Description
Object description
Privately printed memoirs (195pp ts, with illustrative material) of his early childhood and youth in various parts of Yorkshire during the 1920s – 1930s, including Dinnington and Hull, with particular regard to his life in the latter city where he completed part of his schooling as a pupil at Trinity House before serving a merchant navy apprenticeship initially with Brown Atkinson & Co shipping company in the MV SKIPSEA shortly before the Second World War, taking cargo to and from the USA and Far East, then in the SS SUTHERLAND until the outbreak of war in 1939, after which he joined the SS BLAIRESK running cargo to and from northern Canada, being severely wounded on one of these voyages when the ship came under attack from a German aircraft off the coast of Scotland in ? August 1940, resulting in his hospitalisation and consequent home leave in Hull, referring to life there under regular air raids, re-joining the merchant service in September 1941 in the tanker SAN EMILIANO until she was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-155 off Trinidad in August 1942, describing the circumstances in some detail (his actions on that occasion leading to the award of the MBE), his rescue and return to the UK via the USA, and subsequent experiences until the conclusion of his sea service in 1946, the remainder of the memoirs documenting his postwar life until 2007, mainly in the management of the Paddockhurst Estate at Balcombe in Sussex.
Content description
Privately printed memoirs (195pp ts, with illustrative material) of his early childhood and youth in various parts of Yorkshire during the 1920s – 1930s, including Dinnington and Hull, with particular regard to his life in the latter city where he completed part of his schooling as a pupil at Trinity House before serving a merchant navy apprenticeship initially with Brown Atkinson & Co shipping company in the MV SKIPSEA shortly before the Second World War, taking cargo to and from the USA and Far East, then in the SS SUTHERLAND until the outbreak of war in 1939, after which he joined the SS BLAIRESK running cargo to and from northern Canada, being severely wounded on one of these voyages when the ship came under attack from a German aircraft off the coast of Scotland in ? August 1940, resulting in his hospitalisation and consequent home leave in Hull, referring to life there under regular air raids, re-joining the merchant service in September 1941 in the tanker SAN EMILIANO until she was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-155 off Trinidad in August 1942, describing the circumstances in some detail (his actions on that occasion leading to the award of the MBE), his rescue and return to the UK via the USA, and subsequent experiences until the conclusion of his sea service in 1946, the remainder of the memoirs documenting his postwar life until 2007, mainly in the management of the Paddockhurst Estate at Balcombe in Sussex.
History note
Cataloguer SWW