Sir Geoffrey Cecil Congreve, 1st Baronet

Sir Geoffrey Cecil Congreve, 1st Baronet, (19 July 1897 – 28 July 1941) was a British Royal Navy officer and landowner. He is known as the commander of a trawler force that took part in the 1940 Namsos campaign. He was killed in 1941 in Operation Chess, a commando raid on France. Early life Congreve was the second son of General Sir Walter Congreve and his wife Cecilia Henrietta Dolores La Touche, daughter of Cecil D'Urban La Touche of the Bombay Army. Billy Congreve (1891–1916) was his elder brother. Congreve was educated at the Royal Naval College, Osborne, from 1911, and the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. In 1915 he was a midshipman on , and served in the Grand Fleet through the First World War. During the period 1919 to 1923, when his father was General Officer Commanding, British Troops in Egypt and Palestine, he was in 1921–2 his aide-de-camp. Walter Congreve died in 1927 as Governor of Malta. The baronetcy intended for him was given that year to Geoffrey, his eldest surviving son, the seat being Congreve, Staffordshire. Geoffrey Congreve retired from the navy in 1928, with the rank of lieutenant commander. He farmed an estate of