![]() ![]() I have left Tupper’s account of his 1881 Solomons involvement in his own words and unabridged. ![]() He held this post during the Irish War of Independence, handing over command and retiring from the RN in 1921, aged 62. ![]() Instead, he commanded the Northern Patrol until it was abolished in November 1917.Īfter the Armistice, in January 1919, Tupper was promoted to Admiral and appointed Commander-in-Chief, Western Approaches, based at Queenstown in southern Ireland. Tupper had hoped for command of the 4th Battle Squadron of the Grand Fleet. In early 1916 he took over command of the Northern Patrol from Vice Admiral Dudley de Chair and was subsequently promoted to Vice Admiral. Tupper did not return to an operational command at the outbreak of the First World War, but in early 1915 was given command of the patrol area around the west coast of Scotland. In 1912, he returned to a seagoing command with the Home Fleet, as Rear Admiral commanding the Portsmouth Division aboard the battleship HMS Revenge he left this post in 1913. In 1907, he was appointed to command HMS Excellent, a gunnery training depot. In 1903, Tupper was given a seagoing command, the cruiser HMS Venus, and he transferred to the battleship HMS Prince of Wales in 1905. On 28 September 1901, Tupper arrived at Ocean Island (now part of Kiribati) aboard HMS Pylades to take formal possession of the island for Great Britain. In 1898 he was appointed Deputy Commissioner for the Western Pacific and a member of the Naval Intelligence Department, and in 1901 he was promoted to Captain and posted to the Admiralty as Assistant Director of Naval Ordnance. Tupper joined the RN at the age of 14 in 1873.Īfter his involvement in the Solomons, he saw active service during the 1890 Witu Expedition in East Africa, where he was mentioned in despatches. His mother was Letitia Frances Wheeler-Cuffe, the daughter of Sir Jonah Denny-Wheeler-Cuffe, an Irish baronet. Tupper was the son of CW Tupper, an officer in the Royal Fusiliers. PHOTO: Sir Reginald Godfrey Otway Tupper by Bassano Ltd whole-plate glass negative. In 1929 Tupper published his autobiography, titled Reminiscences.?Īdmiral Sir Reginald Godfrey Otway Tupper, GBE, KCB, CVO (16 October 1859 – 5 March 1945) was a Royal Navy (RN) officer during the late Victorian period and First World War. The account I have of his involvement in the Solomons? probably later became part of his memoirs. (This was in the early part of his distinguished naval career.) In 1881, Tupper was personally involved in the punitive action against those responsible. In 2021 I came across an account of a massacre of British naval personnel in the Solomons in 1880, written by Admiral Sir Reginald Tupper. Historically, though, the Solomons only seems to have attracted Australian public attention when there have been acts of violence there – particularly ones where British nationals and Australians have been the victims. Solomon Islands (formerly the British Solomon Islands Protectorate) was in the news again in 2022 because of its closer association with China, largely due to the Morrison government’s neglect of the South-West Pacific and China’s preparedness to pay bribes to promote its strategic interests. By Professor Clive Williams MG is a former army officer and visiting fellow at the ANU. ![]()
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