Occasionally, Bacon wrote from the Mediterranean to Fisher on an intimate and—he assumed—confidential basis, reporting sometimes on reactions, positive and negative, of officers in the fleet to the drastic reforms Fisher was making in the navy. In March 1906, Bacon was summoned to a private interview with King Edward aboard the royal yacht at Corfu, on which occasion “the King pointed out109 that it was his [Bacon’s] duty as late confidential Naval Assistant to keep Fisher au courant with the general opinion of the Fleet.” In one of his letters to the First Sea Lord, Bacon described criticism of the reforms being expressed in the fleet and to the King by Beresford and Admiral Lambton, his second in command. The letter began with the unfortunate phrase “Lord Charles and Admiral Lambton110 have been getting at the King.” Bacon years later said that he wished he had written, “The King has spoken to me111 of the objections to the schemes that have been placed before him by Lord Charles and Admiral Lambton.” But Bacon thought he was writing only to his old chief with whom, in the course of years of intimate contact, a certain informality of expression had developed. What Bacon could not know, and where Fisher transgressed, was that the First Sea Lord, without Bacon’s permission, would have the captain’s letters privately printed and circulated among his friends. These were the letters which had fallen into the hands of Sir George Armstrong.fn3
For a number of weeks, the press and Parliament were filled with sharp words directed at the First Sea Lord’s indiscretion. Revelation of the Bacon letters brought the Prince of Wales, theretofore neutral despite a general predisposition toward the conservative side of the navy, into Lord Charles’ camp. The Prince, Beresford cheerfully told a friend, had become “quite violent”114 against Fisher: “He said... that he must go or the Navy would be ruined.” Eventually, McKenna had to rise to defend the First Sea Lord in the House of Commons: “Is the House115 seriously going to be asked to condemn a great man because, at a time of great labor, he has ordered to be printed a number of letters it would have been better, I would say, hot to have printed at all? This sort of attack is doing a cruel injustice to the First Sea Lord who has had the unreserved confidence of successive First Lords of the Admiralty.... I appeal to the House not to be misled by any such trumpery matters as these into censuring in the slightest degree a man who has given the very best service to the country that any man could give.”
No censure of Fisher by the House was contemplated or even possible; Balfour probably would have prevented the Unionists from supporting such an effort and, in any case, the Liberal Party so thoroughly dominated the Commons that any Unionist motion of censure would easily have been defeated.
As for the Liberal government, the Prime Minister’s method of dealing with all questions about the navy—Beresford versus Fisher included—was the subcommittee inquiry. Fifteen meetings of the subcommittee were held between April 27 and July 13. Over 2,600 questions were asked of Beresford, Fisher, McKenna, Sir Arthur Wilson (who was called as a witness), and others. McKenna conducted and argued the case for the Admiralty. Fisher sat silent unless specifically asked a question by a member; McKenna had extracted a promise of muteness lest the First Sea Lord’s fury at some of Beresford’s statements “lead to the harmony116 of the meeting being rudely interrupted.” Even so, the glowering look on Fisher’s face kept the room in a state of tension. “It was dramatic117—,” Haldane wrote to his mother after the first meeting, “Beresford and Fisher in a deadly fight before us.”
The inquiry began with Beresford presenting his case: despite Great Britain’s overwhelming superiority in warships, her naval defense was inadequate and the Fleet unprepared for war. He attacked the organization of the Fleet in home waters, most notably the fact that in peacetime the Home Fleet had not come under the command of its wartime admiral; that is, himself as Commander-in-Chief of the Channel Fleet. He complained that during his tenure, the Channel Fleet itself was never up to full strength due to the constant withdrawal of ships for repairs. He accused the Admiralty of permitting a dangerous deficiency in cruisers and destroyers, both as compared to the numbers of German ships in both those categories, and relative to the needs of guarding Imperial lifelines. Finally, he charged that the Admiralty lacked any sort of serious war plan.
