commander

   A professional title used on its own or followed by the last name of the person concerned. In the navy a commander is a commissioned officer who is next in rank to a captain. If he were in command of a ship he would be addressed by the honorary title of ‘Captain’. Probably the most famous commander in literature is Commander Bond, otherwise known as 007, the superman created by Ian Fleming. In the police force a commander is a high-ranking officer, his exact status varying slightly in Britain and the USA. In The Choirboys, by Joseph Wambaugh, which is a black comedy about the Los Angeles police force, occurs the following: ‘Now drink your Pink Lady,’ Commander Moss commanded. (It was Hector Moss who had persuaded the chief of police that the traditional police rank of ‘inspector’ was no longer viable in an era of violence when policemen are called upon to employ counter insurgency tactics. Thanks to Moss all officers formerly of the inspector rank could now call themselves ‘commander’. There is a joking misuse of ‘Commander-inChief’ in The Limits of Love, by Frederic Raphael, where an adult son uses it to his father.