Vice Admiral Sir Alan Wedel Ramsay McNICOLL KBE CB GM
Vice
Admiral Sir Alan Wedel Ramsay McNicoll served as Chief of
Navy from 1965-1968. McNicoll faced the drawn out
agony of the first and, in 1967-68, the second Voyager royal
commission which damaged public perception of the RAN and
its senior leadership. The Indonesian ‘Confrontation’
with Malaysia demanded high commitment from the RAN, and the
Vietnam War required a naval response. The arrival of new
classes of British designed submarines and American built
guided-missile destroyers brought challenges in tactics,
manpower, training, logistics and technology, and the fate
of fixed wing aviation in the RAN hung in the balance.
There were also many personnel issues to be resolved.
McNicoll managed all these actual and potential crises with
common sense, attention to detail, charm and acute
perception of the tides of opinion. Both the Oberon
Class submarines and Adams Class destroyers became
successes, a new class of patrol boats was commissioned, the
Fleet Air Arm was re-equipped with American aircraft, and
the RAN commitment of destroyers, clearance divers and
helicopter units to Vietnam enhanced its strategic and
tactical development. The visible legacy of McNicoll’s
tenure is the Australian White Ensign, which replaced that
of the Royal Navy in March 1967.
Early life and career
Alan McNicoll was born in the Melbourne suburb of Hawthorn,
Victoria, on 3 April 1908. He was the second of five
sons of Walter McNicoll, a school teacher and Militia
officer, and Hildur (née Wedel Jarlsberg). The young
McNicoll was of noble Norwegian descent through his mother. He was initially educated at Scotch College, Melbourne,
before the family moved to Goulburn, from where he was sent
to attend The Scots College in Sydney. On 1 January
1922, at the age of thirteen, McNicoll entered the Royal
Australian Naval College at Jervis Bay. Described as
"urbane and studious", he performed well both academically
and in sport, ultimately placing first in seamanship,
history and English. On graduation in 1926, McNicoll
was posted to Britain for service and further training with
the Royal Navy.
Advanced to acting Sub-Lieutenant in September 1928,
McNicoll's appointment to the United Kingdom concluded the
following year, at which point he returned to Australia and
was initially posted to the land base HMAS Cerberus. He was
attached to HMAS Penguin soon after, before being assigned
for duties with HMAS Australia. In his Lieutenants'
Examinations in 1929, McNicoll achieved 1st Class
Certificates in all of his subjects and was awarded a prize
of £10 as a result. He was promoted to Lieutenant in
July 1930, with seniority from 1 April that year.
Completing a twelve-month posting aboard HMAS Canberra
between 1932 and 1933, McNicoll decided to specialise as a
torpedo officer and returned to the United Kingdom in order
to undertake the long course at the Royal Naval College in
Dartmouth. While in the UK, McNicoll wrote and
published Sea Voices, a book of poems centred on naval life.
McNicoll's detachment to the Royal Navy was terminated in
1935 on his graduation from Dartmouth, and he returned to
Australia. Over the next three years, he saw service
in HMAS Canberra, HMAS Sydney and Cerberus, advancing to
Lieutenant Commander on 1 April 1938. On 18 May 1937,
McNicoll wed Ruth Timmins at St Stephen's Church of England
at Brighton. From March 1939, McNicoll was once again
seconded to the Royal Navy, receiving a posting to the
torpedo school HMS Vernon; he was serving in Vernon on the
outbreak of the Second World War. While residing at
Portsmouth, McNicoll and his wife had their first child, a
son named Ian, in June that year. Ian died when one
week old. The couple later had two more sons, Guy and
Anthony, and a daughter, Deborah.
Second World War
On 14 September 1939, eleven days after the outbreak of the
Second World War, McNicoll was posted to HMS Victory, the
flagship of Admiral Sir William James, the
Commander-in-Chief, Portsmouth. In April 1940,
McNicoll was transferred to the light cruiser HMS Fiji as a
member of the ship's commissioning crew. During
McNicoll's time aboard the ship, it was severely damaged by
a torpedo in operations on 1 September and barely made it
back to harbour. McNicoll ultimately served on Fiji
for six months before being attached to HMS Medway, a
submarine depot ship stationed at Alexandria, Egypt, in
October 1940.
