Description
Object description
British officer served with Merchant Navy aboard HMHS Aba in Mediterranean and Atlantic, 1941-1945
Content description
REEL 1 Background in Scarborough, GB, 1921-1937: family; education. Aspects of period as apprentice in Merchant Navy with Thomas and John Brocklebank Ltd, 1937-1940: background to joining company in 1937; attitude towards life at sea; learning seafaring and treatment; coping with sea sickness; outbreak of Second World War in Red Sea, 3/9/1939; refusal to attend gunnery course due to pacifist views; interview with board of Thomas and John Brocklebank Ltd in Cunard Building, Liverpool. Recollections of period as officer with Merchant Navy aboard HMHS Aba in Mediterranean, Atlantic and Arctic, 1941-1945: joining ship; description of ship; pacifist beliefs; duties as second mate; description of hospital ship's markings and status; transporting members of Friends Ambulance Unit; loading casualties at Tobruk, Libya.
REEL 2 Continues: disposing of wounded troops' weapons overboard; awareness of threat of torpedoing or mining of hospital ships; picking up survivors of HMHS Newfoundland off Italy, 3/9/1943; transporting American wounded from Algiers, Algeria to New York, US including fraternising with German submariners in Azore Islands; encounter with German aircraft in Mediterranean; story of encountering Italian hospital ship with decoy navigation lights in Mediterranean; relative's service with Merchant Navy including award of George Medal; witnessing HMS Warspite firing on German positions at Salerno, Italy, 9/1943; transporting wounded from Salerno, Italy, 9/1943; transporting Russian POWs from Trondheim, Norway to Murmansk, Soviet Union including contact with German troops in Tromso, Norway, 7/1945; reception on arrival in Murmansk, Soviet Union, 7/1945.
REEL 3 Continues: transporting Belgian civilians from Belgian Congo to Belgium, 7/1945-8/1945; work of ship in English Channel and North West Europe, 1944-1945; story of visit to family in Bremen who he had first stayed with in 1936, Germany, 6/1945; reaction to leaving ship; sight of wounded troops being taken aboard ship; treatment of wounded German POWs on board; facilities on board including padded cells for psychologically disturbed servicemen; incident of psychological disturbed patient who jumped overboard; presence of female nurses on board; attitude towards war service aboard ship; social activities; story of two musician servicemen who each lost a hand. Reflections on anti-war views: impact of war on pacifist views; father-in-law Corder Catchpool's conscientious objector experiences in First World War.
REEL 4 Continues: involvement of daughter Joanna Engelkamp with Greenham Common protest; attitude towards President George W Bush's plans for New Missile Defence system, 2001.