| John Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher |
Article Index for John |
Website Links For John Fisher |
Information AboutJohn Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher |
|
Admiral of the Fleet John Arbuthnot Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher ( January 25 1841 – July 10 1920 ), commonly known as '''"Jackie" Fisher''', was a British Admiral known for his efforts at naval reform. He had a huge influence on the Royal Navy in a career spanning more than 60 years, starting in a navy of wooden sailing ships armed with muzzle-loading cannon and ending in one of Battlecruiser s, Submarine s and the first Aircraft Carrier s. The argumentative, energetic, reform-minded Fisher is often considered the second most important figure of British naval history, after Lord Nelson . EARLY LIFE AND CAREER Fisher was born in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka ) to an English family, the eldest of eleven children. His father was Captain William Fisher, a British Army officer and Aide-de-camp to the governor of Ceylon. Fisher was sent to England to join the navy in 1854 . After completing his training at HMS ''Britannia'' he was assigned as a cadet to HMS ''Calcutta'' , an old Ship Of The Line which was sent to assist in blockading Russian ports in the Gulf Of Finland during the Crimean War . A few months later the ship returned to the UK where he was assigned to ''Agamemnon'' , which arrived at Constantinople (now Istanbul ) just as the war ended. Promoted to midshipman, he served on a Corvette , ''Highflyer'' , then the steam Frigate ''Chesapeake'' and finally the paddle Sloop ''Furious'' in the China Wars of 1859 – 1860 . He studied at ''Excellent'' , the naval gunnery school, for 14 months before being transferred as gunnery officer to ''Warrior'' , the first all-iron sea-going armoured battleship. He returned to ''Excellent'' in 1864 as an instructor where he remained until 1869 . Whilst there he married Frances Broughton. EARLY REFORM EFFORTS Following two and a half years as commander (i.e., second in command) of ''Ocean'' , Flagship of the China Station he returned to ''Excellent'' again in 1872 , this time as head of Torpedo and Mine training, during which he split it off as ''Vernon'' . From 1876 until 1883 he served as a captain, commanding five ships in succession, the last being ''Inflexible'' . ''Inflexible'' was a very prestigious appointment, the most powerful warship of her day, although in practice the four huge muzzle-loaded guns took so long to load that she was almost useless for naval warfare. Nevertheless she was assigned to the Mediterranean Fleet where she took part in the Egyptian War Of 1882 , bombarding the port of Alexandria as part of Admiral Seymour 's fleet. During this time he became a close friend of the future King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra . Fisher returned to the UK to become commanding officer of ''Excellent'' in April 1883. He was Director Of Naval Ordnance from 1886 until 1890 , where he met with limited success in trying to wrest the design of naval guns from the War Office . AT THE ADMIRALTY Fisher was superintendent of the dockyard at Portsmouth for a few months in 1891 – 1892 after which he became Third Sea Lord , the naval officer with overall responsibility for provision of ships and equipment. He presided over the development of ''torpedo boat destroyers'', later shortened to Destroyer s, for countering torpedo boats. Torpedo-boats had become a major threat as they were cheap but able to sink the largest battleships, and France had built large numbers of them. Torpedo-boat-destroyers were small, fast warships equipped with the then novel water-tube boilers and quick-firing small calibre guns. Fisher was knighted in 1894 and put in charge of the North Atlantic and West Indies station in 1897 before heading the British delegation to the First Hague Peace Convention . Following this he was made chief of the Mediterranean station from 1899 until 1902 . Unlike the North Atlantic station, it was a vital British operational command because of the line of communication between India and the UK which passed through the Suez Canal and which was felt to be under continuous threat from France. In 1902 he returned to the UK as Second Sea Lord , in charge of personnel and in 1903 became commander in chief of Portsmouth dockyard. In October 1905 he was appointed First Sea Lord , the overall operational commander of the Navy. In December 1905 he was promoted Admiral Of The Fleet . Fisher was brought to the admirality to reduce the naval budgets, and to reform the navy for a modern war. Amidst massive public controversy, he ruthlessly sold off 90 obsolete and small ships and put a further 64 into reserve, describing all these vessels as "too weak to fight and too slow to run away", and "a miser's hoard of useless junk". This freed up crews and money to increase the number of large modern ships in home waters. He was a driving force behind the development of the fast, all big-gun Battleship , and chairman of the Committee on Designs which produced the outline design for the first modern battleship, ''Dreadnought'' . His committee also produced a new type of cruiser in a similar style to ''Dreadnought'' with a high speed achieved at the expense of armour protection, this became the Battlecruiser , the first being ''Invincible'' . Fisher's policy with regards to Dreadnoughts has often been misunderstood; it was not a class of ship which he favoured, as his time as admiral of the Mediterranean fleet had taught him the vulnerability of slow big gun ships to mines, torpedoes and submarines. He wanted battlecruisers to defend Britain’s colonies, and a large fleet of small ships to defend the British Isles. However, when his plans for battlecruisers met with opposition from within the service, he was forced to compromise. He also encouraged the introduction of Submarine s into the Royal Navy, and the conversion from a largely Coal fuelled navy to an Oil fuelled one. He had a long-running and public feud with another admiral, Charles Beresford . He was made a baron in 1909 (taking the motto "Fear God and dread nought" on the Coat Of Arms as a reference to ''Dreadnought'') just before his retirement in 1910 . THE FIRST WORLD WAR, AND FISHER'S LAST YEARS On the outbreak of the First World War he was recalled as First Sea Lord, after Prince Louis Of Battenberg had been forced to resign because of alleged German ties. Fisher resigned on May 15 1915 amidst bitter arguments with the First Lord Of The Admiralty , Winston Churchill over Gallipoli , causing Churchill's resignation too. Fisher had opposed the campaign from the outset, preferring an amphibious attack on the German Baltic Sea coastline, even having shallow draft battlecruisers such as ''Furious'' and ''Courageous'' constructed for it. As the Gallipoli campaign failed relations with Churchill had become increasingly acrimonious. Fisher was made chairman of the Government's Board of Invention and Research, serving in that post until the end of the war. He died of cancer in 1920 and is buried in the churchyard at Kilverstone , Norfolk . IN FOLKLORE AND POPULAR CULTURE
REFERENCES
|
|
|