Churchill's Admiral in Two World Wars by Jim Crossley

Author:Jim Crossley [Crossley, Jim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Nonfiction, History, British, Biography & Memoir, Historical
ISBN: 9781526748409
Publisher: Pen & Sword Books
Published: 2020-05-30T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 10

The Dover Patrol

In the summer of 1917 the government decided to shake up the Admiralty and appointed a new First Lord – Sir Eric Geddes. Geddes was a businessman and a hard-nosed tough egg. He had organised the military railway system in France and shaken up the British shipbuilding industry in the face of the terrible losses suffered to U-boats. He found the Admiralty, under the First Sea Lord, Jellicoe, a pit of pessimism and despondency. The U-boats were unstoppable. Convoying of merchant shipping was impossible without depriving the Grand Fleet of the hundred destroyers it needed. Mined nets to confine the enemy to the North Sea would be beyond the resources of the Navy to arrange. All was doom and gloom. Geddes wouldn’t stand for this. He paid a visit to Beatty in Scotland and found out for himself that not much new thinking could be expected from that quarter. Beatty was just as cautious as Jellicoe had been. During this visit he interviewed Keyes in Beatty’s presence. The ostensible reason for the questions was to determine whether Wemyss would, in Roger’s view, make a good First Sea Lord. Roger replied that although Wemyss was no great tactical genius he would choose good subordinates and deal with situations calmly and logically, as he had at Gallipoli. The appointment duly went ahead.

The next thing that Keyes heard was that he himself was to leave the Grand Fleet immediately and go to London as Director of Plans. He was horrified. He loved life in the Grand Fleet and had only recently hoisted his flag as a rear admiral. He wanted to be afloat, and was still naïve enough to think that his hero, Beatty, was about to lead the fleet into a crushing victory against the Hun. He soon discerned that he had no choice. Beatty released him and off he must go to London. He was given a great send off by the Grand Fleet and particularly by the crew of Colossus who, to his delight, had just won the fleet regatta. The only person who seemed to be pleased by the move was Tyrwhitt, still in command at Harwich. He wrote to say that with Keyes in the Admiralty at least there was a chance of some of his more enterprising suggestions for aggressive action getting approved. Significantly he ended with the words ‘a place beginning with Z being always on my mind’.

Keyes was not cut out for office jobs, and Jellicoe, his chief when he arrived, knew it and much resented the appointment. However, Jellicoe himself was shortly to be succeeded by Wemyss, so his views carried little weight with Geddes. Reluctantly, the Keyes family moved from Aberdour to London, taking a house in Wyndham Place. Eva arrived there on a moonlit night in September to be greeted by an air raid on the West End. As she and Roger walked out to dine together bits of casing from anti-aircraft shells rained down on them, causing some serious injuries to people on the streets.

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