Louis Mountbatten

Louis Mountbatten (1900-1979), 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, was a British naval officer, statesman, and uncle to Prince Philip. A key WWII Allied commander and last Viceroy of India, he took a keen interest in UFOs. In 1950, his public statements on flying saucers in the Sunday Dispatch spurred the UK Ministry of Defence to form the secret Flying Saucer Working Party. Mountbatten held 'far-fetched' views on extraterrestrial origins of UFOs, as noted in Philip Ziegler's 1985 biography. In 1955, he personally investigated a close encounter on his Broadlands Estate in Hampshire, where retired sergeant Frederick Briggs reported a spinning top-shaped craft with a descending humanoid figure via a central column. Mountbatten interviewed Briggs, deeming him credible and not prone to hallucinations. No notable publications by Mountbatten survive, but his report appears in Timothy Good's Above Top Secret. His UFO enthusiasm influenced Prince Philip's lifelong interest. Assassinated by the IRA in 1979.