Thomas G. Fuller

Who was Thomas G. Fuller?

Captain Thomas George Fuller was a Canadian naval officer who earned renown in the Second World War for his actions as a member of the Coastal Forces of the Royal Navy.

Born in Ottawa, he was a 32 year old contractor when he joined the Royal Canadian Navy in 1939. He was seconded to the British Navy where he commanded flotillas of motor torpedo boats in the Mediterranean Sea and the Adriatic Sea.

He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for an action off Dover on 12 May 1942 before being transferred to Alexandria and HMS Mosquito in 1943. While there he won a bar to his DSC for actions in the Aegean.

In 1944 he took command of the 61st MGB flotilla, 8 torpedo gunboats, based on Vis island, Yugoslavia. It was here, while conducting raids on Axis shipping to provide supplies to Josip Broz Tito's partisans, that he earned a second bar to his DSC and a Mention in Despatches, as well as the nickname The Pirate of the Adriatic. He was known as the Pirate of the Adriatic because he carried commandos and captured dozens of ships intact carrying useful cargo such as tons of goulash and Danish Butter. For example, he sank or captured 25 ships in 10 days.