Charles Cooper Penrose - Fitzgerald Charles Cooper Penrose - Fitzgerald ( 30 April 1841 – 11 August 1921 ) was a Vice - Admiral in the Royal Navy . Family . His father was Robert Uniacke Penrose ( 1800 – 1857 ) who married Francis Matilda Austin , daughter of the Revd Robert Austin , prebendary of Cloyne Cathedral . Charles married Henrietta Elizabeth Hewson on 29 November 1882 , daughter of Revd Francis Hewson of Dunganston , Wicklow . They had a son John Uniacke Penrose Fitzgerald ( 27 July 1888 - 11 December 1940 ) who also joined the navy and was killed on active service in world war II . In 1896 Charles changed his own surname to Uniacke - Penrose - Fitzgerald . Career . He was educated at Dr . Burney ' s academy , Gosport and joined the navy in 1854 onboard HMS " Victory " at Portsmouth . In 1855 he served in the Baltic and then the Black Sea in 1856 . He served on HMS " Retribution " on the China station and in 1860 on HMS " Ariadne " . On 22 May 1861 he was made Lieutenant . On 24 July 1871 he became a commander while serving as first lieutenant on HMS " Hercules " under Captain Lord Gilford . Was appointed to second in command of HMS " Agincourt " , flagship of the second division of the Mediterranean squadron , commander Captain Hopkins . " Hercules " had been involved in the rescue of " Agincourt " when her previous commander had allowed her to run aground near Gibraltar . He spent three years on HMS " Asia " , which was an old hulk moored near Fareham . Lord Gilford was once again in command . The posting was a bad one for an officer concerned about his career , but allowed plenty of leave and hunting . The most onerous duty was that he was sometimes called to sit on courts - martial . In the summer he had a small yacht to sail about in the Solent so as not to get out of practice . After " Asia " he spent a period on half pay and while in Ireland had a bad hunting accident which required him to lie flat for most of a year while recovering . On 4 January 1878 he was appointed to his first independent command in HMS " Rapid " in the Mediterranean . Lord Gilford was now a junior Lord of the Admiralty so was able to assist in obtaining the command . " Rapid " was the slowest ship in the fleet , so was normally used for ' detached ' duties . It was fourteen months before Fitzgerald met the squadron commander , Admiral Geoffrey Hornby . On 19 March 1880 he was promoted to Captain and was appointed to HMS " Inconstant " , flagship of the flying squadron . Although he wrote on the subject of sailing , he was an advocate of the complete removal of sails from naval vessels ( which frequently were equipped with both engines and sails at this time ) . In 1884 he was the Captain of the Royal Naval college , Greenwich . In 1886 he commanded HMS " Bellerophon " . He was one of the public supporters of a campaign for increased Naval funding ( alongside Captain Lord Charles Beresford and Admiral Sir Geoffrey Hornby ) which led to the Naval Defence Act 1889 and he continued to be involved in public debate on naval matters throughout his life . On 7 November 1889 he was made captain of HMS " Collingwood " in the Mediterranean . He was a proponent of rear - admiral George Tryon ' s ideas that a simplified system of flag signals was needed for battle conditions . After Tryon ' s death , he distributed a pamphlet seeking to continue the campaign for their adoption . Tryon drowned when his flagship HMS " Victoria " was sunk by a collision with HMS " Camperdown " during fleet manoeuvres , which caused both public and naval opinion to turn against him and his ideas . Tryon was held responsible for the sinking and his flag system also blamed . Fitzgerald wrote a biography describing Tryon ' s achievements during his career , but these efforts rebounded to the detriment of his own career . He continued his writing career by contributing a biography of Admiral Rooke for " From Howard to Nelson : Twelve sailors " ( 1899 ) edited by John Laughton for Greenwich College . He became a naval aide de campe in 1892 and served on the council of the Naval Records Society . In January 1893 he became superintendent of Pembroke naval dockyard . He became a Rear Admiral on 20 February 1895 and from 1897 to 1899 was second - in - command of the China station . He was retired with the rank of Vice - Admiral on 28 March 1901 . War with Germany and the White Feather Campaign . In 1904 he was requested to write an article for the Deutsche review on British naval policy . He had no control over the German translation of his article and claimed it had exaggerated his statements , but the article expressed a British interpretation of the threat implied by German naval expansion to traditional British command of the seas . It included the observation that Britain would be better served by a war sooner rather than later when the German navy would be bigger . The article was used in Germany to whip up support for the naval program . In 1914 Fitzgerald organised a group of thirty women in Folkestone to distribute white feather s to men not in uniform . This was reported in the press and rapidly spread nationwide . The government responded by issuing a badge which could be worn by civilians occupied in war work .