Philip Vian

Philip Vian

Admiral of the Fleet Sir Philip Louis Vian, GCB, KBE, DSO & Two Bars (15 July 1894 – 27 May 1968) was a British naval officer who served in both World Wars.

Vian specialised in naval gunnery from the end of World War I, and subsequently received several appointments as gunnery officer. In the early 1930s, he was given command of a destroyer, HMS Active, and, later, various destroyer flotillas. During this phase of his career, in early 1940, he commanded a force that forcibly released captured British merchant sailors from the German supply ship Altmark in Jøssingfjord in, then neutral, Norway and, later, his flotilla took an active role in the final action of the German battleship Bismarck.

Much of Vian's wartime service was in the Mediterranean, where he commanded a cruiser squadron, defended several critical convoys and led naval support at the Allied invasions of Sicily and Italy. His wartime service was completed in command of the air component of the British Pacific Fleet, with successful actions against the Japanese in Sumatra and the western Pacific.

Post-war, Vian served in the United Kingdom, as a Sea Lord and as Commander-in-Chief, Home Fleet. He retired in 1952 with the rank of Admiral of the Fleet, took up commercial directorships and died at home, in 1968.