Mountbatten's Diaries

Rumour has it he was involved in the coup plot against Wilson.
So from WWII though to the Troubles Mountbatten might have expressed himself in such private letters and these could still be dynamite.
 
If they are that secret maybe the National Archives should have scooped them up instead of wasting over £2M in grant money for something that can't be opened.
There is bound to be a ton of controversial stuff in those papers, if they are only releasing up to 1934 that seems to indicate some kind of pre-war political controversy.

The author is going to need a shit ton of royalty payments to pay that legal bill off!
 
There are always going to be 'sensitive' documents around that government does not want published but in the face of our ability nation wise, to repeat the same mistakes over and again. These and other papers should be published. I asked an mp once why political partly's made such grandiose claims to get into government only to then say the policies were not doable. "Politicians lie", was the only answer I got so, who are the real idiots? Us or them?
 
Hood said:
There is bound to be a ton of controversial stuff in those papers, if they are only releasing up to 1934 that seems to indicate some kind of pre-war political controversy.
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There was a certain change of government in Germany around that time...
 
Considering how many times Mountbatten blundered: 2 RN ships heavily damage under his command, botched Dieppe Raid, partition of India, etc. it is little wonder that the British gov't is trying to prevent those embarrassments from becoming public knowledge. I suspect that they will remain "state secrets" until after Queen Elizabeth 2 dies.
Note" while studying at University of Ottawa, I took a few courses with Prof. Brian Villa. When his book "Unauthorized Action" about the Dieppe Raid was published, he lost hope of earning tenure. Basically, Prof. Villa had to do a "negative proof" because so many documents were already missing from the archives (circa 1990).
 
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zen said:
Rumour has it he was involved in the coup plot against Wilson.
So from WWII though to the Troubles Mountbatten might have expressed himself in such private letters and these could still be dynamite.
Click to expand...

Considering how he died, the word "dynamite" is rather unhappy there. It is just like Carrero Blanco and his Dodge - not a very appropriate name for his car, by the way.
 
How did he blunder with the two ships sunk under him? Just asking.
 
Mountbatten didn't have two ships sunk under him, he had one sunk (and heavily damaged) and one heavily damaged.

On 9-10 May HMS Kelly was struck by torpedoes amidships from the S-boat S-31. Mountbatten transferred his flag to HMS Javelin while repairs were undertaken. Even D K Brown mentions Mountbatten's quick thinking (and knowledge of the ship going back to when she was designed) which saved Kelly in Nelson to Vanguard. Mountbatten had a pre-arranged list of topweight that he knew would be needed to jettison to prevent her capsizing, he did this and with luck the ship was saved.

On 29 November 1940 his Flotilla engaged three German destroyers off Lizard Point. Mountbatten turned to port to match a German course change, this disrupted the directors and they lost their target, the result being two torpedoes hitting the ship as well as enemy gunfire, losing both the bow and stern sections (he lost 200ft of his ship - very careless) but again by exercising good damage control was towed back to harbour and rebuilt. Of 15 RN destroyers hit by two torpedoes during the war, only two survived, one of those being Javelin.
The following month Kelly was now repaired so he went back aboard her. Kelly was sunk by dive bombers on 23 May 1941 off Crete and capsized during a high-speed turn but they did shoot down three Ju 87s and damaged another, maybe not a fair return but not a bad effort given the AA armament and directors then in use. Of course the film In Which We Serve captures this event.

There is no doubt that that he was a very much a 'press-on' type of Commander, he certainly wasn't timid. Whether either events while performing turns were poor judgement or just bad luck mixed with effects of battle damage is open to interpretation. What is more certain is that he had the knowledge and skill to keep both Kelly (in 1940) and Javelin afloat following appalling damage, arguably saving the loss of two ships early in the war.
 
A captain who did not show such spirit would, not have been appointed or would be beached at a courts martial. Combat 'aint for cissies.
 
a la Admiral Byng?

I could see how documents from the period when Mountbatten was First Sea Lord and CDS during which nuclear systems were being developed could be 'Retained under Section 3.4'.

Not being particularly interested in such things, so don't know, but are documents relating to the Royal Family still withheld for 100 years?

Chris
 
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Avimimus said:
Hood said:
There is bound to be a ton of controversial stuff in those papers, if they are only releasing up to 1934 that seems to indicate some kind of pre-war political controversy.
Click to expand...

There was a certain change of government in Germany around that time...
Click to expand...
Not to mention a certain change of king over here a couple of years later. And purportedly deliberately waving his ward Prince Phillip under 13yo Princess Elizabeth's nose in 1939. There's potentially a lot of embarrassingly gauche horsetrading between Mountbatten and the Royal Family in the half-decade from 1934.
 
By that figure, Southampton has spent the equivalent of the annual fees of 3.5 students on its legal bill, so its not a bank breaker for them. They must be thinking they made a duff investment though with this hot potato.
 
Sorry if off topic but wasn't he part of the kincora affair and other similar scandals?
 
Lownie's book had better be a humdinger when it comes out.
I doubt he can shoehorn in 4,500 boxes of source material in one 250-350 page book... at some point having access to tons of material is pointless unless you condense it down and then it often loses its power. Of course you can go the other way and cherry pick some bombshells but then it gets sensationalist. I'll be intrigued to see how the book turns out.
 

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