National Museums Liverpool Blog - war

This Sunday a Radio 4 documentary, The Sinking of the Lancastria, will highlight the 70th anniversary of Britain's worst ever maritime disaster. The anniversary was also featured in the Today programme on Radio 4 this morning with interviews with some of the survivors who had gone to lay wreaths at the site of the sinking. It's worth taking a few minutes to listen again on the BBC website if you missed that.

Curator of maritime collections Ellie Moffat explains more about the tragedy:

Wrist watch owned by HMT Lancastria survivor Sidney H Dunmall. On display in Merseyside Maritime Museum, accession number MMM 1998.145.4

There were on board in excess of 5000 troops, as well as civilians and crew when Lancastria suffered heavy air attack. In what Winston Churchill described as "the most terrible disaster in our naval history," many thousands of lives were lost.

Merseyside Maritime Museum's 'Life at Sea' gallery on the first floor includes a display featuring Lancastria, as well as other merchant vessels usedto support military operations.

Amongst the objects on display is a wrist watch worn by Sidney H Dunmall, of the Royal Army Pay Corps, a survivor who leapt in to the sea to escape the sinking ship. It was donated to the museum by the HMT Lancastria Association.

Other items include a lunch menu dated 17 June 1940, a discharge book of Gerrard Walsh who was assistant butcher on board, and two miniature trophies owned by survivors Arthur Pownall and Corporal Bray of the Royal Engineers."

Veteran Wrens Eileen O’Conner and Stella Passey were in full uniform having attended the Royal Naval Association Annual Memorial and Veterans Day service.

They had come to the Museum especially to see ‘Never at sea’ a short performance that tells the story of Liverpool’s role in winning the Battle of the Atlantic and the vital role that Wrens under the street’s of the city.

At the close of the performance, roleplayer Emma Walmsley introduced Eileen and Stella to the rest of the audience as she felt that their contributions needed to be recognised especially in light of Armed Forces Day. The audience gave them a huge round of applause which they very much appreciated.

The Fort George refuelling two Royal Navy ships at sea. Image courtesy of the Liverpool Daily Post & Echo.

I have many memories of the 1982 Falklands War – the first fully-televised conflict, bringing the stark reality of vivid images of fighting to our homes.

I was a national news agency reporter at the time and covered political and other war-related issues. Ships came to the fore because of the huge distances involved.

Merchant ships and their crews were vital in the Falklands campaign. In recent years, however, the dramatic decline in the number of British ships and seafarers has placed this traditional defence role in doubt.

Britain’s Merchant Navy has traditionally been regarded as the fourth arm of defence along with the Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force. In both World Wars the merchant fleet played a crucial role in ensuring the country’s survival and eventual victory.

A photograph on display at the Merseyside Maritime Museum’s Life at Sea gallery shows the Royal Fleet Auxiliary (RFA) ship Fort George refuelling two Royal Navy ships at sea (pictured).

The RFA is a civilian-manned 22-ship fleet owned by the Ministry of Defence. It exists to supply and support Britain’s armed forces around the world. With about 800 officers and 1,400 ratings, it is the largest single employer of UK civilian seafarers.

In both World Wars many ships were converted for use as auxiliary warships, troop and hospital ships. Serving in the front line of Britain’s war effort, they frequently became prime targets for enemy attacks.

There are many items from troop and hospital ships on display in the museum. The RFA was established in 1905 to provide coaling ships for the Royal Navy when the British Fleet was the greatest in the world.

Replenishment at Sea (RAS) techniques were developed, especially by the United States Navy. RAS is the most important and vital role of RFA ships, which fly the Blue Ensign featuring a gold anchor.

Other merchant ships are hired by the Admiralty to assist in campaigns under Royal Navy orders. The roll-on, roll-off container ship Atlantic Causeway of the Atlantic Container Line (ACL) was one of 49 British-flagged ships in the Task Force sent to the Falklands.

On display is a plaque presented to the ship by the Admiralty Board in recognition of her role.

Two unique support ships in today’s fleet are the repair vessel Diligence and the aviation training ship Argus, a former roll-on, roll-off container ship. On active service Argus becomes a Primary Casualty Receiving Ship – the modern term for a hospital ship.

A new Maritime Tale by Stephen Guy appears every Saturday in the Liverpool Echo. A paperback – Mersey Maritime Tales (£3.99) – is available from the museum, newsagents, bookshops or from the Mersey Shop website (£1 p&p UK).

Officers and men from HM Trawler Northern Wave at Wallasey Dock. Image courtesy Liverpool Daily Post and Echo.

I recently appeared on the Liverpool KVFM community radio station hosted by local children and was asked why Liverpool suffered so many German air raids.

The answer was that the city was the main port for the convoys of merchant ships that brought vital supplies to Britain. Liverpool played a key part in the Battle of the Atlantic by serving as a base for escort ships defending the Second World War convoys.

Until mid-1941 only a small force of naval escort ships was based in Liverpool. A fleet of Fleetwood trawlers was established at Wallasey Dock, Birkenhead, for minesweeping and convoy escort work.

A group of destroyers was based in Gladstone Dock, Bootle. A few auxiliary merchant cruisers – fast, well-armed former liners taken over by the Navy – also sailed out of Liverpool on North Atlantic patrol duties.

