Walter McLean was born on July 30, 1855, in Elizabeth, New Jersey. His father was Col. George Washington McLean, who organized, equipped, and commanded a New Jersey regiment in the Civil War; his mother, Rebecca J. McCormick, daughter of James McCormick, whose Maryland estatewas Mount Pleasant, now a part of Baltimore, near the site of Johns Hopkins University.
Destined by his father for a military career, the boy early decided on the navy, and at fourteen took affairs into his own hands by running away. Going to Washington he called on President Grant, a friend of his father, and applied for an appointment to Annapolis. Though it was necessary for him to spend some time further in study, the appointment was promised, and in June 1872, he entered the Naval Academy.
Graduated the Naval Academy in 1876, McLean had his first duty on the Trenton, then fitting out for the European Squadron. After later duty on the North Atlantic Station, he was ordered in 1879 to the Asiatic Station, where he spent three years. On being detached and ordered to Washington for instruction in ordnance, he returned by way of Russia, journeying over the barren wastes of Siberia to Moscow. Varied duties followed, with two assignments in the Coast Survey. In 1891 he received his commission as lieutenant. Four years later he was again sent to the East, and he was there at the outbreak of the Spanish-American War, attached to the old sidewheeler Monocacy. Dewey, realizing the need of more officers and men, detached McLean from this ship on April 25, 1898, and ordered him to the Olympia. When he reported, May 11, he was placed by Dewey on his staff and became the senior aide. There was need of supplies and also of communications with the United States by way of Hong-Kong. McLean was repeatedly sent in charge of the little supply steamer Zafiro to attend to both. Promotion followed rapidly: to lieutenant commander, 1899; commander, 1905; captain, 1908. From 1903 to 1906, he was attached to the Bureau of Ordnance, and then was sent to the Philippines as commandant of the naval station at Cavite and Olongapo. In 1914, he was promoted to the rank of rear admiral. After two years and a half in Washington as a member of the naval examining and retiring boards, he was given a part in the troubled affairs of Mexico by being ordered to relieve Admiral Mayo in command of the fleet off Vera Cruz (1914). The following year he was placed in command of the Norfolk navy-yard and the fifth naval district. When the World War broke out and the United States was finally swept into it, this duty became of great importance. The naval operating base established at Hampton Roads was the scene of intense activity, and large numbers of recruits were there assembled and trained. In addition to this duty McLean was the navy representative in the War Council appointed by the director general of railroads. On March 15, 1919, after forty-seven years of service in the navy, twenty-two years at sea, he was at his own request placed on the retired list. His last residence was in Annapolis, Maryland, where he died.
Under McLean's command, the Shipyard was the holding area for various German vessels which had put into port during World War I, and stayed in a somewhat limbo status - the United States had not entered the war and so could not commandeer the ships, but then neither could the ships be allowed to depart and resume attacks on Allied shipping. The course of action was therefore to keep the foreign ships and their crews as "guests" of the United States for years.
McLean was married in 1887 to Emma Bowne Jarvis of Cooperstown, N. Y. , by whom he had a daughter.
