Born at
Brixworth,
Northamptonshire, in 1874, Carpendale came of a long line of
clergymen. He was the son of the Rev. William Henry Carpendale, by his marriage to Julia Ellen, a daughter of Henry Hall Joy, of
Hartham Park, Wiltshire; the grandson of the Rev. William Carpendale, Rector of
Silton,
Dorset; He joined
HMS Britannia, a Cadet Training Ship, at
Dartmouth, in 1887. He was commissioned as a
Lieutenant in 1894, promoted to Commander in 1904, and to Captain in 1910. In February 1911, he was given command of
HMS Good Hope and went on to command the armoured cruiser
Shannon (1912 to 1914) and then another cruiser,
Donegal, in the first year of the First World War (1914 to 1915).
Donegal had just been refitted and was assigned to the 5th Cruiser Squadron at
Sierra Leone for convoy protection duties. In January 1915 she was transferred to the 6th Cruiser Squadron of the
Grand Fleet. After that until 1917 Carpendale was
flag captain to
Admiral Sir Lewis Bayly at
Queenstown until taking command of the armoured cruiser
Achilles in June 1917. In March 1918 he was put in charge of Auxiliary Patrol Area XVII as a
Commodore. Following the First World War, Carpendale commanded
HMS Benbow from 1919 to 1921, during which time he commanded a landing party of Royal Marines from
Benbow and
Marlborough at the time of the
Occupation of Constantinople during the
Greco-Turkish War. On 6 July 1921, while commanding
Benbow, he was promoted to Rear-Admiral. He retired from the Royal Navy (at his own request) on 1 August 1923 and joined the Retired List. On 25 October 1926, he was promoted to
Vice-Admiral. In 1940, as the British war effort in the
Second World War was intensified, Carpendale agreed to serve as the
Ministry of Information's Liaison Officer at the
Air Ministry and was brought back from retirement. ==BBC and International Broadcasting Union==