Captain John Egerton Broome DSC (23 February 1901 – 19 April 1985), also known as Jackie Broome, was a Royal Navy officer who served in both World Wars. He commanded the escort group of the ill-fated Arctic Convoy PQ 17 in 1942. After the Second World War, he became a writer and illustrator. Early career He was born in 1901 in Seattle, Washington, to Louis Egerton Broome and Clara Kathleen (Aimée) Lake. His father was an English adventurer who had joined the gold rush to the Klondike. He accompanied his parents to Panama in 1907, but returned to England, where he was raised largely by his mother's relatives. He attended Oakwood School, Surrey and in 1912, entered the Royal Naval College at Osborne. From Osborne, he passed in 1915 to the senior College at Dartmouth. World War I and between the Wars In 1917 he was posted as a midshipman to the battleship Colossus in the Grand Fleet. Shortly after the end of the War, he was promoted Sub-Lieutenant and served in the destroyer HMS Clematis in the Red Sea and at Aden. From there he attended Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and after graduating in 1923, chose to serve in submarines. By this time, his talent as a cartoonist and wag was well established. He served in several submarines from 1923 to 1938, except for two short spells on the capital ships HMS Tiger and HMS Royal Oak. Much of this period was spent at the Hong Kong naval station. He married Sybil Nicholas in 1928, with whom he had a son and a daughter. He reached the rank of commander in 1936, while commanding the submarine, HMS Rainbow. In 1938, he attended a staff course at the Royal Naval College at Greenwich. Second World War Broome was judged to be too old in 1939 to command a submarine in wartime. Instead, he was given command of the destroyer HMS Veteran recommissioned from reserve. Characteristically, Broome applied for membership of the Company of Veteran Motorists, who made the ship a life member. HMS Veteran served in the Norwegian campaign in 1940. While there, her bridge was adorned with a huge stuffed hippopotamus head, acquired by Broome from Formby Golf Club during a spree ashore. Broome also acquired a German torpedo, which had missed its target and run onto the shore of a fjord. Suitably covered in German graffiti, it was eventually