The fact that these men had no
administrative duties and that they could therefore devote all their
time to surveying our operations, discovering mistakes, and suggesting
better ways of doing things, as well as the fact that they were
themselves scholarly students of naval warfare, made their labours
exceedingly valuable. I gave them the utmost freedom in finding fault
with the existing regime; there was no department and no office, from
that of the Commander-in-Chief down, upon whose activities they were not
at liberty to submit the fullest and the frankest reports. If anything
could be done in a better way, we certainly wanted to know it. Whenever
any specific problem of importance came up, it was always submitted to
these men for a report. The value of such a report depended upon the
completeness and accuracy of the information available, and it was the
business of the Intelligence Department of the staff to supply this. If
the desired information was not in their files, or the files of the
Allied admiralties, or was not up to date, it was their duty to obtain
it at once. The point is that the Planning Section had no other duties
beyond rendering a decision, based upon a careful analysis of the facts
bearing upon the case, which they submitted in writing. There was no
phase of the naval warfare upon which the officers of the Planning
Section did not give us reports. One of their favourite methods was to
place themselves in the position of the Germans and to decide how, if
they were directing German naval operations, they would frustrate the
tactics of the Allies. Their records contain detailed descriptions of
how merchant ships could be sunk by submarines, and these methods, our
officers believed, represented a great improvement over those used by
the Germans. Indeed, I think that many of these reports, had they fallen
into the hands of the Germans, would have been found by them exceedingly
useful. There was a general impression, in our own navy as well as in
the British, that most of the German submarine commanders handled their
boats unskilfully and obtained inadequate results. All these documents
were given to the responsible men in our forces, as well as to the
British, and had a considerable influence upon operations. The British
also established a Planning Section, which worked harmoniously with our
own.
A subject upon which our Planning Section liked to speculate was the
possible sortie of the German fleet. The possibility of a great naval
engagement filled the minds of most naval officers; and, after we had
sent five of our battleships to reinforce Admiral Beatty's fleet, this
topic became even more interesting to American naval men. Would the
Germans ever come out? What had they to gain or to lose by such an
undertaking? What were their chances of victory? Where would the
engagement be fought, and what part would the several elements of
modern naval warfare play in it: mines, submarines, battle-cruisers,
airplanes, dirigibles, and destroyers? These were among the questions
with which the Planning Section busied itself, and this problem, like
many others, they approached from the German standpoint. They placed
themselves in the position of the German High Command, and peered into
the Grand Fleet looking for a weakness, which, had they been Germans,
they might turn to account in a general engagement. The only weak spot
our Planning Section could find was one which reflected the greatest
credit upon the British forces. The British commander, Admiral Sir David
Beatty, was a particularly dashing and heroic fighter; could not these
splendid qualities really be turned to the advantage of the Germans?
That Admiral Beatty would fight at the first opportunity, and that he
would run all justifiable risks, if a chance presented of defeating the
German fleet, was as well known to the Germans as to ourselves. The
British Admiral, it was also known, did not entertain much respect for
mines and torpedoes. All navies possessed what was known as a "torpedo
flag." This was an emblem which was to be displayed in case torpedoes
were sighted, for the purpose of warning the ships to change course or,
if necessary, to desist from an attack. It was generally reported that
Admiral Beatty had ordered all these torpedo flags to be destroyed; in
case he once started in pursuit of the German fleet, he proposed to take
his chances, dive straight through a school of approaching torpedoes, or
even to rush full speed over a mine-field, making no efforts to avoid
these hidden dangers. That he would probably lose some ships the Admiral
well knew, but he figured--and probably correctly--that he would
certainly have enough vessels left to annihilate the enemy. Still, in
the judgment of our Planning Section, Admiral Beatty's assumed attitude
toward "torpedo flags" gave the Germans their only possible chance of
seriously injuring the Grand Fleet. They drew up a plan of attack on the
Scapa Flow forces based upon this assumption. Imagining themselves
directors of the German navy, they constructed large numbers of torpedo
boats, submarines, and mine-fields and stationed them in a particularly
advantageous position; they then proposed to send the German fleet in
the direction of Scapa Flow, draw the Grand Fleet to the attack, and
then lead it in the direction of the torpedoes and mines. Probably such
a scheme would never have succeeded; but it represented, in the opinion
of our Planning group, Germany's only chance of crippling the Grand
Fleet and winning the war. In other words, had my staff found itself in
Germany's position, that is the strategy which it would probably have
used. I gave this report unofficially to the British Admiralty simply
because I thought it might afford British officers reading that would
possibly be entertaining. It is an evidence of the co-operation that
existed between the two forces, and of the British disposition to accept
suggestions, that this document was immediately sent to Admiral Beatty.
