Death of Captain Grenville Philip Johnson MBE RN

29 Apr 2026 - I regret to announce that MCDOA member Grenville crossed the bar at lunchtime yesterday with his family around him. He had been suffering from a debilitating cancer for the past couple of years but remained stoic throughout and his end was peaceful. He would have been 72 tomorrow and his death comes as a personal blow because he was the ‘baby’ on my Long MCD Officers’ Course at HMS VERNON (now Gunwharf Quays) exactly 50 years ago.

Grenville originally qualified as a submariner and served as the Torpedo Officer of HMS OTUS before transferring to General Service whereupon he served as the Ship’s Diving Officer of the Tribal class frigate HMS MOHAWK. After qualifying as an MCD officer in 1976, his appointments included XO of the Ton class minehunter HMS SHERATON and assistant to the late ‘Uncle Bill’ Filer GM MBE at DTU (Deep Trials Unit) Haslar, part of RNPL (Royal Naval Physiological Laboratory) at Alverstoke. He appears on the right in this photo on page 112 of Combat Frogmen: Military Diving from the Nineteenth Century to the Present Day by Michael Welham.

Grenville went on to qualify as a PWO (Principal Warfare Officer) and serve as the PWO(U) of the Type 42 destroyer HMS MANCHESTER. He was then appointed as the first CO of the Sandown class minehunter HMS INVERNESS which has since been transferred to the Estonian Navy in 2006 and renamed ENS SAKALA. He also served as senior naval officer in the Falklands and ended his naval career working for MPDSAP, the MOD’s Saudi Arabian Project, both as a serving Captain and then as a civilian.

Grenville was a staunch supporter of Project Vernon, the successful campaig to erect a monument celebrating all personnel - past, present and future - involved in naval mine warfare, service diving and bomb & mine disposal. He was among our team that visited the the Morris Singer foundry at Lasham in Hampshire where our monument was cast in February/March 2020, and ran the invitation list for our two-year Covid-delayed dedication in July 2022.

Most recently, Grenville, together with his wife Sandra, has made pilgrimages from Manchester to Portsmouth to see old friends while he was still able.

I will announce any funeral details as they become available. In the meantime, I’m sure all members of our community will join me in extending our sincere condolences to Grenville’s wife Sandra, their sons Phil & Chris, and their daughter Hayley.