William Sims

For more information on William Sowden Sims, visit Britannica.com.

Sims graduated from Annapolis in 1880. During the Spanish‐American War, he served as naval attaché in Paris, organizing espionage to report Spanish ship movements. Later he advocated improved gunnery, popularizing the techniques of the Englishman Sir Percy Scott. He commanded two battleships, Minnesota (1909–11) and Nevada (1915–16), but his most important command was the Atlantic Torpedo Flotilla (1913–15). He was president of the Naval War College when in March 1917 he was sent to London to coordinate the navy's role in World War I. He later became commander in chief of U.S. naval forces in European waters.

Admiral Sims immediately sensed the necessity for antisubmarine operations to counter Germany's adoption of unrestricted undersea warfare, a maritime strategy intended to force victory before the United States could make its presence felt. He recommended construction and deployment of antisubmarine craft to European waters to serve under British admirals such as Sir Lewis Bayley at Queenstown, Ireland. This course meant suspension of American naval construction intended to create a unified battle fleet. His views prevailed despite initial oppo sition from Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels and the chief of naval operations, Adm. William Benson, who concluded that Sims was unduly influenced by the British Admiralty. Sims emphasized protection of supply shipments to the Allies; the Navy Department stressed protection of troopships transporting the American Expeditionary Force to France. Sims generally supported Admiralty views, which made him popular in Britain but suspect at home.

After the war, an angry Sims sparked a congressional inquiry into naval affairs in 1917–18, arguing that the Navy Department's effort had been slow and misdirected. This investigation led to long‐term divisions within the officer corps. In 1920, he published The Victory at Sea, an account of his wartime service, which won the Pulitzer Prize.

[See also Navy, U.S.: 1899–1945; World War I: Military and Diplomatic Course.]

Bibliography

• Elting E. Morison, Admiral Sims and the Modern American Navy, 1952

Sims, William S. (1858-1936) commander of U.S. naval forces in Europe during World War I. Sims's Canadian family emigrated to the United States in 1872. Sims began his navy career as an instructor in naval navigation and as an intelligence officer; his expansive reports won the praise of Assistant Navy Secretary Theodore Roosevelt. Sims also reported on ordnance and on naval construction; he became an outspoken critic of the current class of navy battleships and encouraged the development of an alternative. After time spent at sea, in 1917 he became president of the Naval War College; when the United States entered World War I, he was appointed commander of all U.S. naval forces in Europe (1917-19) and made a temporary admiral. He continued to push for naval reforms and favored destroyers over the larger, less mobile battleships, and the use of supply convoys. His innovations drastically reduced Allied shipping losses in the waning days of the war.

See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.

William Sowden Sims (1858-1936), American admiral, commanded United States naval forces in European waters during World War I.

William Sims was born in Port Hope, Ontario, on Oct. 15, 1858. After graduating from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1880, he served in the Atlantic (1880-1888) and the Pacific (1889-1897). He was American naval attaché in Paris during the Spanish-American War. After additional service as attaché in St. Petersburg, Russia, and further duty at sea, he became inspector of target practice for the U.S. Asiatic fleet. He first came to public notice when he argued vigorously that gunnery was ineffective and in need of modernization. President Theodore Roosevelt made him his naval aide (1907-1909).

In 1909 Sims assumed command of the battleship Minnesota. His next assignment was as a student at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. (1911-1913), to which he returned as president in 1917, after commanding the destroyer flotilla in the Atlantic.

In 1917, after Germany resumed unrestricted submarine warfare against noncombatant vessels, Rear Adm. Sims was dispatched to Europe to establish contact with the naval staffs of the Allies. On April 28 he assumed command of American naval forces in European waters, rising to vice admiral a month later. Sims urged the Navy Department to send all available antisubmarine craft to European waters to participate in convoys and offensive operations against German submarines. At the same time he struggled to build his organization in London. Rapidly gaining the confidence of the British Admiralty, he just as quickly created suspicion in Washington that he was unduly pro-British.

Various controversies with the Navy Department deeply angered Sims, but he remained at his post. Throughout 1917-1918 Sims tried to make the American fleet an effective adjunct of the British fleet, especially in the submarine war, and to provide naval support for the American Army in France. An advocate of close inter-Allied cooperation, he became a leading spirit in the Allied Naval Council, set up in 1917 to coordinate the naval operations of the Western coalition. His contribution to the victory at sea earned him the lasting praise and admiration of his European associates and promotion to full admiral.