II
The fact that I was able ultimately to create such an organization and
leave the administration of its individual departments so largely to
their respective heads was especially fortunate because it gave me time
for what was perhaps the most important of my duties. This was my
attendance at the meetings of the Allied Naval Council, not to mention
daily conferences with various officials of the Allies. This naval
council was the great headquarters for combined Allied operations
against the enemy on the sea. It was not officially constituted by the
Allied governments until November 29, 1917, but it had actually been in
continuous operation since the beginning of the war, the heads of the
Allied admiralties having met frequently in conference. At these
meetings every phase of the situation was discussed, and the methods
finally adopted represented the mature judgment of the Allied naval
chiefs who participated in them. Without this council, and without the
co-operation for which it stood, our efforts would have been so
dispersed and would have so overlapped that their efficiency would have
been greatly decreased. This international naval conference not only had
to decide questions of naval strategy, but it also had to concern itself
with a multitude of practical matters which have little interest for the
public, but which are exceedingly important in war. In this struggle
coal, oil, and other materials played a part almost as important as
ships and men; these materials, like ships and men, were limited in
quantity; and it was necessary to apportion them as deliberately and as
economically as the seemingly more important munitions of warfare. The
Germans were constantly changing their tactics; sometimes they would
make their concentrations in a certain area; while at other times their
strength would appear in another field far distant from the first. These
changes made it necessary that we should in each case readjust our
forces to counteract the enemy's tactics. It was a vital necessity that
these readjustments should be made immediately when the enemy's changes
of tactics became known. It is evident that the element necessary to
success was that the earliest and most complete possible information
should be followed by prompt decision and action; and it is manifest
that these requirements could have been satisfied only by a council
which was fully informed and which was on the spot momentarily ready to
act. The Allied Naval Council responded to all these requirements. One
of my first duties, after my arrival, was to attend one of these
councils in Paris; and immediately afterward the meetings became much
more frequent.
Not only were the proceedings interesting because of the vast importance
of the issues which were discussed, but because they brought me into
intimate contact with some of the ablest minds in the European navies.
Over the first London councils Admiral Jellicoe presided. I have already
given my first impressions of this admirable sailor; subsequent events
only increased my respect for his character and abilities. An English
woman once described Admiral Jellicoe as "a great gentleman"; it is a
description upon which I can hardly improve. The First Lord, Sir Eric
Geddes, though he was by profession an engineer and had been transferred
from the business of building roads and assuring the communications
behind the armies in France to become the civilian head of the British
navy, acquired, in an astonishingly short time, a mastery of the details
of naval administration. Sir Eric is a type of man that we like to think
of as American; perhaps the fact that he had received his business
training in this country, and had served an apprenticeship on the
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, strengthened this impression. The habitues
of the National Sporting Club in London--of whom I was one--used to look
reproachfully at the giant figure of the First Lord; in their opinion
he had sadly missed his calling. His mighty frame, his hard and supple
muscles, his power of vigorous and rapid movement, his keen eye and his
quick wit--these qualities, in the opinion of those best qualified to
judge, would have made this stupendous Briton one of the greatest
heavyweight prize-fighters in the annals of pugilism. With a little
training I am sure that Sir Eric would even now make a creditable
showing in the professional ring. However, the paths of this business
man and statesman lay in other fields. After returning from America he
had had a brilliant business career in England; he represented the type
which we call "self-made men"; that is, he fought his way to the top
without the aid of influential friends. His elevation to the Admiralty,
in succession to Sir Edward Carson, was something new in British public
life, for Sir Eric had never dabbled in politics, and, until the war
started, he was practically unknown in political circles. But this
crisis in British affairs made it necessary for the Ministry to "draft"
the most capable executives in the nation, irrespective of political
considerations; and Sir Eric, therefore, quite naturally found himself
at the head of the navy. In a short time he had acquired a knowledge of
the naval situation which enabled him to preside over an international
naval council with a very complete grasp of all the problems which were
presented. I have heard the great naval specialists who attended say
that, had they not known the real fact, they would hardly have suspected
that Sir Eric was not a naval man. We admired not only his ability to
direct the course of discussion, and even to take an important part in
it, but also his skill at summing up the results of the whole proceeding
in a few terse and masterly phrases. In fine, the First Lord was a man
after Roosevelt's heart--big, athletic, energetic, with a genius for
reaching the kernel of a question and of getting things done.