In this post he was made Torpedo Officer
of the 1st Submarine Flotilla operating in the Mediterranean
theatre. In addition to his standard duties, McNicoll
was regularly involved in rendering safe captured enemy
ordnance. On one such occasion, he was tasked with
disarming the captured Italian submarine Galileo Galilei,
which entailed removing the inertia pistols from eight badly
corroded
torpedoes.
As a consequence of
his
"gallant and undaunted devotion to duty in this action",
McNicoll was awarded the George Medal and presented a
Commander-in-Chief's Commendation. This was only one
of McNicoll's exploits and he recalled that the hardest was
to remove the multiple explosive charges clustered in the
bows of one of the Italian Navy's speedboats used to attack
Brtisish shipping.
In April 1942, McNicoll transferred to the battleship HMS
King George V and served as Squadron Torpedo Officer.
As part of the Home Fleet, King George V provided support to
several Arctic convoys throughout the conflict. From
April to May 1942, King George V formed up as a support
component to Convoy PQ 15, the first for McNicoll.
While sailing in thick fog on 1 May, King George V collided
with the destroyer HMS Punjabi after the latter crossed
under the bow of the battleship. Punjabi was sliced in
two during the collision, and sank with heavy loss of life.
Several depth charges were also ignited on the damaged stern
of King George V during the accident. King George V
was patched up at Seidisfjord, before sailing to Gladstone
Dock, Liverpool, to receive repairs.

In April 1942, McNicoll
served as Torpedo Officer of HMS King George V.
In December 1942, HMS King George V deployed in support of
Convoy JW 51A, the first Russian convoy to sail direct from
the United Kingdom without stopping at Iceland. The
journey was completed without incident. On receiving
word of the German naval attack on Convoy JW 51B in what
became known as the Battle of the Barents Sea, King George V
was dispatched along with nine other ships from Scapa Flow
on 31 December to provide cover for the returning Convoy RA
51 and to attempt to catch the German ships engaged in the
previous assault. The German ships were ultimately not
encountered, and RA 51 was returned safely. King
George V later provided a covering force for two further
convoys during early 1943, before being transferred to the
Mediterranean during May in preparation for Operation Husky,
the Allied invasion of Sicily. Promoted to Commander
on 30 June 1943, McNicoll took part in the Sicilian invasion
the following month, with King George V serving as part of
the covering force. Prior to the invasion, King George
V, along with HMS Howe, had executed a bombardment of
Trapani and the islands of Favignana and Levanzo on the
night of 11–12 July, as part of a deception suggesting
landings on the west coast of Sicily.
McNicoll was briefly reposted to HMS Victory on 1 September
1943, before being transferred for staff duties with the
Admiralty in London the following month. He completed
a year-long attachment with the Admiralty, and was involved
in the planning for the Normandy landings. On 15
February 1944, he attended an investiture ceremony at
Buckingham Palace, where he was formally presented his
George Medal by King George VI. McNicoll returned to
Australia and was attached to the staff of HMAS Cerberus
in October 1944; he spent the remainder of the war in this
post. Up to this period, McNicoll had completed all
but five of his years of military service attached to the
Royal Navy.
Senior command
Ships' captain
McNicoll was appointed Executive Officer of the light
cruiser HMAS Hobart on 16 September 1945, a fortnight after
the cessation of hostilities in the Pacific theatre.
From November 1945 until July 1947, Hobart spent nine months
operating in Japanese waters over three distinct periods as
part of the British Commonwealth Occupation Force. The
ship was placed in reserve from December 1947, and McNicoll
briefly transferred to HMAS Penguin before assuming the post
of Director of Plans and Operations at the Navy Office in
Melbourne on 6 January 1948. Advanced to Captain in
June 1949, he was posted two months later to HMAS
Shoalhaven, a River-class frigate, as the ship's Commanding
Officer, and was simultaneously placed in charge of the 1st
Frigate Squadron. He was appointed an honorary
aide-de-camp to the Governor-General of Australia in
December for a period of three years. In January 1950,
McNicoll transferred to command the destroyer HMAS
Warramunga and was subsequently made Captain (D) in control
of the 10th Destroyer Squadron.
