Signal Division (Royal Navy)

The Signal Division of the Naval Staff was the constituent part of the Royal Navy's Naval Staff responsible for communications. The division was instituted on 18 August, 1917, and emerged from the earlier Signal Section of the Admiralty War Staff set-up in 1914 under Rear-Admiral Sydney Fremantle.

History

On 8 September, 1914, the Admiralty directed that:

the Signal Committee shall be temporarily transferred from Portsmouth to London and attached to the Admiralty War Staff of which it will for the present constitute a Section.

In an Admiralty Memorandum of 18 August, 1917, the Section was upgraded to a Division:

Signal Division will be responsible for all Naval, Mercantile, Allied and Naval and Military: W/T Signalling (including the allocation of all W/T Call-signs other than 'commercial'); S/T Signalling; Visual Signalling(including allocation of pennants); Private and Recognition Signals; Signal Books; Codes and Ciphers; Methods of Drafting, Coding Ciphering and dealing with all messages (whether W/T, S/T, Visual, Landline, or Cable); 'S' Orders and 'SR' Orders … Signal Division is not responsible for either Personnel or Materiel, but will act in an advisory capacity to the departments dealing therewith and should be consulted as necessary.

Directors of the Signal Division

Dates of appointment given:

• Captain (Acting) Richard L. Nicholson, August, 1917.

Bibliography

• Dewar, Alfred C. (1922). Encyclopædia Britannica: The New Volumes. Volume XXX. London: Encyclopædia Britannica Company, Ltd..
• Naval Staff, Training and Staff Duties Division (1929). The Naval Staff of the Admiralty. Its Work and Development. B.R. 1845 (late C.B. 3013). Copy No. 8 at The National Archives. ADM 234/434.

Primary Sources

• The National Archives. ADM 116/3403. Admiralty Signal Division: History. Volume I.