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Object description
British ordnance artificer served aboard HMS Fiji, 15th Cruiser Sqdn in North Atlantic and Mediterranean, 1/1941-5/1941 including sinking in Kithera Channel, 22/5/1941; served aboard HMS Petard, 12th Destroyer Flotilla in GB coastal waters and Mediterranean, 1/1942-12/1943; served aboard HMS Petard, 11th Destroyer Flotilla, Eastern Fleet in Indian Ocean, 1/1944-8/1944; petty officer served as instructor with Gunnery School, HMS Excellent, Whale Island, GB, 9/1944-12/1945
Content description
REEL 1 Background in Dundee and Portsmouth, GB, 1919-1939: family; education; employment as apprentice with Vosper Ltd in Portsmouth; membership of Territorial Army, 1937-1938. Aspects of enlistment and training as ordnance artificer at with Gunnery School, HMS Excellent, Whale Island in GB, 1940: background to volunteering as ordnance artificer; advantages of being an ordnance artificer; opinion of training; formation of anti-invasion platoons; public morale during German Air Force attacks on Portsmouth, 1940-1941; listening to radio broadcasts by Prime Minister Winston Churchill and William Joyce, 'Lord Haw Haw'. Recollections of operations as ordnance artificer aboard HMS Fiji, 15th Cruiser Sqdn in North Atlantic and Mediterranean, 1/1941-5/1941: drafting to ship in River Clyde, 1/1941; wartime history of cruiser; brief patrolling in Denmark Straits, North Atlantic and transfer to Freetown, Sierra Leone, 3/1941; escorting slow convoy in North Atlantic, 3/1941-4/1941; joining Force H in Gibraltar, 5/1941.
REEL 2 Continues: abortive plan to intercept battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau off French coast, 4/1941; move to eastern Mediterranean, 9/5/1941-12/5/1941; transporting troops to Crete, Greece, 15/5/1941; naval situation off Crete, Greece, 5/1941. Recollections of sinking of HMS Fiji, 15th Cruiser Sqdn in Kithera Channel, 22/5/1941: role providing anti-aircraft fire for rescue of survivors of destroyer HMS Greyhound; action station on bridge; sinking of cruiser HMS Gloucester; damage caused by bomb dropped on ship by Messerschmitt Me 109; heroism of ship's doctor and padre; behaviour of ship's officers and crew during action; attitude to abandoning ship; misfire on port QF 2 Pounder Naval Gun; story of gunner attempting to count spent shell cases during action; abandoning ship; period in sea clinging to Carley Float.
REEL 3 Continues: arrival of HMS Kingston and HMS Kandahar; rescue of survivors; his treatment aboard HMS Kandahar; how he decided not tell the mother of sick berth attendant that her son was dead on return to GB; reasons for return to GB, summer 1941. Recollections of operations as ordnance artificer aboard HMS Petard, 12th Destroyer Flotilla in GB coastal waters and Mediterranean, 1/1942-12/1943: drafting to stand by destroyer under construction at Newcastle upon Tyne, GB, 1/1942; anti-aircraft armament and problems of maintaining them; voyage from GB to Mediterranean via South Africa including reception in Durban, South Africa, 8/1942; sinking of submarine U-559 north east of Port Said, Egypt, 30/10/1942; reasons for posthumous award of the George Cross to Lieutenant Francis Fasson and Able Seaman Colin Grazier for boarding sinking submarine U-559, 30/10/1942.
REEL 4 Continues: sinking of Italian submarine Uarsciek after attempt to capture it off Benghazi, Libya, 15/12/1942; basing on Malta, 2/1943; obtaining rides in Bristol Blenheim Mk IV at RAF Luqa on Malta; interception of Italian ammunition ship SS Campo Basso off Kelibia, Tunisia, 4/5/1943; impressions of surrendered Italian warships, 9/1943; transporting General Dwight D Eisenhower from Malta to beach-heads on Sicily, Italy, 7/1943; contrast between Lieutenant David Dunbar-Nasmith and General Dwight D Eisenhower on board destroyer, 7/1943; participation in attempts to capture Dodecanese Islands, Greece, 10/1943.
REEL 5 Continues: escorting HMS Carlise from Dodecanese Islands, Greece to Alexandria, Egypt, 9/10/1943-10/10/1943. Aspects of operations as ordnance artificer aboard HMS Petard, 11th Destroyer Flotilla, Eastern Fleet in India Ocean, 1/1944-8/1944: move to Trincomalee, Ceylon; state of ship and crew after two years of operations in Mediterranean; torpedoing of SS Khedive Ismail by Japanese submarine I-27 in Indian Ocean, 12/2/1944; subsequent attacks on Japanese submarine I-27 and forcing it to surface, 12/2/1944; ramming of Japanese submarine I-27 by destroyer HMS Paladin, 12/2/1944; problems the ship had dealing with Japanese submarine I-27 and aftermath of the action, 12/2/1944; return to GB, 8/1944-9/1944. Aspects of period as petty officer ordnance artificer instructor at HMS Excellent, Whale Island, GB, 8/1944-12/1945: background to becoming an instructor; how he kept one jump ahead of his students; VE Day celebrations in Parliament Square, London, 8/5/1945; method of obtaining release from Royal Navy, 1/1946.
REEL 6 Continues: question of what he was Mentioned in Despatches for during naval service.
