Royal Navy: HMS Prince of Wales Commanding Officer and Portsmouth native celebrates 100 years family service
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The Commanding Officer of the Royal Navy flagship is celebrating his family serving in the force for 100 years.
Captain Will Blackett, born in Portsmouth and Commanding Officer of HMS Prince of Wales, raised a toast to the emotional moment that saw his family serve in the Royal Navy every day since January 1925.
He is the fourth generation of Blacketts in the Senior Service, with careers of father and son overlapping – making more than 111 years’ collective service. As well as a proud, continuous history of service to the nation, Captain Will believes the Blackett story mirrors the social mobility many Britons have enjoyed over the past century: from a dockyard shipwright to commanding the country’s most powerful warship.
Captain Will said: “Celebrating this family achievement has involved reaching back into history and learning more about my ancestors – it is quite humbling to be at the end of a line of such brilliant people and I hope I have done them proud. HMS Prince of Wales’ deployment this year will take me to many of the places my grandfather served – I will take his old photographs with me and look forward to retracing his steps.”
The Blackett family naval service
William Blackett (great grandad), born in Newcastle in 1902. Joined up as an ordnance artificer (in modern Royal Navy parlance a weapons engineer) at HMS Pembroke in Chatham in January 1925 after seven years as an apprentice engineer with the legendary Swan Hunter shipyard on Tyneside. He served for 22 years, leaving in 1947 as a chief petty officer (and also a trained diver), briefly becoming a Royal Marines policeman.
William Blackett (grandad), born in Wallsend in 1926. Joined the Royal Navy through HMS Raleigh in July 1942 as an ordnance artificer apprentice, was commissioned in 1956, and left the Service in 1976 as an acting lieutenant commander after 34 years and five months.
Jeffrey Blackett (dad), born in Portsmouth in 1955, joined Dartmouth in 1973 as a trainee supply officer and left in November 2004 as a commodore after 31 years and two months, but continued to serve the Armed Forces as their Judge Advocate General until October 2020.
William Blackett, born in Portsmouth in 1982, joined Dartmouth in September 2001 as a warfare officer and has commanded frigate HMS Lancaster before being appointed captain of HMS Prince of Wales at the beginning of last year.
Captain Will’s mum Sally was a Wren Officer and left service after becoming pregnant - her father and brother are also naval officers.
“The Royal Navy is in our blood”
Captain Will’s dad Jeffrey believes the Blackett name, which has been a constant thread through the Senior Service since 1925, is not the only continual factor. He said: “Much has changed in the 100 years since my grandfather joined up in 1925 but the one constant is the professionalism and dedication of the people who serve.
“He would not recognise the technical advances in modern warships, but he would have an affinity with the men and women who serve in them. The Royal Navy is in our blood, and long may it remain so.”
Captain Will was enthralled by stories his late grandfather told him of service in the Second World War – such as watching an air raid by Junkers dive-bombers attacking the naval base at Rosyth from a train stopped on the iconic Forth Bridge. Despite his enthusiasm, his dad at one point advised his son not to join the force.
Dad – and Captain Will – are delighted he did anyway as the latter has had “a great adventure” so far. He is now responsible for more than 800 men and women on a daily basis on Britain’s biggest warship – rising to 1,600 souls when the flagship sails from Portsmouth in the spring leading her first Carrier Strike Group.
In his first week in the Navy, his dad Jeff bought a flagon of rum in Gibraltar, opened only for special occasions. This week father and son shared a tot to toast the family’s service.