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| − | S<small>IR</small> '''Eustace Henry William Tennyson-D'Eyncourt''', First Baronet, K.C.B., F.R.S., R.C.N.C. ([[1 April]], [[1868]] – [[1 February]], [[1951]] was head of the [[Royal Corps of Naval Constructors]] and [[Director of Naval Construction]] during the [[First World War]].
| + | #REDIRECT [[Eustace Henry William Tennyson d'Eyncourt, First Baronet]] |
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| − | ==Early Life & Career==
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| − | Tennyson-D'Eyncourt, the sixth and youngest child of Louis Charles Tennyson-d'Eyncourt, metropolitan magistrate, and his wife, Sophia, daughter of John Ashton Yates, of Dinglehead, Lancashire, was born 1 April 1868 at Hadley House by Barnet Green, Hertfordshire. His father was a cousin of Alfred Tennyson [q.v.] ; his grandfather Charles Tennyson had added to his name that of d'Eyncourt, the family through which he was descended on the maternal side.
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| − | Leaving Charterhouse at eighteen Tennyson-d'Eyncourt became an apprentice at the Elswick shipyard of Armstrong, Whitworth & Co., and after two years spent in going through the various shops took as a private student the naval architecture course at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich. Returning to Elswick, he was placed in the design office under J. R. Perrett and remained there on the permanent staff at the conclusion of his five years' apprenticeship. At that time very many warships were being built for the British and other navies, the ‘Elswick cruisers’ having a specially high reputation. This was valuable experience, but it did not include mercantile shipbuilding, and in 1898 he obtained a post as naval architect with the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company, at Govan, Glasgow, where, in addition to naval vessels, both passenger liners and cargo ships were under construction.
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| − | In 1902, however, d'Eyncourt received what he termed ‘an irresistible opportunity to go back to the Tyne’. (Sir) Philip Watts [q.v.] had left Elswick to become director of naval construction; Perrett had succeeded Watts at Elswick and invited d'Eyncourt to take charge of the design office. This post involved many trips abroad to negotiate naval contracts. In 1904, after handing over the new cruiser Hamidieh, he was asked by the Turkish Government to report on the condition of its navy. In view of the poor state of many of the ships, this called for very tactful wording and he was awarded a third class Medjidieh for his efforts.
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| − | In 1912 d'Eyncourt was appointed director of naval construction in succession to Watts, (Sir) Winston Churchill having decided to bring to the Admiralty a relatively young man instead of promoting a senior constructor who was near the retiring age. During d'Eyncourt's term of office 21 capital ships, 53 cruisers, 133 submarines of eleven different classes, and numerous other vessels were added to the Royal Navy. The battleships of the Royal Sovereign class were the first capital ship designs for which he was responsible. In lieu of two of the class, the battle cruisers Renown and Repulse were designed and built in under twenty months. He introduced the ‘bulge’ form of protection against torpedo attack and no ship so fitted was sunk in the war of 1914–18 by torpedoes. In 1915 he was entrusted with the design of rigid airships for the navy and retained this responsibility until it was transferred to an air department. In February of the same year Churchill had asked him to undertake the design of a ‘landship’. Material for the army was certainly not normally his province, but d'Eyncourt was keenly interested in the project and agreed to head a committee formed to design and produce landships or ‘tanks’ as they were later termed. The prototype was ready for trials early in 1916 and the first tanks saw action at the battle of the Somme. Although the original Admiralty landship committee was disbanded after the early and successful trials, d'Eyncourt was retained as chief technical adviser.
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| − | Among the many naval developments which took place during the war perhaps the most important were those in the design of aircraft carriers. Under d'Eyncourt's guidance there was rapid progress and a pattern of bridge and superstructure was set which has been followed by all other navies. His most impressive design was that of the battle cruiser Hood, the first capital ship to be fitted with small tube boilers, a type he had long advocated. In the post-war years, he had to contend with the difficult problems consequent on the Washington Treaty of 1922 and the Nelson and Rodney represented his solution for the most powerful battleship of less than 35,000 tons.
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| − | D'Eyncourt resigned from the Admiralty in 1924, but remained for some time a special adviser. From 1924 to 1928 he was a director of his old firm, Armstrong, Whitworth & Co. He then joined the board of Parsons Marine Steam Turbine Company until his retirement in 1948. During the inter-war years he designed numerous merchant ships including the very novel heavy lift ‘Belships’. He was appointed K.C.B. in 1917 and in 1918 was made a commander of the Legion of Honour and also awarded the American D.S.M. He was elected F.R.S. in 1921, and received honorary degrees from Durham and Cambridge. In 1930 he was created a baronet and in 1937 he was elected foreign associate member of the French Académie de Marine in succession to Lord Jellicoe [q.v.] .
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| − | D'Eyncourt was chairman of the advisory committee of the William Froude Laboratory for fifteen years and was a prominent and active member of many societies and institutions, including the Worshipful Company of Shipwrights, becoming a master in 1927. He read several important papers before the Royal Institution of Naval Architects and was elected a vice-president in 1916 and an honorary vice-president in 1935. He was president of the North-East Coast Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders from 1925 to 1927.
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| − | In 1898 d'Eyncourt married Janet, daughter of Matthew Watson Finlay, of Langside, near Glasgow, and widow of John Burns, of Glasgow. She had two children by her first marriage and a son and a daughter by her second and died in 1909 when accompanying her husband on a business visit to the Argentine. D'Eyncourt died in London 1 February 1951 and was succeeded as second baronet by his son, Eustace Gervais (born 1902).
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| − | A portrait by Sir Oswald Birley was hung in the office of Brixton Estate, Ltd., a company d'Eyncourt had formed in conjunction with his son and son-in-law.
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| − | [[Category:1868 births|Tennyson-D'Eyncourt]]
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| − | [[Category:1951 deaths|Tennyson-D'Eyncourt]]
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| − | [[Category:Personalities|Tennyson-D'Eyncourt]]
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| − | [[Category:Directors of Naval Construction|Tennyson-D'Eyncourt]]
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