Admiral Briscoe graduated from the United States Naval Academy in June 1918. During World War I he served on the battleship USS Alabama (BB-8) of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet and on the destroyer USS Roe (DD-24), operating from Brest, France. At the end of hostilities, he made the first postwar Midshipmen cruise in the USS Kearsarge (BB-5) and in 1919 returned to destroyer duty as Engineer Officer of the USS Humphreys (DD-236), stationed in Near East waters at Constantinople. During the Turko-Greek fighting in 1920-1921, he commanded a naval landing force at Derindge, Turkey.