It will be seen that whilst at the War Office the liaison between the General Staff and the administrative side was maintained by a Deputy Chief of the General Staff, in the organization in the field the same function was performed by the Staff Officer known as G.S. (b).
It will also be seen that neither at General Headquarters nor in the case of an Army command does the Chief of the General Staff exercise control over the administrative side.
After some discussion the Admiralty organizations shown in the Tables A and B on page 20 (below) were adopted, and I guarded as far as possible against the objection to keeping the Plans Division separate from the Operations Division by the issue of detailed orders as to the conduct of the business of the Staff, in which directions were given that the Director of the Plans Division should be in close touch with the Director of the Operations Division before submitting any proposals to the Deputy Chief of Naval Staff or myself.
During the remainder of my service at the Admiralty the organization remained as shown in Tables A and B on p. 20 below. It was not entirely satisfactory, for reasons already mentioned and because I did not obtain all the relief from administrative work which was so desirable.
TABLE A
First Sea Lord and Chief of Naval Staff.
Deputy Chief of Naval Staff.
Director of Intelligence Division.
Director of Signals Division.
Director of Operations Division.
Deputy-Director of Operations
Operations at home.
Assistant Director Operations Division and Staff.
Operations abroad.
Director of Plans Division.
Preparation of Plans for operations at home and abroad.
Consideration of and proposals for use of new
weapons and material. Building programmes to
carry out approved policy.
Deputy First Sea Lord.
Director of Training and Staff Duties.
Assistant Chief of Naval Staff.
Director of Trade Division.
Director of Mercantile Movements.
Director of Mine-sweeping.
Director of Anti-Submarine Division.
TABLE B
Board of Admiralty.
Operations Committee.
Naval Staff.
Maintenance Committee.
Shipbuilding and Armaments.
Stores.
Air.
Finance.
Personnel and Discipline, etc.
Works.
Early in 1918, after my departure from the Admiralty, the following announcement appeared in the Press:
The Secretary of the Admiralty makes the following announcement:—
The Letters Patent for the new Board of Admiralty having now been issued, it may be desirable to summarize the changes in the personnel of the Board and to indicate briefly the alterations in organization that have been decided upon.
Acting Vice-Admiral Sir Henry Oliver now brings to a close his long period of valuable service on the Naval Staff and will take up a sea-going command, being succeeded as D.C.N.S. by Rear-Admiral Sydney Fremantle. Rear-Admiral George P.W. Hope has been selected for the appointment of Deputy First Sea Lord, formerly held by Admiral Wemyss, but with changed functions. Commodore Paine, Fifth Sea Lord and Chief of Naval Air Service, leaves the Board of Admiralty in consequence of the recent creation of the Air Council, of which he is now a member, and formal effect is now given to the appointment of Mr. A.F. Pease as Second Civil Lord, which was announced on Thursday last.