Admiral Sir Geoffrey Layton

Admiral Sir Geoffrey Layton, (20 April 1884 – 4 September 1964) was a Royal Navy officer. He was in command of the submarine when, under attack from German vessels, it ran aground off the Danish coast during the First World War. Despite this incident, he rose to senior command in the Second World War and retired in 1947. His final appointment had been as Commander-in-Chief, Portsmouth. Early life and career Layton was the son of a Liverpool solicitor, George Layton, and was educated at Eastman's Royal Naval Academy. He joined the Royal Navy as a naval cadet on 15 May 1899 on HMS Britannia. Following this he served as a midshipman aboard cruisers in the English Channel and off the south coast of the United States. Layton took his lieutenant's course and was promoted to that rank on 30 November 1905. He then he joined the submarine branch of the navy, in which he had his first command. From 1910 he did two years general service and returned to submarines in 1912, commanding several of them during the First World War. First World War On 18 August 1915 Layton's submarine, , was ordered to the Baltic to assist the Russians, but he ran aground on Saltholm off the Danish coast. E13 was destroyed early the following morning by a German torpedo boat, killing half his men. Layton and the others were interned at Copenhagen. Three months later, disguised as a local sailor, he managed to return to Britain. In 1916–17, he commanded the experimental steam submarine S-1. At the end of the war he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order.