When it came to facility of exposition, however, we Anglo-Saxons made a
poor showing in comparison with most French naval officers and in
particular with Admirals Lacaze and de Bon. Both these gentlemen
represented the Gallic type in its finest aspects. After spending a few
moments with Rear-Admiral Lacaze, it was easy to understand the real
affection which all French naval officers felt for him. He is a small,
slight man, with a grey, pointed beard, and he possesses that
earnestness of spirit, that courtesy of manner, and that sympathy and
charm which we regard as the finest attributes of the cultured
Frenchman. Admiral Lacaze has also a genuine French facility of speech
and that precision of statement which is so characteristic of the French
intellect. A slight acquaintance would make one believe that Admiral
Lacaze would be a model husband and father, perhaps grandfather; it was
with surprise, however, that I learned that he was a bachelor, but I am
sure that he is that kind of bachelor who is an uncle to all of the
children of his acquaintance. As Minister of Marine he was the presiding
officer of the council when it met in Paris.
In Vice-Admiral de Bon, chief of the French naval staff, Admiral Lacaze
had a worthy colleague; he was really a man of heroic mould, and he
certainly looked the part. His white hair and his white beard, cut
square, gave at first glance an impression of age; yet his clear, pink
skin, not ruffled by a trace of wrinkle, his erect figure, his bright
blue eyes, the vigour of his conversation and the energy of his
movements, betokened rather perpetual youth. Compared with the naval
forces of Great Britain, the French navy was of inconsiderable size, but
in Admiral de Bon it made a contribution to Allied naval strength which
was worth many dreadnoughts. The reputation of this man has scarcely
reached this side of the Atlantic; yet it was the general opinion of
practically all naval men that his was the keenest mind at the Allied
Naval Council. It was certainly the most persuasive in argument, and the
one that had most influence in determining our conclusions. Not that
there was anything about this great French sailor that was arrogant or
offensively self-assertive. On the contrary, his manner was all compact
of charm and courtesy. He was about the most persuasive person I have
ever met. Whenever an important matter arose, there was some influence
that made us turn instinctively to Admiral de Bon for enlightenment;
and, when he rose to talk, the council hung upon his every word. For the
man was a consummate orator. Those who understood French even slightly
had little difficulty in following the Admiral, for he spoke his
delightful language with a precision, a neatness of phrase, and a
clearness of enunciation which made every syllable intelligible. So
perfect did these speeches seem that one would have suspected that
Admiral de Bon had composed them at his leisure, but this was not the
case; the man apparently had only to open his mouth, and his speech
spontaneously flowed forth; he never hesitated for a word. And his words
were not only eloquent, but, as I have said, they were full of
substance. The charm which he manifested on these public occasions he
carried likewise into his domestic life. Whenever the council met in
Paris the Admiral's delightful wife and daughters entertained us at
luncheon--an experience which caused many of us to regret that it did
not always meet in that city.
The other two members of this interesting group were Rear-Admiral
Funakoshi, representing the Japanese navy, and Vice-Admiral di Revel,
representing the Italian. The Japanese was also naval attache at London,
and the popularity which he had acquired in this post he also won in the
larger field. In some respects, he was not like the conventional notion
of a Japanese; physically he did not fulfil the accepted role, for he
was tall and heavily built; nor was there anything about him that was
"inscrutable"; the fact was that he was exceedingly frank and open, and
apparently loved nothing so much as a good joke. The remark of a London
newspaper that Admiral di Revel, the Italian, "unlike Admiral Sims,
looks every inch the sailor," caused Admiral Funakoshi much amusement;
he could not resist the temptation to chaff me about it. We all became
so well acquainted that, in our lighter moments, we did not mind having
a little fun at one another's expense; and in these passages the
Japanese representative did not always make the poorest showing. The
Italian, di Revel, was a source of continual delight. Someone remarked
that he was in reality an Irishman who had escaped into Italy; and this
facetious characterization was really not inapt. His shock of red hair,
his reddish beard, and his short, stocky figure almost persuaded one
that County Cork was his native soil. He delivered his opinions with an
insistence which indicated that he entertained little doubt about their
soundness; he was not particularly patient if they were called in
question; yet he was so courteous, so energetic, and so entertaining
that he was a general favourite. That his Government appreciated his
services is shown by the fact that it made di Revel a full admiral, a
rank which is rarely bestowed in Italy.
Such, then, were the men who directed the mighty forces that defeated
the German submarines. The work at the councils was arduous, yet the
opportunity of associating with such men in such a task is one that
comes to few naval officers. They all worked with the most indomitable
spirit; not one of them ever for a moment showed the slightest
discouragement over a situation which was at times disquieting, to say
the least; not one faltered in the determination to force the issue to
the only logical end. History has given few examples of alliances that
worked harmoniously. The Allied Naval Council did its full share in
making harmonious the Allied effort against the submarine.