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Authors: Larry Collins, Dominique Lapierre
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waterski-ing in the Mediterranean or receiving a trophy won playing polo.
Mountbatten reveled in every dance, party, and polo match. But another figure of which the public was unaware emerged when the dancing was over. The glamorous young man had not forgotten his boyhood vow. Mountbatten was also an ambitious, totally dedicated naval officer. He possessed an awesome capacity for work, a trait that would leave his subordinates gasping all his life. Convinced that future warfare would be patterned by the dictates of science and won by superior communications, Mountbatten eschewed the more social career of a deck officer to study communications techniques.
He came out at the top of the Navy Higher Wireless Course in 1927, then sat down to write the first comprehensive manual for all the wireless sets used by the Navy. He was fascinated by the fast-expanding horizons of technology, and he plunged himself into the study of physics, electricity and communications in every form. New techniques, new ideas, new gimmicks were his passion and his playthings.
He obtained for the Royal Navy the works of a brilliant French rocketry expert, Robert Esnault Pelterie. Their pages gave Britain an eerily accurate forecast of the V-bomb, guided missiles and even man's first flight to the moon. In Switzerland, he ferreted out a fast-firing antiaircraft gun designed to stop the Stuka dive bomber, then spent months forcing the reluctant Royal Navy to adopt it.
Even in his pastimes, Mountbatten displayed the same
methodical, analytical approach that characterized his work in the Navy. When he discovered polo, he made slow-motion movies of the best players in action to study their techniques. He picked apart the polo stick, analyzing it in every detail, then devised a new one. By the time he finished, he was only a better-than-average player, but he had acquired enough knowledge to write the definitive textbook on the game, and the teams he led rarely lost a match.
He had followed the rise of Hitler and Germany's rearmament with growing apprehension. He had also watched with pained but perceptive eyes the evolution of the society that had driven his beloved uncle Nicholas II from the throne of the Tsars. Increasingly, as the thirties wore on, Mountbatten and his wife spent less and less time on the dance floor, and more and more in a crusade to awaken friends and politicians to the conflict that was coming.
On August 25, 1939, Mountbatten took command of a newly commissioned destroyer, H.M.S. Kelly. A few hours later the radio announced that Hitler and Stalin had signed a nonaggression pact. The Kelly's captain understood the import of the announcement immediately. Mountbatten ordered his crew to work day and night to reduce the three weeks needed to ready the ship for sea.
Nine days later, when war broke out, the captain of the Kelly was slung over the ship's side in a pair of dirty overalls, sloshing paint on her hull along with his able seamen. The next day, however, the Kelly was in action against a German submarine.
"I will never give the order, 'Abandon ship,'" Mountbatten promised his crew. "The only way we will ever leave this ship is if she sinks under our feet."
The Kelly escorted convoys through the channel, hunted U-boats in the North Sea, dashed through fog and German bombers to help rescue six thousand survivors of the Narvik expedition at the head of the Namsen Fjord in Norway. Her stern was damaged at the mouth of the Tyne and her boiler room devastated by a torpedo in the North Sea. Ordered to scuttle, Mountbatten refused, spent a night alone on the drifting wreck, then, with eighteen volunteers, brought her home under tow.
A year later, in May 1941, off Crete, the Kelly's Irish luck ran out. She took a bomb in her magazine and went down in minutes. Faithful to his vow, Mountbatten stayed
on her bridge until she rolled over, then fought his way to the surface. For hours, he held the oil-spattered survivors around a single
Mountbatten reveled in every dance, party, and polo match. But another figure of which the public was unaware emerged when the dancing was over. The glamorous young man had not forgotten his boyhood vow. Mountbatten was also an ambitious, totally dedicated naval officer. He possessed an awesome capacity for work, a trait that would leave his subordinates gasping all his life. Convinced that future warfare would be patterned by the dictates of science and won by superior communications, Mountbatten eschewed the more social career of a deck officer to study communications techniques.
He came out at the top of the Navy Higher Wireless Course in 1927, then sat down to write the first comprehensive manual for all the wireless sets used by the Navy. He was fascinated by the fast-expanding horizons of technology, and he plunged himself into the study of physics, electricity and communications in every form. New techniques, new ideas, new gimmicks were his passion and his playthings.
He obtained for the Royal Navy the works of a brilliant French rocketry expert, Robert Esnault Pelterie. Their pages gave Britain an eerily accurate forecast of the V-bomb, guided missiles and even man's first flight to the moon. In Switzerland, he ferreted out a fast-firing antiaircraft gun designed to stop the Stuka dive bomber, then spent months forcing the reluctant Royal Navy to adopt it.
Even in his pastimes, Mountbatten displayed the same
methodical, analytical approach that characterized his work in the Navy. When he discovered polo, he made slow-motion movies of the best players in action to study their techniques. He picked apart the polo stick, analyzing it in every detail, then devised a new one. By the time he finished, he was only a better-than-average player, but he had acquired enough knowledge to write the definitive textbook on the game, and the teams he led rarely lost a match.
He had followed the rise of Hitler and Germany's rearmament with growing apprehension. He had also watched with pained but perceptive eyes the evolution of the society that had driven his beloved uncle Nicholas II from the throne of the Tsars. Increasingly, as the thirties wore on, Mountbatten and his wife spent less and less time on the dance floor, and more and more in a crusade to awaken friends and politicians to the conflict that was coming.
On August 25, 1939, Mountbatten took command of a newly commissioned destroyer, H.M.S. Kelly. A few hours later the radio announced that Hitler and Stalin had signed a nonaggression pact. The Kelly's captain understood the import of the announcement immediately. Mountbatten ordered his crew to work day and night to reduce the three weeks needed to ready the ship for sea.
Nine days later, when war broke out, the captain of the Kelly was slung over the ship's side in a pair of dirty overalls, sloshing paint on her hull along with his able seamen. The next day, however, the Kelly was in action against a German submarine.
"I will never give the order, 'Abandon ship,'" Mountbatten promised his crew. "The only way we will ever leave this ship is if she sinks under our feet."
The Kelly escorted convoys through the channel, hunted U-boats in the North Sea, dashed through fog and German bombers to help rescue six thousand survivors of the Narvik expedition at the head of the Namsen Fjord in Norway. Her stern was damaged at the mouth of the Tyne and her boiler room devastated by a torpedo in the North Sea. Ordered to scuttle, Mountbatten refused, spent a night alone on the drifting wreck, then, with eighteen volunteers, brought her home under tow.
A year later, in May 1941, off Crete, the Kelly's Irish luck ran out. She took a bomb in her magazine and went down in minutes. Faithful to his vow, Mountbatten stayed
on her bridge until she rolled over, then fought his way to the surface. For hours, he held the oil-spattered survivors around a single
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