Pound, Alfred Dudley Pickman Rogers (1877-1943)

Dudley Pound, like Churchill, was born to an American mother. He had been named to succeed Fisher as the commander of the Mediterranean Fleet when the Abyssinian Crisis of 1935 broke out, making the Admiralty reluctant to carry out the change. Pound volunteered instead to become Fisher's chief of staff until the crisis abated.

Pound was First Sea Lord when war broke out in the Pacific. He continued in this post until shortly before his death from a brain tumor on 21 October 1943. Pound's illness had been known to his doctor since at least 1939 but he was not told at the time. He was prone to doze off in meetings and was in obvious ill health by August 1943. Nevertheless, he was respected by his associates and was credited with winning the Battle of the Atlantic.

Service record

References

Boatner (1996)

The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia (c) 2008 by Kent G. Budge. Index

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