After the war Sims resumed the presidency of the Naval War College (1919-1922). In 1920 he presented an angry report to Congress criticizing the wartime conduct of the Navy Department for its failure to react promptly against Germany's submarine warfare. He received a Pulitzer Prize for an account of his wartime service, The Victory at Sea (1920). He died in Boston on Sept. 28, 1936.

Further Reading

An excellent biography of Sims is Elting E. Morison, Admiral Sims and the Modern American Navy (1942).

For other persons named William Sims, see William Sims (disambiguation).

William Sowden Sims
October 15, 1858(1858-10-15) – September 25, 1936 (aged 77)
Vice Admiral William Sowden Sims
Place of birth	Port Hope, Ontario, Canada
Place of death	Boston, Massachusetts
Allegiance	United States of America
Service/branch	United States Navy
Years of service	1880 – 1922
Rank	Admiral
Commands held	Naval War College U.S. Naval Forces Operating in European Waters (WWI)
Battles/wars	World War I
Other work	Pulitzer Prize

William Sowden Sims (October 15, 1858 – September 25, 1936) was an admiral in the United States Navy who sought during the late 19th and early 20th centuries to modernize the Navy. During World War I he commanded all United States naval forces operating in Europe. He also served twice as President of the Naval War College.

Sims was born to American parents living in Port Hope, Ontario, Canada. He graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1880, the beginnings of an era of naval reform and greater professionalization. Commodore Stephen B. Luce founded the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, in 1884, to be the Service's professional school. During the same era, Naval War College instructor Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan was writing influential books on naval strategy and sea power.

As a young officer, Sims sought to reform naval gunnery by improving target practice. His superiors resisted his suggestions, failing to see the necessity. He was also hindered by his low rank. Never one to let obstacles stand in his way, Sims overcame the opposition by writing directly (in 1902) to President Theodore Roosevelt. The President, who had previously served as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, was intrigued by Sims' ideas and made him the Navy's Inspector of Target Practice.

When the United States entered World War I, then-Rear Admiral Sims was serving as President of the Naval War College. Just before the U.S. entered the war, the Wilson Administration sent him to London as a naval representative. After the U.S. entry, Sims was given command over U.S. naval forces operating from Britain. He ended the war as a vice admiral, in command of all U.S. naval forces operating in Europe.

Sims served a second tour as President of the Naval War College (1919–1922), and retired in October 1922. His account of the U.S. naval effort during World War I, The Victory at Sea, won the 1921 Pulitzer Prize for History. In 1929 Sims received an LL.D. from Bates College. He died in Boston, Massachusetts, with the rank of full admiral.

Contents 1 Legacy 2 See also 3 External links 4 References

Legacy

Several U.S. Navy vessels have been named for Sims. Three ships have been named USS Sims, while a transport vessel was named USS Admiral W. S. Sims (AP-127).

See also

• List of people on the cover of Time Magazine: 1920s

External links

• Sims (DD-409), Dictionary of American Fighting Naval Ships
• Admiral W.S. Sims (AP-127) Dictionary of American Fighting Naval Ships
• Naval History Bibliography, World War I, 1917-198, Naval Historical Center
• Register of the Papers of William S. Sims
• History of the Naval War College (from NWC website)
• William Sims at Find a Grave Retrieved on 2008-02-11

References

• Allard, Dean C. "Admiral William S. Sims and United States Naval Policy in World War I." American Neptune 35 (April 1975): 97–110.
• Hagan, Kenneth J. “The Critic Within.” Naval History (December 1998): 20-25.
• Hagan, Kenneth J. “William S. Sims: Naval Insurgent and Coalition Warrior.” In The Human Tradition in the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. Ballard C. Campbell, ed. Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, 2000, 187-203.
• Little, Branden, and Kenneth J. Hagan, “Radical, But Right: William Sowden Sims (1858-1936),” in Nineteen Gun Salute: Case Studies of Operational, Strategic, and Diplomatic Naval Leadership during the 20th and early 21st Centuries. Eds. John B. Hattendorf and Bruce Elleman (Newport, RI and Washington, D.C.: Naval War College Press & Government Printing Office, 2009).
• Morison, Elting E. Admiral Sims and the Modern American Navy. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1942.
• Simpson, Michael. “William S. Sims, U.S. Navy, and Admiral Sir Lewis Bayly, Royal Navy: An Unlikely Friendship, and Anglo-American Cooperation.” Naval War College Review, Vol. 41 (Spring 1988): 60-80.

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