In one of those striking coincidences which Jung thought deeply significant, on the very day this dictionary came through my letter‐box the admiral who contributes its preface created a sensation in the newspapers by telling the truth at a government press conference. He never became an Admiral of the Fleet, since the rank has not been awarded since 1995, on several grounds, principally because the Royal Navy is now too small to justify it. Hence this book is likely to remain a definitive collection. As the author (formerly the senior Curatorial Officer of the Ministry of Defence, who has already compiled a similar volume on Field‐Marshals) is careful to explain, this is not quite the same as a list of the most distinguished naval officers, for until 1870 the rank was filled strictly by seniority rather than merit. The complex and sometimes unexpected workings of this system are outlined in the introduction. On the one hand, several renowned admirals did not live to achieve such promotion (Nelson would have had to reach the age of 86 to do so) and on the other, some especially long‐lived officers reached it without ever having served actively above the rank of captain. But in general, the 115 officers listed here are among the most distinguished in British history, though the occasional award of honorary rank to Royal personages allowed a place for such embarrassing holders as Admiral of the Fleet Emperor William II of Germany.
The articles, arranged in alphabetical order with a list in chronological order at the end, vary in length according to the historical importance of the admiral in question, from about 600 words for some of the most recent appointees to 3,500 for Lord Fisher. The amount of space allows the author to go beyond mere lists of ships commanded and battles fought, to give accounts of each officer’s personality and reputation, and sometimes to enliven these with anecdotes. So we are told that Sir John Cunningham would not suffer fools gladly, and considered 95 per cent of people to be fools; and we learn how the then Captain Roger Keyes dissuaded Winston Churchill from organizing submarines into Shoals rather the squadrons. Nor does the author hesitate to criticize even the most famous admirals: thus he refers to Lord Mountbatten’s “cavalier attitude to truthfulness”. Mountbatten’s entry also demonstrates the attention paid to the historical role of some officers beyond their naval career (though naturally, less space is given to honorary appointees).
As the text is plainly a result of a great deal of research, it is unfortunate reproduction of illustrations does not measure up to the same high standard. In my copy at least, some of them look as they would have done on an old television set. As if in compensation for this deficiency, the text is complemented by a long list of the ships in which each officer served, a useful general bibliography and a comprehensive index. This dictionary will be a necessary purchase for libraries specialising in naval history, and its comparatively moderate price should also commend it to more general collections.
