1. Rear Admiral Sir Horace Lambert Alexander Hood was a Royal Navy admiral of the First World War, whose lengthy and distinguished service saw him engaged in operations around the world, frequently participating in land campaigns as part of a shore brigade.
Horace Hood was descended from one of the most influential and experienced navy lines, being a great-great-grandson of Admiral Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood, who won numerous actions against the French in the American Revolutionary War and the French Revolutionary Wars.
Horace Hood's father was Francis Wheler Hood, 4th Viscount Hood, and his mother Edith Lydia Drummond Ward.
Horace Hood gained a record score in his exam for lieutenant, and qualified first time.
Horace Hood performed well at these duties and, in 1897, was recommended to the Egyptian government, which provided him with a Nile gunboat to command on the Nile Expedition of 1898 in the Mahdist War.
Landing his men on an opposed beach in the dark, Horace Hood led from the front, personally engaging in hand-to-hand combat and driving the dervishes into the hinterland, for which he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order.
Later in the year, Horace Hood became Commander-in-Chief, Dover and commander of the Dover Patrol, tasked with preventing German ships and submarines passing through.
Horace Hood was transferred to command of Force E at Queenstown by orders of Churchill and Fisher, for his perceived failure to do this as submarines continued to pass the Channel to threaten shipping in the Irish Sea.
Horace Hood's squadron was attached to Jellicoe's main battlefleet and thus had not witnessed the destruction of two British battlecruisers at the guns of their German counterparts.
Horace Hood's intervention had far greater effects than were realised at the time however.
In diverting his squadron to the North-West to aid Chester, Horace Hood had inadvertently confused the German battlecruiser commander Admiral Hipper into believing that the main British force was approaching from the North-West and prompting his withdrawal to the main German fleet, an act which has been claimed saved the British battlecruiser fleet from destruction.
Horace Hood meanwhile attached his squadron to the British battlecruiser squadron of Admiral Beatty and with them formed the vanguard of the British battlefleet, which was now heading directly for the approaching Germans.
Admiral Horace Hood was posthumously appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath.
Horace Hood had previously been made a Member of the Royal Victorian Order.
Horace Hood's collected papers were donated by his family, with those of his ancestor Samuel Hood, to the Churchill Archives Centre in 1967.
Horace Hood was sunk with the loss of 1,415 hands when a shell detonated an after magazine.
Horace Hood's name is inscribed on the War Memorial at St Botolph's Church, Barton Seagrave, Northamptonshire.