Daniel J. Murphy

Who was Daniel J. Murphy?

Daniel Joseph Murphy, Sr. was a four-star admiral in the United States Navy and an official in the Carter and Reagan administrations.

Murphy grew up in Brooklyn, and graduated from the University of Maryland and the Naval War College. He joined the Navy in 1943, during his second year at St. John's University in New York, and flew anti-submarine patrols over the North Atlantic during World War II.

During the 1960s he was commanding officer of the aircraft carrier Bennington. He commanded the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean during the Arab-Israeli War of 1973 and the Cyprus crisis of 1974. He retired from active service in 1977. Murphy's son, Vice Admiral Daniel J. Murphy, Jr., later also commanded the Sixth Fleet, from 1998 to 2000.

Murphy was principal military assistant to successive Secretaries of Defense Melvin R. Laird and Elliot Richardson, deputy director of the CIA in 1976 and 1977, and Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy at the Pentagon from 1977 to 1980 under Jimmy Carter. He was Vice President George H. W. Bush's chief of staff from 1981 to 1985.