Lord Louis Mountbatten

First World War

At the age of 16, Mountbatten was posted as midshipman to the battlecruiserHMS Lion in July 1916 and, after seeing action in August, transferred to the battleship HMS Queen Elizabeth during the closing phases of the First World War. In 1917, when the royal family abandoned their German names and titles and adopted the more British-sounding "Windsor", Mountbatten acquired the courtesy title appropriate to a younger son of a marquess, becoming known as Lord Louis Mountbatten (Lord Louis for short) until he was created a peer in his own right in 1946. He paid a ten-day visit to the Western Front in July 1918.