Vice Admiral Sir Edmund Walter Anstice, (5 May 1899 – 30 August 1979) was a senior Royal Navy officer and aviator who served as Fifth Sea Lord from 1951 to 1954.
Early life and training
The second son of Major John Christian Appold Anstice, he joined the Royal Navy in August 1914, and was trained at the Royal Naval Colleges at Osborne and Dartmouth before seeing service in the First World War. He was commissioned as a sub-lieutenant on 15 January 1918. In 1919 he was stationed at HMS President while attending a course at Cambridge University, receiving promotion to lieutenant on 15 February 1920.
Naval career
Naval aviator
On attachment to the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Air Force (RAF; all naval aviation being under the control of the RAF at that time), he attended No. 1 Flying Training School at Netheravon, Wiltshire, from June 1924 until January 1925, before being posted to No. 462 Flight, Fleet Air Arm, aboard the aircraft carrier in the Atlantic Fleet, receiving the RAF rank of flight lieutenant on 1 July 1927. On 1 September he became Flight Commander of No. 464 Flight, Fleet Air Arm, aboard the carrier . He was promoted to lieutenant commander on 15 February 1928 and, in October 1929, transferred to the battlecruiser .
