Allegiance Great Britain Commands held HMS Thistle Name Hector Boyes | Years of service 1895–1934 Other work Diplomat Died October 23, 1960 Rank Rear admiral | |
Born February 20, 1881 ( 1881-02-20 ) Battles/wars Boxer RebellionWorld War IEast Africa Campaign Awards Commander of the Order of St Michael and St GeorgeOrder of Aviz (Portugal)mentioned in dispatches (7) Battles and wars Boxer Rebellion, East African Campaign, World War I | ||
Rear Admiral Hector George Boyes CMG CIE (20 February 1881 - 23 October 1960) was an officer of the Royal Navy.
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Background, early career, and World War I
Hector Boyes was born in 1881 at Plymouth, the son of a naval officer: he entered the service shortly before his fourteenth birthday. He saw action in the Boxer Rebellion, and by the outbreak of World War I, he was thirty-three years old, and the Flag Lieutenant to the Commander-in-Chief of the China Station.
In 1915, Lieutenant-Commander Boyes was assigned to command the gunboat HMS Thistle in the East Africa Campaign. In the subsequent fighting, he was mentioned in dispatches seven times, and earned the Order of St Michael and St George and the Portuguese Order of Aviz.
Shore appointments and diplomatic duties
In 1919, Commander Boyes, now 38 years old, married Eleonora Bille de Falsen, a twenty-year-old half-Norwegian, half-Afrikaaner. From January 1920 to December 1921 he commanded HMS Hollyhock on the China station. Subsequently, he was promoted to captain, commanding the Australian naval academy at Flinders, the British squadron in the Persian Gulf, and the shore base at Simon's Town in South Africa, before being appointed Chief of Staff to the Commander-in-Chief, The Nore.
Captain Boyes took retirement with the rank of rear admiral in 1934, but he was subsequently appointed as a naval attache with the temporary rank of captain, serving in Oslo, where he was responsible for obtaining an important dossier of German military blueprints.
Admiral Boyes continued in the diplomatic service during World War II, serving as attache in Tokyo until the outbreak of the Pacific War, and then at various embassies in Latin America. He retired for a second time on 31 March 1947, and died in 1960.