Rodney Sturdee was a midshipman in the heavy cruiser Exeter during the Battle of the River Plate in December 1939, which resulted in the destruction of the German warship Admiral Graf Spee, a timely tonic early in the Second World War during a depressing period of mixed disaster and inactivity.

Slightly exceeding the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, Graf Spee weighed more than 10,000 tons. Unconventionally powered by large diesel engines conferring long range, equipped with a floatplane and six 11-inch guns, she was a formidable commerce raider, her class nicknamed by the British as “pocket battleships”.

Graf Spee and sister ship Deutschland left home waters before the outbreak of war and vanished into the southern Atlantic and Indian Oceans, thereafter harrying the merchant shipping of the Allied powers. To counter this threat, the British and French navies formed eight search groups based on places as far apart as Ceylon and the West Indies.

One of these, under Commodore Henry Harwood, consisted of the 8-inch gun cruiser Exeter, the light 6-inch gunned cruiser Ajax and her Royal New Zealand Navy sister ship, the Achilles. From rare wireless reports gallantly transmitted by merchant ships, Commodore Harwood deduced that the Graf Spee would soon be attracted towards the River Plate and made his dispositions accordingly. In the early dawn of December 13 he was rewarded by the sighting of smoke on the horizon. Exeter was sent to investigate and soon made the heart-stopping signal: “I think it is a pocket battleship.”

The first phase of the battle ended with Graf Spee concentrating on Exeter and damaging her so badly that, on fire and listing heavily, she had to withdraw to the Falkland Islands with 58 dead, many wounded and only one of her three gun turrets still in action. As a “spotting officer” in one of the turrets, Sturdee was lucky to survive.

The ferocity of attacks by the two light cruisers drove the Graf Spee into Montevideo, Uruguay, where, short of fuel and ammunition, trammelled by the legalities affecting combatants in neutral ports and deluded by the arrival of the cruiser Cumberland into thinking that the feeble blockade had been strongly reinforced, Captain Langsdorff scuttled his ship on December 17 and shot himself soon afterwards.

Arthur Rodney Barry Sturdee was educated at Canford School, Dorset, and joined Dartmouth naval college as a special entry cadet in 1937. Promoted lieutenant in 1941, he specialised in navigation and was awarded the DSC for his skill, perseverance and great devotion to duty while serving in the 12th minesweeping flotilla in the Mediterranean during 1944 and 1945. In operations where mistakes in navigation usually had fatal results, Sturdee took part in many actions that matched the Allies’ painful advance up the west coast of Italy, including Husky, the invasion of Sicily, and Avalanche, the Salerno landings. It was reported that the flotilla swept a total of 770 mines, frequently targeted by shore batteries and under air attack.

While working at the Joint Services Staff College in 1953 Sturdee met his future wife, Marie-Claire Amstoutz, at the French Embassy, the couple reportedly becoming known as the most glamorous among the British Joint Services Mission in Washington. In 1955 he was posted to the Mediterranean as fleet navigating officer and was subsequently second in command of the major air station at Culdrose, Cornwall. Promoted captain, he was Queen’s harbour master in Singapore, followed by tours on the staff of the Chief of Defence Staff and Flag Officer Portsmouth. He retired in 1972 after a delightful tour as Flag Officer Gibraltar and was appointed CB.

Sturdee enjoyed a second career as the bursar at Malvern Girls’ College until 1985. He also served as president of the Worcestershire branch of the Royal British Legion and Malvern Sea Cadets and was a governor of Canford School.

His wife Marie-Claire died in 1995, and in 2001, at the age of 81, he was married to Joyce, herself a widow, whom he had first met 20 years earlier. He is survived by her and the two daughters and son of his first marriage.

Rear-Admiral Rodney Sturdee, CB, DSC, Flag Officer Gibraltar 1969-72, was born on December 6, 1919. He died on October 6, 2009, aged 89