During McNicoll's tenure as Commanding Officer of
Warramunga, the ship operated in Australian waters as part
of the Australia Station, sailing to New Zealand for a visit
during March 1950. On the outbreak of the Korean War
in June that year, Warramunga was selected as part of the
Australian contribution to the conflict. Moreover, the
ship was to be attached to a force of five Royal Navy
destroyers led by a Captain, making it expedient to have the
Australian ship commanded by an officer of lower rank;
McNicoll was consequently replaced by Commander Otto Becher
on 28 July. McNicoll was then posted to the Navy
Office to assist in the introduction and co-ordination of
National Service in the Australian military in response to
the National Service Act 1951. He moved to the land
base HMAS Lonsdale in October 1951, on being made Deputy
Chief of Naval Staff.
In 1952, McNicoll was appointed chairman of the planning
committee for the British nuclear tests on the Montebello
Islands, off the coast of Western Australia. Later
that year, he was made Commanding Officer of the heavy
cruiser HMAS Australia, a post he held for the next two
years. As commander of Australia, McNicoll also served
as Chief Staff Officer to the Flag Officer Commanding HM
Australian Fleet. HMAS Australia was near the end of its
naval service and had been relegated to training duties from
1950.
McNicoll was appointed a
Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1954 New
Year Honours List for his involvement in the British atomic
program; he was presented with the decoration three months
later by Queen Elizabeth II in a ceremony at Government
House, Melbourne.
The year of 1954 was to be HMAS Australia's last in
service, with the ship conducting Royal and Vice Regal tasks
as some of its final duties. In February and March,
she served as part of the escort for the Royal Yacht
Gothic during the Australian leg of Queen Elizabeth II's
coronation tour.
The cruiser was presented with the
Gloucester Cup on 25 March as the ship "considered to be
foremost in general efficiency, cleanliness, seamanship and
technical training" during the year of 1953. As one of
the ship's final duties with the Navy, Australia was tasked
with transporting Field Marshal Sir William Slim, the
Governor-General of Australia, along with his wife and their
staff on a cruise around the Coral Sea, the Great Barrier
Reef and the Whitsunday Passage. The voyage embarked on 4
May, and two days later Australia fired its 8-inch guns for
the final time. While in the Coral Sea, a Dutch naval
ship was discovered to be incapacitated off the coast of
Hollandia, Netherlands New Guinea, and was consequently
towed by Australia to Cairns. McNicoll was later
appointed a Commander of the Order of Orange-Nassau by the
Dutch government for his rescue of the ship.

HMAS Australia
Rise to Chief of Naval Staff
McNicoll relinquished command of HMAS Australia in July 1954
before the cruiser was paid off and marked for disposal the
following month, and he briefly returned to duties at the
Navy Office. In November, he embarked for London to
attend the Imperial Defence College as part of the 1955
course intake, which signified that he had been marked for
senior command. McNicoll and his wife, Ruth, had
separated in 1950 and their divorce, which cited adultery as
the cause, was finalised in October 1956, while the former
was still in London. On 17 May the following year,
McNicoll wed Frances Mary Chadwick, a journalist, in the
Hampstead register office. Made Acting Rear Admiral in
January 1957, McNicoll was appointed as Head of the
Australian Joint Service Staff in London. He returned
to Australia in February 1958 and was selected to serve as
Deputy Secretary (Military) at the Department of Defence;
McNicoll's rank was made substantive in July that year.
On 8 January 1960, McNicoll was posted to the Naval Board in
Canberra as Second Naval Member and Chief of Personnel.
As noted by historian Ian Pfennigwerth, McNicoll held this
position at a time in which recruitment and retention in the
Navy particularly lagged behind targets. McNicoll was
additionally appointed as a trustee of the RAN Relief Trust
Fund during this period. Completing his term on the
Naval Board, McNicoll was posted as Flag Officer Commanding
HM Australian Fleet on 8 January 1962 and hoisted his
standard aboard HMAS Melbourne, the flagship of the RAN.