McKenna countered that Beresford knew when he accepted the Channel Fleet, that he was taking command during a transitional period. Even as constituted under Beresford (and even deducting ships under repair) the Channel Fleet was always more powerful than the High Seas Fleet. Now, McKenna pointed out, what Lord Charles was advocating—and what the Admiralty had always planned—was being carried out: the Channel Fleet was merging with the Home Fleet. As to the shortages of cruisers and destroyers, the Admiralty produced figures which proved Beresford wrong. The question as to whether the Sea Lords should provide an admiral afloat with a detailed war plan received careful consideration. Fisher was against it, but more important for the purposes of this inquiry, so was Sir Arthur Wilson. Wilson “did not consider it118 either practicable or desirable to draw up definite plans in peace which would govern the action of the fleet on the outbreak of war.... If such plans were forwarded to the Admiralty by a Commander-in-Chief they would pass through so many hands that secrecy could not be guaranteed... a plan, such as Lord Charles Beresford had required, in which every ship is told off by name for its duties, as practically impossible.”
In presenting his case, Lord Charles proved to be his own worst enemy; when he spoke, he rambled; applying logic, he contradicted; offering illustration, he was irrelevant. Fisher, more or less gagged by McKenna, observed his enemy’s ineffectiveness, but also noted with dismay that Asquith and the committee seemed easy on him. “We have... roped him119 [Beresford] in on every single point so far, but the disquieting aspect is the obvious desire of the Committee to get him out of his mess,” Fisher wrote to Ponsonby—and thus to the King. “He refuses to answer questions when we get him into a tight place and makes long, irrelevant, wild speeches instead—or else he says the question is too absurd to answer—and the Committee let him have his way and don’t insist on his answering. He makes the most malignant misstatements, and when we bring him to book, he appeals to Asquith whether his word ought to be doubted, etc., etc., and Asquith glosses over the matter and asks a question to get round the ugly corner.” Beresford’s case also was damaged by the discovery that he was being supplied with facts and figures from inside the Admiralty by two of his supporters—information which they had no right to pass along and he no right to receive.
In its findings, issued as a parliamentary paper on August 12, the subcommittee noted that all naval forces in home waters had been merged, which “satisfies in substance120 all of Lord Charles Beresford’s requirements.” As to the claimed deficiency in destroyers, the subcommittee declared itself “satisfied... there is no such deficiency”;121 as to the shortage of cruisers, “there is no sufficient foundation for Lord Charles Beresford’s apprehensions.” When it came to Beresford’s complaint about war plans, “the Committee are satisfied that he had no substantial grounds for complaint in this matter.” Nevertheless, there was uneasiness at the fact that all navy war plans seemed to be locked up in the heads of two or three admirals, especially when those admirals were scarcely on speaking terms. The “General Conclusion” to the committee findings contained a passage equally critical of Beresford and Fisher: “[The committee] feel bound122 to add that the arrangements [for war] were in practice seriously hampered through the absence of cordial relations between the Board of Admiralty and the Commander-in-Chief of the Channel Fleet. The Board of Admiralty do not appear to have taken Lord Charles Beresford sufficiently into their confidence as to the reasons for dispositions to which he took exception; and Lord Charles Beresford, on the other hand, appears to have failed to appreciate and carry out the instructions of the Board and to recognize their paramount authority.”
Although Fisher’s partisans, beginning with the King, hailed the report as a clear verdict in the First Sea Lord
’s favor, Fisher himself was bitterly disappointed. In his view the Admiralty did not need to take a subordinate into its confidence or offer him reasons for the orders they gave; the fact that the board (he knew the words were directed at himself personally) was chastised on this point he considered unjust and humiliating. Beresford considered himself the victor and went about London trumpeting that opinion. From the South Tyrol, where he had gone to escape all the tumult, Fisher boiled with frustration. “The Committee, by not squashing123 Beresford when they had the chance and so utterly discrediting him thereby in the face of all men, have given Beresford a fresh leash of insubordinate agitation,” he wrote to a friendly admiral. “Had they smashed him, as they could have by the evidence, as a blatant liar, he would have been so utterly discredited that no newspaper would have noticed him ever again,” he wrote to a friendly journalist. The villains, Fisher believed, were the four committee members: Asquith, Grey, Haldane, and Morley. “I thought they were great men,”124 he wrote to McKenna. “They are great cowards.” He closed that letter by wishing all five in hell—“on earth... instead of waiting.”
