Intelligence Department, Commander J. V. Babcock, who also acted as aid; Convoy Operations, Captain Byron A. Long; Anti-Submarine Section, Captain R. H. Leigh; Aviation, Captain H. I. Cone, and afterward, Lieutenant Commander W. A. Edwards; Personnel, Commander H. R. Stark; Communications, Lieutenant Commander E. G. Blakeslee; Material, Captain E. C. Tobey; Repairs, Captain S. F. Smith, and afterward, Naval Constructor L. B. McBride; Ordnance, Commander G. L. Schuyler, and afterward Commander T. A. Thomson; Medical Section, Captain F. L. Pleadwell, and afterward, Commander Edgar Thompson; Legal Section, Commander W. H. McGrann; Scientific Section, Professor H. A. Bumstead, Ph. D. This large establishment in Grosvenor Gardens had been built up from the small beginning in 1917 when Admiral Sims, accompanied by his aid, arrived just after war was declared. Entrusted first with the duty of conferring with the British Admiralty and reporting the naval situation with his recommendations, Admiral Sims was soon designated as commander of our forces in European waters with the rank of vice admiral, and before the armistice was promoted to admiral. Keeping in constant touch with the British and other Admiralties, representing our Navy upon the Allied Naval Council, the information he secured, with that furnished us by Allied naval officers stationed in Washington, enabled the Navy Department to keep pace with all naval activities, and his recommendations were taken into consideration in important decisions that were made. Serving with zeal and ability, he won the regard and confidence of his associates of the allied navies, and received high honors from European governments. In addition to the daily exchange of messages between London headquarters and Washington, information from special Government missions, and the intimate intercourse of officers of all the Allied navies, high ranking officials of our Navy from time to time went to Europe for conferences and inspection of our forces and activities, among them Assistant Secretary Roosevelt and Admirals Benson, Mayo and Gleaves. The Assistant Secretary, going over in the destroyer _Dyer_, spent six weeks abroad in the summer of 1918. He had conferences with the Allied naval authorities in London, Paris and Rome, and inspected our bases and mine depots, and witnessed the work of laying the North Sea barrage. Reporting that our personnel there had done well under hazardous and difficult circumstances, he advised a like mine barrage across the strait of Otranto.