The third son of
Lord Clanmorris, Edward Bingham was born in
Bangor Castle,
County Down, Ireland. Educated at
Arnold House and in
HMS Britannia, he entered the Royal Navy in 1895 as an acting sub-lieutenant. He was confirmed as a
sub-lieutenant 15 March 1901. At the beginning of the First World War, he was appointed
Commander (Executive Officer) of , which saw action at the
Battle of the Falkland Islands in December 1914. On 31 May 1916, during the
Battle of Jutland off Denmark, Commander Bingham was in command of a
destroyer division. He led his division in their attack, first on enemy destroyers and then on the battle cruisers of the German
High Seas Fleet. Once the enemy was sighted Bingham ordered his own destroyer, , and the one remaining destroyer of his division, , to close to within 2,750 meters of the opposing battle fleet so that he could bring his
torpedoes to bear. While making this attack
Nestor and
Nicator were under concentrated fire of the secondary batteries of the German fleet and
Nestor was subsequently sunk. For his actions, Bingham earned the
Victoria Cross, one of relatively few awarded for naval bravery during
World War I. Bingham was picked up by the Germans at Jutland, and remained a
prisoner of war (latterly at
Holzminden) until the
Armistice. After the war, he remained with the Royal Navy and retired as a
Rear Admiral in 1932. He was made an
Officer of the Order of the British Empire. Bingham died in 1939 and is buried in the
Golders Green cemetery in northwest
London. == Family ==