"P.L." AND THE NAVY."

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 285, 1 December 1934, Page 2 (Supplement)

"P.L." AND THE NAVY."

WAR RESIGNATION RECALLED i The fact that a First Sea Lord of the Admiralty who wias originally German was forced to resign from that • high office by "ill-judged, uninformed 1 and bitter censures and suspicions" in , 1914 may not concern the British public of 1934 very much, but by those of his generation, .and particularly those inter- , ested in naval affairs, this great injustice to Admiral His Serene Highnes3 Prince Louis of Battenberg was mosj; deeply regretted. Twenty years after the events recorded in the book, his former flag-captain, Admiral Mark Kerr, lias written a biography of • "P.L." (as ho was affectionately known throughout the service) —"Prince Louis of Battenberg" (Longmans)—and the impression one gains in reading it is of , the very great influence exerted by | Prince Louis throughout his forty years' ( service under liis adopted flag, in developing the British Navy into the finished fighting machine which stood between Germany and her ambitions in 1914. He , foresaw the possibility of war with Germany many years before it happened, and did everything in his power to prepare our Navy for the coming struggle. Moreover, it was "P.L." who, on the eve of the war, on his own responsibility, cancelled the order for the demobilisation of the British Fleet after manoeuvres, thereby keeping the Fleet ready for instant action. A grandson of the reigning Grand Duke of Hesse, Prince Louis, who was born in 1854, was related to half the royal houses of Europe, including that of England, his wife being a granddaughter of Queen Victoria. He became a naturalised British subject and joined the British Navy as a cadet in 1808. During the next forty years ho worked his way from naVal cadet to the highest rank and office that the Royal Navy can offer, by sheer merit and hard work; and in spite of his personal rank which, far from being a help, proved a hindrance, since it evoked the jealousy of many of his contemporaries and seniors. Throughout the whole of his life Prince Louis' guiding ambition was the good of the British Navy. He joined it in the days of transition from sail to steam, from wooden walls to ironclads, and left it when super-dread-nouglits formed a "sure shield of Britain and her Empire." He was associated with Sir Percy Scott in improving the shooting of our ships, which up to the latter part of the last century was deplorable. Many of his administrative ideas were adopted, both at the Admiralty and afloat. lie was largely responsible for the efficiency of the Naval Intelligence Department, which later played a very big part in bringing the war to a successful conclusion. He was a magnificent seaman, and American naval officers still talk of his navigation in their narrow waters.

It has been said, arid with truth, that biographies such as this are uniformly laudatory. Prince Louis is admittedly Mark Kerr's hero, but, by one lookup at his biography with impartiality, it must be conceded that th~ author produces more than sufficient material to justify this mature hero worship. The book concludes with many glowing tributes to Prince Louis' worth and character, written by his former associates at sea and ashore. Perhaps the most striking of these is that of the Labour leader, Mr. J. H. Thomas. In J{>l7, when Prince Louis became Marquess of Milford Haven, Mr. Thomas said in the. House, "What that man has done for our Navy and the Intelligence Department, and many other things, is almost beyond belief, and the way he .was kicked out in that disgraceful manner at the beginning of the. war was a scandal. I wrote to him what I thought about it, and he wrote back to me a fine, manly letter, without a single complaint. I shall keep that letter all my life."