The Australian government had designated the role of the RAN
to be primarily one of anti-submarine warfare, a posture
which McNicoll thought unwise. McNicoll argued that
surface and air weapons posed a threat equal to that of
submarines toward vessels in modern naval warfare. As
such, he campaigned for a contemporary aircraft carrier to
replace that of HMAS Melbourne. The Army and Air Force
opposed McNicoll's stance, and the government ultimately
concluded that there was no strategic requirement for a new
carrier in light of agreements contained in the Southeast
Asia Treaty Organization. In any event, McNicoll
experienced a particularly demanding tenure as Fleet
Commander since the RAN was in the process of a complete
overhaul of its order of battle and, as a consequence, he
had to manage the introduction and deployment into service
of six Ton-class minesweepers acquired from the Royal Navy,
along with the first batch of Westland Wessex helicopters
and modernised afloat support capabilities.
Furthermore, McNicoll was charged with the responsibility of
ensuring Australian naval commitments to the Far East
Strategic Reserve were met.
McNicoll's two-year term as Fleet Commander concluded on 6
January 1964, at which point he returned to the Naval Board
as Fourth Naval Member and Chief of Supply. However,
this post proved short-lived with his appointment as Flag
Officer-in-Charge East Australia Area, headquartered at the
land base HMAS Kuttabul in Sydney, from June that year.
In the 1965 New Year Honours, McNicoll was appointed a
Companion of the Order of the Bath.
Chief of Naval Staff
On 24 February 1965, McNicoll was promoted Vice Admiral and
made Chief of Naval Staff (CNS) in succession to Vice
Admiral Sir Hastings Harrington. By virtue of this
position, McNicoll was head of the Naval Board and the
functional Commander of the RAN. McNicoll's term as
CNS was characterised by a period of heightened activity for
the RAN in light of the Australian commitments to the
Indonesia–Malaysia Konfrontasi and the Vietnam War. He
furthermore had to oversee an extensive modernisation of the
fleet, with the introduction into service of the Perth-class
destroyers, Attack-class patrol boats, and the initial batch
of Oberon-class submarines. The Fleet Air Arm was also
re-equipped with American fixed wing aircraft. Despite
these acquisitions, the RAN possessed a rather thin and
limited fleet during this period, which McNicoll blamed on
past naval planning. He criticised the lack of
foresight in earlier decisions that had led to
"inconsistencies and inadequate estimating" in the future
needs of the RAN, which had consequently left the fleet
outdated and minimal.
In addition to the RAN's
materiel issues, McNicoll faced significant problems with
morale and recruitment. A series of mishaps and
accidents over the previous decade led to what naval
historian Tom Frame termed as "an appreciable erosion of
public confidence in the navy's professional standards".
The situation intensified following the February 1964
collision between HMAS Melbourne and Voyager. The two
subsequent Royal Commissions into the incident subjected the
RAN to unprecedented scrutiny and damaged the public
perception of its senior leadership. McNicoll had to
cope with the turmoil occasioned by these events and
concerned himself with the restoration of morale in the
Navy.
The tenure of Air Chief Marshal Sir Frederick Scherger as
Chairman, Chiefs of Staff Committee was set to expire in May
1966, and a replacement had to be selected from the service
Chiefs. The Chief of the General Staff, Lieutenant
General Sir John Wilton, had among defence and military
circles been assumed to be the natural successor.
However, mounting speculation arose from late 1965 over who
was to be selected for the position as it became known Prime
Minister Sir Robert Menzies preferred McNicoll for the post,
as did Secretary of the Department of Defence Sir Ted Hicks,
who thought McNicoll more intelligent and objective than his
army counterpart. McNicoll lobbied ardently for the
position, and was supported by his wife, Frances, who
actively campaigned on her husband's behalf. By
December 1965, Scherger's replacement had still not been
decided upon and Menzies chose to delay the decision until
the new year. However, Menzies retired in January 1966
and was succeeded by his deputy, Harold Holt. Holt and
the newly appointed Minister for Defence, Allen Fairhall,
preferred Wilton and ultimately selected him to succeed
Scherger. In any event, McNicoll was advanced to a Knight
Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1966 New
Year Honours for his service as CNS.
