Bernard Rawlings (Royal Navy officer)
Sir Henry Bernard Hughes Rawlings, was a Royal Navy officer who served as Flag Officer, Eastern Mediterranean during the Second World War.Naval career
Rawlings was born in St Erth, Cornwall, England, on 21 May 1889. Following education at Stubbington House School, Rawlings joined the Royal Navy in 1904 and served in the First World War. After the war he worked for the Foreign Office and undertook Military Missions in Poland. He then commanded the destroyer and then the cruisers and before becoming Naval Attaché in Tokyo in 1936.
Rawlings served in the Second World War, initially commanding the battleship, then commanding the 1st Battle Squadron from 1940 before commanding the 7th Cruiser Squadron from 1941 and becoming Assistant Chief of Naval Staff in 1942. He became Flag Officer, West Africa in 1943 and Flag Officer, Eastern Mediterranean in 1943. He went on to be second-in-command of the British Pacific Fleet with his flag in. He commanded British Task Force 57 in the Pacific from 1944 through the Battle of Okinawa in the spring of 1945, and retired in 1946.
Rawlings died in Bodmin, Cornwall, England, on 30 September 1962.
