Renowned as the author of a bestselling autobiography, One of Our Submarines, which was published in 1952, Edward Young was also the first Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve (RNVR) officer in history to command a submarine, and one of the most successful. In a war which took him from patrols in the Arctic, via operations in the Far East based on Trincomalee, to the west coast of Australia in the submarine Storm, which he commanded from mid-1943 almost to the end of hostilities, he was awarded the DSO and two DSCs.

His career in publishing was no less distinguished. He was born in 1913 and, after leaving Highgate School, Edward Preston Young joined The Bodley Head as an office boy. There his artistic talent led him into designing book jackets. When The Bodley Head’s director, Allen Lane, decided to break away and set up on his own, he took Young with him to look after production and design.

The name Penguin was chosen, and Young was sent to the zoo to draw a penguin for the company symbol. Contributing more than just the famous bird, he proposed the original orange-white-orange cover for their novels and the colour-coding — green for crime, cherry pink for travel, dark blue for biography and pale blue for economics and politics in Pelicans — which gave Penguin books their characteristic prominence worldwide.

Young left Penguin for the Reprint Society in 1939. As a keen yachtsman and maritime student in civilian life, he qualified for direct entry into the RNVR as a sub-lieutenant at the outbreak of war and, having volunteered for submarines, went on his first patrol in the ancient submarine H28 in October 1940.

Serving next in the brand new Umpire in July 1941, he was below in the wardroom when she was accidentally rammed and sunk, while on the surface at night, by a trawler which was escorting a convoy. Rapid flooding caused Umpire to hit the bottom at 80 feet, Young and three others making an extemporised escape without breathing apparatus using the top and bottom hatches of the conning tower trunk as an air lock. The CO and 14 men were saved, but 22 were drowned in this disaster.

As torpedo officer of the Sealion, Young operated from Murmansk for a few months until appointed second-in-command of the newly built Saracen, commanded by the distinguished Lieutenant Michael Lumby. This submarine was at sea, working up the skills of an inexperienced crew in the North Atlantic off the Faeroes when a U-boat was sighted making her way to the Atlantic. A snap attack sank her and the one survivor was made prisoner. Young was awarded a mention in dispatches.

Saracen was subsequently ordered to the beleaguered island fortress of Malta to join the 10th Submarine Flotilla — the famous “Fighting Tenth” — whose base was under constant air attack from enemy aircraft flying from nearby Sicily. Young’s efficiency and coolness were rewarded by the DSC when Saracen sank the Italian submarine Granito off Sicily in November 1942.

In January 1943 he was selected for the CO’s qualifying course — known as the “perisher” probably from its original title, the Periscope School, coupled with its strict attitude to standards — which he passed successfully. He cut his teeth commanding the P555 — an ex-American submarine, used mainly for training anti-submarine forces.

Then, in June 1943, he was appointed to command the new submarine Storm then building at Cammell Laird’s at Birkenhead. The celebrated Admiral Sir Max Horton, C-in-C Western Approaches, came down to see him off to his first patrol.

Storm’s first patrol north of the Arctic Circle was uneventful. By January 1944 the Allies had established a strategic mastery of the Mediterranean and the operational focus shifted to the war against Japan. Storm, with others and her depot ship, moved to Ceylon and started operations in the narrow Malacca Strait.

Peculiarities abounded in an atmosphere which was at a far remove from the operating conditions of the North Atlantic. The sea in the area was generally very shallow; the water was often calm and clear so that periscopes were easily seen; while a failure of air-conditioning became intolerable and abbreviated the patrol. The many gun actions in which the submarine was involved required extra ammunition boxes to be stowed in places not usually allowed by Naval Magazine Regulations. Young assiduously tended the morale of his men by writing a lightly amusing daily news sheet which told everyone about destinations, latest news, plans and also urged economy in water consumption and gave health tips for tropical conditions.

Sighting a Japanese submarine on his first patrol, Young was disappointed to be unable to close sufficiently to attack. Thereafter his luck — and skill — improved and he was awarded a Bar to his DSC for the results of four war patrols with the Far Eastern Fleet. In April he sank a minesweeper and subsequently several other vessels in support of the overall campaign to deny the Japanese any use of the sea for military purposes.

A particularly hair-raising cloak-and-dagger action involved the landing of an agent by rubber boat on Pulau Weh island on the northwest tip of Sumatra. When the submarine approached to recover the agent four days later, the prearranged Morse code signal by light, although correct, was late and was being transmitted from the wrong place.