Fisher, Sir John, 1st Baron Fisher

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Fisher, Sir John, 1st Baron Fisher (1841–1920). Admiral. ‘Jackie’ Fisher was the main architect of the fleet with which Britain went to war in 1914. Between 1905 and 1910, when he served as 1st sea lord, he introduced two new classes of warship, the all-big-gun, turbine-propelled Dreadnought class of battleship and the more lightly armoured ‘Invincible’ class of battle-cruiser. They made all existing capital ships obsolete and gained for Britain a brief respite in the Anglo-German naval race. But when the Germans began to launch their own dreadnoughts in 1909, Fisher was determined to out-build them. He succeeded but only at the cost of further souring Anglo-German relations. Recalled to serve as 1st sea lord in October 1914, he resigned amidst great acrimony in May 1915 when he lost patience with his political chief, Winston Churchill, over the navy's growing commitment to the Dardanelles.

David French

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John Arbuthnot Fisher 1st Baron Fisher

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