Fisher’s view was shared by many, including Knollys, who wrote from Balmoral that he was “disgusted”125 by the report, that “Asquith ‘watered it down’126 to such an extent that it amounts to a verdict in Beresford’s favor” and that “the fact is that the Committee... were afraid of Beresford, and this has been proved by their treatment of him....” The King himself wrote privately that he hoped the Admiralty “will consider most seriously127 C.B.’s outrageous conduct, which if tolerated undermines all discipline in the R[oyal] N[avy].” Despite these endorsements, it became increasingly clear that Fisher’s days at the Admiralty were numbered. Beresford was still on the loose, charging that “a system of espionage,128 favoritism, and intimidation exists at the Admiralty.” In letters, he referred to Fisher as “the mulatto.”129 He let it be known that he meant to run for Parliament in the next election and hinted that he had a commitment from Balfour to make him First Sea Lord if the Unionists won. Balfour said nothing. Both political parties, the navy, and the public were weary of the vendetta and anxious about the harm it had caused to the service. Beresford was gone; now to balance the scales Fisher also had to leave.
On the King’s birthday, November 9, Fisher was raised to the peerage as Baron Fisher of Kilverstone, taking as a motto131 for his coat of arms “Fear God and Dread Nought.”fn4130 He did not object to retiring. He was leaving only one year early and his departure would make it possible for Sir Arthur Wilson, who had only two years of active service left, to succeed him as First Sea Lord. On January 25, 1910, his sixty-ninth birthday, after fifty-five years of service, Fisher left the navy. That evening, a group of his enemies held a dinner to celebrate his retirement. Unable to be present, Beresford sent a telegram:
SO REALLY SORRY132 THAT I CANNOT COME TO CELEBRATE THE GREAT DAY AT YOUR DINNER. MUST GO TO DEPTFORD TO SPEAK. YOUR TOAST SHOULD BE—‘TO THE DEATH OF FRAUD, ESPIONAGE, INTIMIDATION, CORRUPTION, TYRANNY, SELF-INTEREST, WHICH HAVE BEEN A NIGHTMARE OVER THE FINEST SERVICE IN THE WORLD FOR FOUR YEARS.’
In the General Election of January 1910, Beresford overcame the overall Liberal victory to win a seat for Portsmouth in the House of Commons. There, he continued to harangue the government and the Admiralty on naval matters, although to less and less effect. Still nominally on the navy list until his sixty-fifth birthday in 1911, he did not cease aspiring for promotion to supreme command. In December 1910, only seven months after the Prince of Wales had become King George V, the new monarch urged Asquith to make his friend Beresford an Admiral of the Fleet like Fisher and Fisher’s successor as First Sea Lord, Sir Arthur Wilson. Saying that he “had no personal objections,”133 Asquith referred the request to McKenna, who firmly scotched it. He did so by comparing Beresford to Wilson, the most recent Admiral of the Fleet: “Sir Arthur Wilson stands out134 by universal acknowledgement as the greatest sailor we have had for many years, whose incomparable merits could only be rewarded by exceptional distinction.... Judged by these standards, what claim has Lord C. Beresford to an extraordinary promotion? His services are no longer required. He has commanded at sea with much, but not unusual, success.... He has not been responsible for, or associated with, any development of naval science, strategy, or training.... To single him out for exceptional honor would lower the value of our naval rewards.... The Service would not think it right to rank Lord Charles Beresford with Sir Arthur Wilson.”
