Admiral of the Fleet Sir Philip Louis Vian, & Two Bars (15 July 1894 – 27 May 1968) was a Royal Navy 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, , 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 World War II 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 Fifth 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. Early life Born the son of Alsager Richard Vian and Ada Frances Vian (née Renault), Vian joined the Royal Navy as an officer cadet in May 1907 and was educated at the Royal Naval Colleges at Osborne and Dartmouth. On passing out from Dartmouth in 1911, Vian and his term sailed for the West Indies on the training cruiser but the cruise was ended by grounding on an uncharted reef off Nova Scotia. He became a midshipman on the pre-dreadnought battleship , which was serving with the Home Fleet, on 15 January 1912. World War I At the start of World War I Vian remained on Lord Nelson which, as an obsolescent ship, was kept at Portland away from danger. This was disappointing for Vian, but when the ship was to be transferred to the Mediterranean he was posted to what he considered to be an even less desirable appointment. From October 1914 to September 1915, Vian served in , an armoured cruiser patrolling in East African waters, on the lookout for the German cruiser . He was confirmed as a sub-lieutenant in January 1915. Dissatisfied