NEW FIRST LORD.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 679, 2 December 1909, Page 7

NEW FIRST LORD.

SIR A. K. WILSON,

,"TIMES"',CONFIRMS APPOINTMENT.: ; (By Telegraph.—Press Assbclatlon.-Copyrleht.)

, , , London, Iv'oveniber 30.,'. , "Tho Times" confirms thestatcmont that Admiral Sir Arthur K. "Wilson, V.C. (whoso handling of the Channel Fleet during his command has won general praise), will Sir John Fisher' (raised to the peorage) ps"' First Sea Lord of the Admiralty.

HOW SIR ARTHUR WILSON WON HIS V.C,

Sir Arthur Wilson entered the Navy m 1855 at the age of 13 years. Ho saw service in the Black. Sea'during the Russian' War, and in the Chinese War. Ho was- captain.. ,of tho Hecla at tho hnmbardment of Alexandria,.and was present with the Naval Brigatlo at tho battle of El Tob in the Sudan on February. 31), 1881. Tho act of gallantry for which Sir A.. Wilson has been brought to notico was ■ described by Sir Eodvers Duller as ono ot tho most courageous he over witnessed, .there was a gap in tho square, and live or six..of .the enemy seeing it rushed' forward,' attempting to pierce the ranks. Then Captain Wilson advanced to meet them alone, and breaking his sword in his effort to out one of them down, would not lotirb a step, but held his ground, knocking them down with his fists. Either by a-miracle or the surprising nature of his attack, ho escaped with a' few wounds,, the square closing up and rescuing jum.. ,-Fpr. his bravery he was awarded the V.C. air Arthur Wilson attained flag rank in 1895. £■■.■'- \ In"With the Flagship," Mr. C. E. W. Bear, rofcrs to Sir Arthur Wilson as "a man that had a horror of advertisement, a man' of whom nine-tenths' of. us havo never .heard; a man of -whom yon will be told more in a wardroom -than of all the rest of the powers that bo put together; a man that was beyond all question the greatest .English sailor, since Nelson; a man that a fair, part of the servico believes tho greatest, seaman there over was; a man who in tho manoeuvres, year after year, sinco the lator '80's,' when he. took his fleet unseenin a fog into an Irish harbour through tho vory midst of a blockading fleet, has invariably found by somo strange instinct, tho one thing to be done, and has always done it; the man and tho only man who. has handled, immense modern fleets as though they wore a four-in-hand, pulled, them, tugged them, swung them within a" biscuit-toss of each others: rams, apparently by sheer intuition; the man who has •drilled them, dressed .them down, sweated and thrashed 'them, stopped thoir leave, and. cut short their holidays till they onded-by almost worshipping him; a man who,did_ not praise • overmuch, but, whoso praise was worth getting.