From the summer of 1941, however, as more escort ships became available, the naval presence in port grew rapidly. Liverpool became one of the Royal Navy’s main escort bases for Atlantic convoys.

Eventually nearly 60 naval escort ships, excluding trawlers and other auxiliaries, sailed regularly from Liverpool. They ranged from destroyers and sloops to frigates and corvettes.

While Gladstone Dock supported by other docks provided berths for larger ships, many corvettes were based at Albert Dock. This is now the home of Merseyside Maritime Museum with its many convoy-linked displays in the Battle of the Atlantic gallery.

This 1945 photograph shows officers and men from HM Trawler Northern Wave at Wallasey Dock. Another image shows the armed merchant cruiser HMS Patroclus, formerly of the Blue Funnel Line, leaving the Mersey for escort duties in 1940.

Just five days later Patroclus was torpedoed and sunk by the notorious U99 submarine which sank 40 British and Allied merchant ships before being sunk by a British destroyer.

There is a photo of 19-year-old Nigerian seaman Douglas Memberre who was engaged as a steward’s boy on the Mattawin at Lagos in December 1941. Douglas survived after his ship was sunk by a U-boat in the North Atlantic in June 1942. He later returned to sea and eventually settled in Liverpool.

Merseyside became the main home of the Merchant Navy in wartime Britain. In 1939 Liverpool-owned and registered ships formed at least one-fifth of Britain’s entire ocean-going merchant fleet.

Many were taken over by the Government as armed merchant cruisers, troopships, hospital ships, assault vessels and other auxiliaries.

A new Maritime Tale by Stephen Guy appears every Saturday in the Liverpool Echo. A paperback – Mersey Maritime Tales (£3.99) – is available from the museum, newsagents, bookshops or from the Mersey Shop website (£1.50 p&p UK).

Image courtesy Liverpool Daily Post and Echo.

I am particularly moved by this story which graphically demonstrates the caring nature of people placed in extreme danger. We cannot comprehend what the victims of this disaster went through - many died but the surviving children were tenderly cared for as they awaited rescue.

The sinking of the passenger liner City of Benares with the loss of 81 of 100 children on board brought home the ruthlessness of German U-boat submarines to newspaper readers and radio listeners all over the world.

The 11,081-ton Ellerman Line ship left Liverpool on 13 September 1940 as leading vessel on the19-strong convoy OB213. Ninety of the child passengers were part of a government scheme to evacuate them from heavily-bombed British cities to the safety of North America.

On 17 September the convoy’s naval escort ships had left to accompany another convoy. Some hours later the City of Benares was spotted and torpedoed by the German U48 submarine.
 
There were more than 400 people on board and 250, including the children, were lost. As a result, the evacuation of children by sea was scrapped.

The attack came during a period of the Second World War known to the U-boat commanders as the Happy Time. This came after the fall of France in June 1940 when the Germans were able to use the French Atlantic ports as bases.

This allowed U-boats to reach far out into the Atlantic and the Mediterranean for the first time. Germany soon began to wage unrestrained U-boat warfare around Britain’s coast.
 
Despite the continuing shortage of submarines and air support, the U-boat fleet commanded by Rear Admiral Karl Dönitz became increasingly successful. For the first time, small U-boat pack attacks were used with devastating effect against still largely unprotected British convoys.

On display at Merseyside Maritime Museum’s Battle of the Atlantic gallery is a contemporary newspaper report of the City of Benares disaster under the headline “Hitler’s Worst Crime”.

A photograph (pictured) shows five of six boy survivors who were rescued after spending eight days in a crowded open lifeboat. They are pictured being given piggy-back rides by rescuing sailors.

Another shows a heroine of the disaster, accomplished classical pianist and music teacher Mary Cornish who had volunteered as a children’s escort. She was awarded the MBE for looking after the six small boys during their horrific lifeboat journey.

Miss Cornish, from London, calmed the terrified children by telling them: “It’s all right, it’s only a torpedo.”

A new Maritime Tale by Stephen Guy appears every Saturday in the Liverpool Echo. A paperback – Mersey Maritime Tales (£3.99) – is available from the museum, newsagents, bookshops or from the Mersey Shop website (£1.50 p&p UK).

Copyright Lee Doherty

Emma Walmsley from the Maritime Museum's Education team has just introduced a new character to her repertoire of historical figures. Here she describes how she researched and prepared the performance in order to make it as true to life as possible:

I play a fictional Wren, May Hatton, based in the secret underground HQ at Derby House which was responsible for co-ordinating the convoys bringing our supplies into the port and for training escort commanders in tactics for contending with the U-Boat threat.

I began researching the subject and the character in the spring, including asking on the blog for contact details of anyone who actually was in the Wrens at this time. After this request went out, I received a response from a lovely lady who was a Wren in the Isle of Man who came into the museum and gave me some wonderful stories and advice. Then came the script writing and finally the piece was finished off and rehearsed with a freelance director.

The next performances now are scheduled for 3, 17 and 24 January - with British Sign Language interpretation at the 2.30pm performance on 17 January - so feel free to pop along and have a look! You can see full details on the Maritime Museum's events and activities page."