Stuart H. Ingersoll

Stuart Howe Ingersoll (June 3, 1898 – January 29, 1983) was a vice admiral of the United States Navy. He was a naval aviator whose career included service as an aircraft carrier commander during World War II and tours as commander-in-chief of the United States Seventh Fleet, President of the Naval War College, and Commandant of Midshipmen at the United States Naval Academy. Early life Ingersoll was born on 3 June 1898 in Springfield, Massachusetts. Appointed from Maine to the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland, he was admitted to the school on 19 July 1917. The United States had entered World War I on 6 April 1917, and he arrived at the academy as a member of the Class of 1921 at a time when the school's student body and staff were growing rapidly to meet the need for naval officers in the expanding wartime navy. On 4 March 1917, the United States Congress had authorized the academy to shorten its four-year program to three years, with the school year starting earlier than usual, the second class (i.e., junior year) deleted, and instruction normally held that year taught in the plebe (i.e., freshman) or first class (i.e., senior year) instead. The top 286 members of the Class of 1921 — Ingersoll among them — graduated after only three years, on 3 June 1920, and were commissioned as ensigns on 5 June 1920, while the other 280 members of the class graduated in 1921 as the academy returned to its four-year curriculum. Ingersoll's Naval Academy years included a cruise on the battleship . Naval career