Asquith passed this letter along to the palace and no more was heard on the subject. In 1912, Beresford published a vitriolic book, The Betrayal, rehashing all of his arguments presented in the inquiry. Times had moved on, and the new First Lord, Winston Churchill, ignored the book and demolished Beresford in the House whenever the member for Portsmouth rose to speak. In 1916, the King raised Lord Charles to the peerage as First Baron Beresford of Curraghmore. He died in 1919.
In another time, Lord Charles Beresford might have gone to the pinnacle of the navy. His qualities, those of a brave, patriotic officer and good commander, were those of innumerable other Royal Navy officers who had advanced steadily through the ranks to admiral, commanded major fleets, served a few years as First Sea Lord, and then retired into happy oblivion. Beresford’s misfortune was to come along in the time of a naval genius. Jacky Fisher possessed gifts which Beresford lacked. Beresford stood for things as they were, for orthodoxy and tradition. Fisher looked beyond, imagined new men, new rules, new ships, new worlds that broke tradition so violently that they constituted revolution. Both men had colossal egos, but over a lifetime of service, Beresford’s ego tended to focus on himself, while Fisher’s was devoted to the advancement of the Service. Despite his bonhomie, Beresford was a social snob. Fisher’s seniority appeared to him a subversion of the natural order and it galled him that “the Malay” or “the Mulatto” should always give the orders. Disappointment became humiliation, bitterness led to insubordination and a crusade against the First Sea Lord.
Fisher was more sensitive to Beresford’s opposition than to that of any other officer. Once he discovered that Beresford was to be his principal antagonist within the Service, he automatically opposed any suggestion Lord Charles had to make. As Commander-in-Chief in the Mediterranean, Fisher advocated concentration of force, unified command, and the dispatch of more ships to his fleet. When he didn’t get the ships, he criticized the Admiralty and the First Sea Lord, often behind their backs. When Beresford, as Commander-in-Chief of the Channel Fleet, demanded the same concentration, unified command, and increase in strength, Fisher denounced him as insubordinate. To Beresford, it did not seem fair.
Esher, writing to Balfour’s private secretary, declared of Fisher, “I do not say135 he has not made mistakes. Who has not? But he is a great public servant, and at the end of a long life devoted to his profession and to the state, he is the victim of Asquith’s want of moral courage.” As it turned out, the epitaph was premature. None of those who followed him at the Admiralty approached him in imagination or drive. Soon after the outbreak of war, responding to Churchill’s plea, Admiral of the Fleet Lord Fisher of Kilverstone, then seventy-three, returned to the Admiralty as First Sea Lord.
fn1 As it turned out, the entire brouhaha was unnecessary: the Kaiser arrived too late and the inspection and review were cancelled.
fn2 See Chapter 33.
fn3 Fisher’s indiscretion in having the letters printed, and their revelation to the navy and the public by Armstrong, ruined Bacon’s career. An exceptionally imaginative and talented officer whom Fisher had called “the cleverest officer in the Navy,”112 Bacon was responsible for the early development of the Royal Navy’s submarine force and was the first captain of the Dreadnought. In the aftermath of the letters scandal, he left the navy.
Remarkably, Bacon bore Fisher no ill will for what had happened. “Fisher, of course, had no right113 to circulate copies of the letter privately to his friends without the writer’s permission but that w
as Fisher all over,” Bacon wrote. In 1929, still loyal to his dead chief, Bacon published a two-volume biography of Fisher.
fn4 Fisher struggled in choosing a motto and wrote to his daughter and others about his dilemma. First he considered simply “Dreadnought” but decided that this was “too egotistical,” “too arrogant and boastful.” Then he pondered, “Perhaps in two words, ‘Dread Nought.’” This still did not please him, and he wondered to a friend, “It wouldn’t do to take ‘Dreadnought’ as a motto, but how would ‘Fear God and nothing else’ do?... which is a paraphrase of ‘Dreadnought’ and Psalm 34, verse 9.” Eventually, he made a final choice: “Dread Nought is over 80 times in the Bible (‘Fear Not’). So I took as my motto ‘Fear God and Dread Nought.’”
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