McNicoll was eager for a RAN contribution to the Vietnam War
and, in July 1966, proposed that the four Australian
minesweepers operating out of Singapore be deployed to
Vietnamese waters since Konfrontasi was at an end and the
vessels were no longer necessary in that area. The
notion was rejected by Fairhall, however, who was conscious
of an upcoming election and was adamant that nothing be
decided until afterward.
The possibility of a naval
contribution to Vietnam was raised again in December, and it
was decided that the guided missile destroyer HMAS Hobart
and a clearance diving team of six personnel be deployed as
the Royal Australian Navy Force Vietnam. Per an
agreement between McNicoll and Admiral Roy L. Johnson,
Commander of the United States Pacific Fleet, HMAS Hobart
was to be attached to the United States Seventh Fleet and
conduct shore bombardment operations. The deployment
of an Australian destroyer to Vietnam became permanent, with
the ships operating on a six-month rotation.
To
McNicoll's satisfaction, the RAN contribution to the theatre
was further bolstered in 1967 with the formation of the RAN
Helicopter Flight Vietnam and the dispatch of naval aviators
to serve in an Army support role with No. 9 Squadron RAAF.
The visible legacy of McNicoll's service as CNS is the
Australian White Ensign. The British White Ensign had
been flown by Australian vessels since the formation of the
RAN in 1911, but the Australian contribution to Vietnam — a
conflict in which the United Kingdom was not involved —
served to complicate the situation. Federal politician
Sam Benson questioned the Australian use of the British
ensign before parliament in October 1965, and McNicoll later
raised the issue with the Naval Board. The Naval Board
ultimately decided to recommend to the government that the
RAN create its own unique white ensign. A design
accompanied the recommendation, which described the ensign
as a "white flag with the Union Flag in the upper canton at
the hoist with six blue stars positioned as in the
Australian flag". The government approved the
proposal, and the Australian White Ensign was formally
introduced throughout the RAN on 1 March 1967.

On the morning of the 1 March
1967 the Australian National Line cargo ship Boonaroo was
commissioned into the
Royal Australian Navy for war service. This event in
itself is not unusual as merchant ships have been
requisitioned by navies for centuries. What made this
particular commissioning noteworthy is that Boonaroo
was the first vessel to be commissioned under a distinctly
Australian White Ensign.
After 46 years of service, McNicoll retired from the RAN on
2 April 1968 and was succeeded as CNS by Vice Admiral Victor
Smith. In the lead-up to his retirement, McNicoll
completed a farewell tour by visiting several ships and
naval establishments throughout Australia. The trip
culminated with a two-week visit to Vietnam, and McNicoll
was present in Saigon when the city was attacked by Viet
Cong forces as part of the Tet Offensive. As a man who
"liked action", McNicoll later stated that he received a
"great thrill" during the assault as he awaited
transportation back to Australia.
Ambassador and later life
On his retirement from the Navy, McNicoll was appointed by
the Australian government as its inaugural ambassador to
Turkey. He was able to form amiable relations between
the governments of Australia and Turkey, despite the
physical and logistic issues associated with the
establishment of a new embassy and the lack of knowledge
both nations had of one another. McNicoll held his
diplomatic post in Ankara for five years, before he returned
to Australia in 1973 and retired to Canberra.
A man of
"culture and refined literary tastes", McNicoll engaged his
passion for the arts during retirement and in 1979 published
his translation of The Odes of Horace. He was also a
music lover and a keen fly-fisherman.
Sir Alan McNicoll died on 11 October 1987 at the age of 79.
Remembered as a "well-informed, hard working and skilled
administrator", he was cremated with full Naval Honours.
He was survived by his wife, and by the children from
his first marriage.
Sources:
Wikipedia
Bravo Zulu Vol 1 - Ian Pfennigwerth
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