Ships
- USS Monterey (CVL-26) Captain from 20 March 1945 · Relieved on 17 February 1946
John Ballachey Lyon was born on 14 October 1898 and made his career as a United States Navy aviator. He entered the Naval Academy at Annapolis with the Class of 1920. The First World War sent him to sea in the Atlantic while he was still a midshipman, and he was commissioned an ensign in 1919, when that class was graduated early. In 1922 he qualified as a naval aviator.
Between the wars he served with aircraft squadrons of the Atlantic Fleet and the Pacific Fleet and commanded two of those squadrons. He attended the Naval War College, served on the staff of the commander of Aircraft, Pacific Fleet, and spent a year in Argentina as a United States naval adviser. He was promoted to commander on 1 July 1940 and to captain, in the temporary wartime grade, on 18 June 1942.
His first carrier command was the escort carrier Croatan. From 28 April 1943 until 23 November 1943 he took her on anti-submarine operations in the Atlantic, the hunter-killer work in which escort carriers and their aircraft patrolled the convoy lanes for German U-boats.
On 20 March 1945 Lyon assumed command of the light aircraft carrier Monterey (CVL-26). The Independence-class ship, converted from a cruiser hull, had already served with the fast carriers across the central Pacific. Under Lyon she returned for the last months of the war. In May 1945 her aircraft flew in the raids supporting the Okinawa campaign. In July and August she operated with the Third Fleet in the attacks on the Japanese home islands.
After Japan’s surrender, Monterey entered Japanese waters and embarked troops at Tokyo. She departed on 7 September 1945 and arrived at New York on 17 October. Lyon remained in command through the winter that followed the ship’s return. He was relieved on 17 February 1946.
Lyon retired in 1949 as a rear admiral and was recalled to active duty on the Munitions Board until the summer of 1950. He then spent several years in Washington as secretary-treasurer of the Armed Forces Relief and Benefit Association, and he served as chairman of the Naval Academy Class of 1920. He died in 1972.