George Alexander Ballard

George Alexander Ballard
Born	March 7, 1862 Bombay, India
Died	September 16, 1948 (aged 86) Hill House, Downton, near Salisbury, Wiltshire
Allegiance	United Kingdom
Service/branch	Royal Navy
Years of service	1875–1921
Rank	Admiral
Commands held	Janus Isis Royal Arthur[1] Terrible Hampshire Commonwealth Britannia
Battles/wars	Mahdist War, Third Anglo-Burmese War, First World War
Other work	Author

Admiral George Alexander Ballard, CB (7 March 1862 – 16 September 1948) was an officer of the Royal Navy and a historian.

Biography

Ballard was the eldest son of General John Archibald Ballard (1829–1880), and his wife Joanna, the daughter of Robert Scott-Moncrieff, and was born at Malabar Hill, Bombay on 7 March 1862.

He joined the Royal Navy as a sub-lieutenant, was promoted lieutenant 15 March 1884,^[2] and commander 31 December 1897.^[3] In February 1902 he was ordered to six months' service at the Admiralty.^[4] He was further promoted captain 31 December 1903.^[5] In May 1913, Ballard was appointed a naval aide-de-camp to King George V,^[6] and in the King´s Birthday Honours 3 June 1913 he was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath.^[7] The following year he was appointed rear admiral 27 August 1914.^[8] He became Admiral Superintendent Malta Dockyard in September 1916.^[9]

After a long and active career in the Navy he retired as vice-admiral in 1921 and was advanced to the rank of admiral on the Retired List in 1924.^[10]

During the 1930s he contributed two extensive series of technical articles on the warships of the mid-Victorian Navy to the quarterly Mariner's Mirror, one series on the armoured vessels (which was subsequently republished in a consolidated form in his book The Black Battlefleet) and one on lesser warships.

Archives

• Correspondence and papers, MS 80/200 NRA 20623; National Maritime Museum
• Memoirs, 1988/89; Royal Navy Museum, Portsmouth

Publications

• The Influence of the Sea on the Political History of Japan (John Murray, London, 1921)
• America and the Atlantic (Duckworth & Co, London, 1923)
• Rulers of the Indian Ocean (Duckworth & Co, London, 1927)
• The Black Battlefleet (Nautical Publications Company, 1980)

References

1. The Dreadnought Project
2. The London Gazette: no. 25329. p. 1304. 18 March 1884.
3. The London Gazette: no. 26924. p. 7854. 31 December 1897.
4. "Naval & Military intelligence". The Times (36692). London. 15 February 1902. p. 12.
5. The London Gazette: no. 27632. p. 25. 1 January 1904.
6. The London Gazette: no. 28718. p. 3438. 13 May 1913. Retrieved 2010-10-25.
7. The London Gazette: no. 28724. p. 3903. 30 May 1913.
8. The London Gazette: no. 28881. p. 6794. 28 August 1914.
9. Service Record. The National Archives. ADM 196/42. f. 65.
10. The London Gazette: no. 32919. p. 2323. 18 March 1924.

Sources

• "Bombay Almanac"
• The Times (18 Sept 1948), 4
• The Times (28 Sept 1948), 7
• A. J. Marder, From the Dreadnought to Scapa Flow: The Royal Navy in the Fisher Era, 1904–1919, 5 vols. (1961–70)
• S. W. Roskill, Hankey, Man of Secrets, 3 vols. (1970–74)
• N. A. Lambert, Sir John Fisher's Naval Revolution (1999)

External links

• The Dreadnought Project – George Alexander Ballard