Anthony Miers Rear Admiral Sir Anthony Cecil Capel Miers , VC , KBE , CB , DSO & Bar ( 11 November 1906 – 30 June 1985 ) was a Royal Navy officer , who served in the submarine service during the Second World War . He was a Scottish recipient of the Victoria Cross , the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces . He was involved in two incidents alleged to be war crimes while commanding HMS " Torbay " . Early life . Born in 1906 , the son of an Army Captain killed in First World War , Miers was educated at the Edinburgh Academy , before joining the Navy as a special entry cadet . He volunteered for the submarine service in 1929 . Service history . In November 1940 he was given command of HM Submarine " Torbay " . While working up , " Torbay " collided with the British tanker " Vancouver " in Loch Long though no serious damage was caused . " Torbay " began its first patrol in March 1941 . The submarine left at very short notice , with half the crew on leave and replaced by members of the spare crew of the depot ship , the reason being that the German battleship s " Scharnhorst " and " Gneisenau " , had arrived at Brest and needed to be shadowed in case they sailed for the Atlantic sea lanes . The submarine later continued to Gibraltar , then Alexandria to join the 1st Submarine Flotilla . On 27 April 1941 while on patrol off Cape Ferrato Miers attacked a two - masted single - funnelled merchant ship of about 4000 GRT . " Torbay " fired two torpedoes but both missed . " Torbay " ' s 3rd war patrol was in the northern Aegean Sea . On 28 May 1941 , " Torbay " sank two Greek caiques with gunfire , then torpedoed and damaged the Vichy French tanker " Alberta " off Cape Hellas . In 1989 former Royal Naval Officer and broadcaster Ludovic Kennedy published his autobiography , in which he devoted several pages to " a submarine atrocity " on the night of 9 July 1941 which gave rise to the accusation of ' war crimes ' . According to the accounts , on two separate occasions , Miers ordered the machine - gunning of several shipwrecked German soldiers in rafts who had jumped overboard when their vessels were sunk by the " Torbay " . These events were witnessed and reported by acting First Lieutenant Paul Chapman who reported " everything and everybody was destroyed by one sort of gunfire or another " . Miers also made no attempt to conceal his actions , his patrol log recording : " Submarine cast off , and with the Lewis gun accounted for the soldiers in the rubber raft to prevent them from regaining their ship . . . " When informed of Miers ' s actions , Flag Officer Submarines Admiral Horton wrote to the Admiralty about the possibility of German reprisals : " As far as I am aware , the enemy has not made a habit of firing on personnel in the water or on rafts even when such personnel were members of the fighting services ; since the incidents referred to in " Torbay ' s " report , he may feel justified in doing so . " The Admiralty then sent a strongly worded letter to Miers advising him not to repeat the practices of his last patrol . He had already carried out nine successful patrols in HMS " Torbay " in the Mediterranean theatre before the patrol in March 1942 which saw the incident which earned him the VC . The citation read : Lieutenant Commander Anthony Cecil Chapel Miers DSO Royal Navy Whilst on patrol in HM Submarine " Torbay " off the Greek coast on the 4th March 1942 . < br > Lieutenant Commander Miers sighted a northbound convoy of four troopships entering the South Corfu Channel and since they had been too far distant for him to attack initially , he decided to follow in the hope of catching them in Corfu Harbour . During the night 4 / 5 March , Torbay approached undetected up the channel and remained on the surface charging her battery . Unfortunately the convoy passed straight through the channel but on the morning of the 5th March , in glassy sea conditions , Miers successfully attacked two store ships present in the roadstead and then brought Torbay safely back to the open sea . The submarine endured 40 depth charges and had been in closely patrolled enemy waters for seventeen hours . His VC is on display in the Lord Ashcroft Gallery at the Imperial War Museum , London . Later life . Later Sir Anthony , he continued to serve in the Royal Navy , and achieved the rank of Rear Admiral in 1956 . Miers died in 1985 . He is buried at Tomnahurich Cemetery , Inverness , Scotland , in the Roman Catholic Section .