EASTERN FLEET OF ROYAL NAVY

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 59, 3 December 1941, Page 8

EASTERN FLEET OF ROYAL NAVY

Commander Announced ADMIRAL SIR TOM PHILLIPS FOR SINGAPORE (British Official Wireless.! RUGBY, December 1. The appointment of Rear-Admiral Sir Tom Phillips to be commamler-iu-cbief of the Eastern Fleet with the rank of Admiral, is announced from Singapore. The force under his command will be a powerful one. Mr. Churchill indicated in his Mansion House speech on November 10 that "we' now -feel ourselves strong enough to provide a powerful naval force of heavy ships with the necessary auxiliary vessels for service if needed in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.’ The new commander-iii-chiet has held an important post at the Admiralty for over IS mon tin?, and when it was announced a few days ago that changes at the Admiralty would mean bis return to sea, it was generally accepted that the First Sea Lord. Admiral of the Fleet Sir Dudley Pound, would be only too willing to release his very able assistant for a command of the first importance. Admiral Toni Spencer Vaughan Phillips, C. 8., R.N., had been Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff since June, 1939. The son of an English artillery colonel, he entered the navy in 1902 and first went to sea as a midshipman in 11.M.5. Drake when Jellicoe was her captain. He specialized in navigation, and during the early part of the last war was navigator of the destroyer depot ship Woolwich. His subsequent service in the war was unusual for, after being navigator of the cruiser Bacchante throughout the Dardanelles campaign, he was appointed, in February. 1916, to the cruiser Lancaster, in which lie was "marooned” in the 'Pacific, far from the main war zone, for three years. From April, 1917, he was acting commander of the Lancaster, and in 1918 was acting captain for three months —probably the only ease for many years of an officer having two steps in acting rank in the same ship at sea. In 1919 he commanded the cruiser Euralyus for five months and took her home from China, still with his. substantive rank of lieutenant-commander. He took a staff course after the war and was promoted commander in 1921, when lie was serving on a committee of the League of Nations at Geneva. He afterwards served in the Plans Division of the Admiralty and in 1927 was appointed staff officer (operations) to Admiral Sir Roger Keyes, commander in chief of the Mediterranean Fleet. Promoted to 'the rank. of captain after only six years’ service as commander, he went through the senior officers’ technical course and was appointed captain of a destroyer flotilla. In 1930 he became Assistant Director of the Plans Division at the Admiralty, mid in 1932 he was appointed to H.M.S. Hawkins as ting captain and chief of staff to Rear-Admiral Dunbar-Nasmith, V.C. C. 8., commander-in-chief of the East’ Indies Station. Three years later he was appointed Director of the Plans Division at the Admiralty, a post which he held for nearly three years. In April, 1935, lie was appointed to the cruiser Aurora as commodore (firstclass) commanding the destroyer flotillas of the Home Fleet. He was promoted to Rear Admiral in January, 1939, and in June of that year succeeded Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham as a Sea Lord and Deputy Chief of the Naval Staff when the latter was appointed com-mauder-in-chief in the Mediterranean.