Admiral Sir Wilmot Hawksworth Fawkes, GCB, KCVO (22 December 1846 – 29 May 1926) was a Royal Navy officer who went on to be Commander-in-Chief, Plymouth.

[5] He then took command of HMS Mercury on the China station, returning to England in 1897 to be Private Naval Secretary to the First Lord of the Admiralty in 1897.

[7][8] In October 1902, he was appointed in command of the Cruiser Squadron,[9][10] and temporary hoisted his flag in HMS Hero, tender to the gunnery school Excellent.

[11] The armoured cruiser HMS Good Hope was scheduled to be his flagship for the squadron, but was first ordered to take the Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain on a trip to South Africa.

Fawkes hoisted his flag on the Good Hope on 23 November, and the ship left Portsmouth with Chamberlain and his wife on board two days later.