William V . Pratt William Veazie Pratt ( 28 February 1869 – 25 November 1957 ) was an admiral in the United States Navy . He served as the President of the Naval War College and as the Chief of Naval Operations . Biography . Pratt was born in Belfast , Maine . After graduating from the U . S . Naval Academy in 1889 , he served in several cruisers and gunboats , visiting Europe , South America and Asia . During 1895 – 97 , Ensign Pratt had the first of three instructor tours at the Naval Academy . He was assigned to the gunboat " Mayflower " during the Spanish - American War and to the cruiser " Newark " afterwards . While in the latter , he returned to Asiatic waters , where he saw action in the Philippine - American War . A second Naval Academy session followed in 1900 – 1902 , after which he served in the North Atlantic Fleet flagship " Kearsarge " . Lieutenant Commander Pratt ' s final Naval Academy tour took place in 1905 – 1908 . He then was Executive Officer of the cruiser s " Saint Louis " and " California " . Promoted to the rank of Commander in 1910 , Pratt was an instructor at the Naval War College in 1911 – 1913 and spent the next two years in the Atlantic Torpedo Flotilla , much of that as Commanding Officer of its flagship , the scout cruiser " Birmingham " . Captain Pratt was assigned to the Army in Panama and at the Army War College in 1915 – 1917 . During the First World War he served in Washington , D . C . as Assistant Chief of Naval Operations in 1918 . Pratt was at sea in 1919 – 1921 as Commanding Officer of the battleship " New York " and as Commander Destroyer Force , Pacific Fleet . Following promotion to Rear Admiral in mid - 1921 , he was a member of the General Board in Washington , D . C . , and served as a technical advisor during the negotiations that led to the Washington Naval Limitations Treaty of February 1922 . He commanded a battleship division in 1923 – 1925 and was President of the court of inquiry that examined the 8 September 1923 Honda Point Disaster . Assignments followed to the General Board and as President of the Naval War College . In 1927 , he returned to sea as Commander Battleship Division s , Battle Fleet . A year later , he became Commander Battle Fleet in the rank of Admiral and in 1929 – 1930 was Commander in Chief United States Fleet . Admiral Pratt ' s work with the U . S . Fleet was interrupted in early 1930 by a trip to England to participate in the London conference that further limited the size of the World ' s major navies . He became Chief of Naval Operations in September 1930 and spent nearly three years in that post , during a time when Depression - era demands for economy made it very difficult to maintain the Navy ' s size and readiness . During his tenure , he also helped Coast Guard Commandant Harry G . Hamlet in discouraging President Franklin D . Roosevelt from merging the Navy and Coast Guard . Retired at the beginning of July 1933 , Pratt lived thereafter in Maine and New York City . During the World War II years , he wrote a regular column for a nationally - circulated magazine and spent several months on active Navy Department duty in 1941 studying measures to counter the German submarine threat . Admiral William V . Pratt died in 1957 . In 1960 , the destroyer USS " William V . Pratt " ( DLG - 13 , later DDG - 44 ) was named in honor of Admiral Pratt .