Royal Naval College Greenwich Centenary 1873 - 1973

Greenwich was further enriched by the return of the Royal Naval War College in 1920 though the Geddes axe was applied to its students as elsewhere. The President at this time was the gifted sailor/scholar Admiral Sir Herbert Richmond, later Master of Downing College, Cambridge. His belief was that 'History is to make you think' and 'an educated man is primarily a man whose powers have been developed by mental and spiritual experience. In the young, development is accelerated by means of books and surroundings which stimulate the reasoning, thinking and observing powers.' His own books 'packed with wisdom and wide experience will probably be read and referred to for as long as, if not longer than, those of Mahan.'

Greenwich had become the Naval University in all but name with Courses in the Sciences, Humanities and Military Affairs being taken by officer-students of all ages, ranks and experience.

Students came from all the Dominions and indeed from foreign countries (Russia, Germany, China and Japan) and included many distinguished personalities - Prince Albert, Prince George, (later George V) the late Duke of Kent, Prince Charles of Belgium, the Crown Prince of Japan and the Duke of Edinburgh (1948). There were many royal visitors too, notably the Emperor of Japan in 1921 and the Prince and Princess Takamuti in 1931. A stirring sight was Sunday. Church Parade when the 900 boys of the Royal Hospital School marched over from the Queen's House behind their band. In 1933 an ambitious 'Pageant of Greenwich' was staged in the Grand Square, a fine College-Borough joint effort at which the Mayoress, Mrs Charlotte Turner, believing him suited, cast her husband for the role of chief mourner at Nelson's funeral. The Pageant was the inspiration of perhaps the College's strangest President, Admiral Sir Barry Domvile, who spent the Second World War in prison because of his sympathy with Fascist ideas.

Admiral Sir Barry Domvile visited Germany in 1935. He was impressed by many aspects of the Nazi government and was invited to attend the Nuremberg Rally of September 1936 as a guest of the German Ambassador Joachim von Ribbentrop.

He became a council member of the Anglo-German Fellowship and founded The Link, an 'independent non-party organisation to promote Anglo-German friendship.' The Link generally operated as a cultural organisation, but its journal, the Anglo-German Review, reflected the pro-Nazi views of Admiral Sir Barry Domvile. At its height, membership of The Link numbered around 4,300. The organisation was investigated by Maxwell Knight, head of counter-subversion in MI5, and was closed soon after the start of the Second World War in 1939.

Because of his pro-Nazi views and because he might 'endanger the safety of the realm', Admiral Sir Barry Domvile was interned in Brixton Prison in the Second World War, from 7 July 1940 to 29 July 1943. While he was interned, his anti-semitism increased and he developed a conspiracy theory about a Jewish-Masonic organisation.

His diaries are kept in the National Maritime Museum. His book 'Look to Your Moat' is a history of British naval and merchant seamen. The cabin referred to in the title of his book 'From Admiral to Cabin Boy' was the cell he occupied in Brixton Prison during his internment.

"No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail with the chance of being drowned ... a man in jail has more room, better food, and commonly better company."
Dr. Samuel Johnson. A.D.1759.

Source: http://www.dumville.org/

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