Born on April 3, 1888 and from Hanover, New Hampshire, Kinkaid commanded Task Force 77 during the Leyte Gulf Battle in 1944. United States Navy Vice Admiral. A 1908 graduate of Annapolis Naval Academy, he began his naval career aboard battleships and his specific training was in ordnance engineering. After World War I he was assigned to the Bureau of Ordnance in Washington DC. Prior to the US entry into WWII he commanded a squadron of destroyers. In 1942 he was promoted to Rear Admiral and was placed in command of the Pacific Fleet Cruiser Division, participating in the Solomon Islands Campaign. The following January Kinkaid was placed in command of the North Pacific Fleet and regained possession of the Aleutian Islands. In November of 1943 he was promoted to Vice Admiral and became Commander of Allied Naval Forces and Commander of the 7th Fleet directing the US Navy and the Royal Australian Navy in both the New Guinea Campaign and the Battle of Leyte Gulf. After World War II Kinkaid was the Commander of the Eastern Sea Frontier and was in charge of the Atlantic Reserve Fleet. He retired from the navy in May of 1950.