Stoker 1st Class HMS Hecla (F 20) + Bennett, John Frank, SANF 23 Engine Room Artificer 4th Class HMS Hecla (F 20) + Bicknell, Alfred, RN 41 Stoker 1st Class HMS Hecla (F 20) + … However, by late 1942, the U-boats began to concentrate in the mid-ocean again. Prentice, Commanding Officer, on the bridge of the corvette HMCS Chambly (K116) at sea, May 24, 1941. Nonetheless, serious equipment shortfalls remained, especially the lack of modern radar. The RCN was also short of destroyers and shipboard high frequency direction finding (HF/DF) radio-interception gear. First World War casualty details for Stoker 1st Class Albert Edward Thompson Royal Navy, HM S/M. Fortunately, all the escorts carried type 271 radar and by forming a tight barrier around the convoy they fought it through with only six ships lost. One was sunk by the RCAF early in the battle, while Restigouche used its HF/DF to help drive off shadowers. This section includes over 21.000 Allied Warships and over 11.000 Allied Commanders of WWII, from the US Navy, Royal Navy, Royal Canadian Navy, Royal Australian Navy, The Polish Navy and others. Herbert "Bert" Turner . They perfected systems for classifying bottomed contacts, including profiling them using their navigational echo sounder. Stoker Albert Beaver, the son of William Beaver and his wife of Oakham, was just a month over 17 years of age when he joined the 5th Leicestershire Regiment (Territorial Force) on the 15 May 1908. Douglas, who served as a stoker first class, saw battle all over the world, including Normandy and D-Day at Juno Beach. No naval counterattacks were effective against these two intrepid submariners. The veteran River-class destroyers were combined into groups EG-11 and -12 and assigned to work in the middle of the English Channel along with two British groups. Murray, Flag Officer Newfoundland, greets the crew of the destroyer Assiniboine at St. John’s after their sinking of U-210 on August 6, 1942; the ship’s captain, Lieutenant- Commander John Stubbs (right), would be lost with his next ship, Athabaskan. Tankers were prized targets and strategically placed in the centre of a convoy for maximum protection, but a skillful and daring U-boat captain could strike even at the heart of a convoy. Commander J.D. Indeed, it was. Even British staff officers concluded afterward, “Sackville’s two [sic, actually three] U-boats would have been a gift if it had been fitted with RDF [radar] type 271.”3. She understood that he died from oil that was in his lungs on 14.8.1941. It was not until November that the first U-boat kill fell to an RCN support group, when Snowberry of EG-5 sank U-536. When his group dissolved in August due to increased operational commitments, the Americans and British soon established the “Western Support Force” to fill the need. Cape Howe, Royal Navy Died on 21st June 1940, Aged 20 Commemorated Portsmouth Naval Memorial, Panel 42, Column 3. Through the fall of 1941, NEF operations remained plagued by poor equipment, too few destroyers and escort group commanders, no training, and an operational cycle between Newfoundland and Iceland that was unbearable as winter set in. Moose Jaw eventually rammed it, then used its guns to keep the Germans from manning their armament. All that Itchen ever found of the corvette was wreckage and a single man clinging to it: Polyanthus, too, had been completely destroyed by a single homing torpedo. 1940 photo of HMS Javelin showing stern entirely blown off Javelin participated in the Operation Ironclad assault on Madagascar in May 1942. In the last half of 1942, the RCN escorted 14 out of 24 slow eastbound convoys, while the RN protected the fast HX series. Only constant air patrols and operations by USN forces in deep water beyond the Canadian zone provided an effective check on U-boat depredations in the RCN’s own front yard in the last winter of the war. When the ship went into action, they could also be utilised with damage control parties for instance, passing vital information to combat floods and fires. Through most of 1942, with the U-boats attacking inshore, this was not a serious problem. Prime Ministers Winston Churchill and W.L. SC-107 pointed to the Canadians as the weak link in the mid-ocean. At the time of his death Stoker Rafferty was serving on the HMS Broke, with the HMS Attentive II as his home base. These problems were manifest in all the operations of the NEF, especially in the battle for SC-42 in September 1941.The slow eastbound convoy was escorted by the destroyer HMCS Skeena and three corvettes, with support from now-Commander Prentice’s training group, Chambly and Moose Jaw. On 17 December 1942, Winston Churchill made a formal request to the Canadian government asking that the C groups be withdrawn. The Royal Navy ranks can be an even more confusing prospect, given that records often listed a sailor’s trade as his rank, the two being used interchangeably. "Gloucester," 6th and 7th August, 1914:. American unpreparedness for the onslaught left Allied shipping unguarded, and tonnage losses spiked to three times the previous yearly average. No one in Ettrick knew what had struck it until the hull was examined in drydock and bits of U-1232 removed; the sub, however, survived. For their actions, Pickard received a Mention in Despatches and Spence received a Distinguished Service Medal. 29123 - 9 APRIL 1915 . By the time U-132 arrived in the St. Lawrence River in early July, traffic was moving in convoys. Meanwhile, British support groups, equipped with newer equipment and in some cases (like EG-2) directed by special intelligence, scored with greater ease. But it was not an easy or direct path. It was, in the end, a very small proportion of the 1,000 U-boats sunk by the Allies between 1939 and 1945, and a very modest portion of the 500 of these claimed by naval vessels. "Penarth." By creating an account you agree to us emailing you with newsletters and discounts, which you can switch off in your account at any time. U-165, informed of the convoy’s progress, later hit three ships in a submerged daylight attack. Some records are free to view but others are available on either a subscription or pay per Company, Highland Light Infantry of Canada Galt [H] Ableson Gordon L. Stoker First Class Royal Canadian Navy Galt [H] Adam Kenneth F. Pilot Officer Royal Canadian Air Force Elmira [H], Preston [R] … Stoker 1st Class SS/ 117522 Royal Navy H.M.S. The sinking of U-744 was a classic deep water ASW operation of the period: a large group of ships holding a deep contact, pounding it relentlessly with masses of depth charges and hoping that a lucky attack or sheer exhaustion in the submarine would end the action. In reaction, the RCN increased the size of escort groups, and scrambled to acquire new equipment like radiotelephones and radar. The Royal Navy in World War 2 was a huge and complex organisation spread all across the world. 100, 100A and 100B. For the operations round Antwerp from the 3rd to the 9th October: Naval Brigade. Meanwhile, the final German pack assault on the transatlantic convoys fizzled out, hounded and beaten by Allied naval and air power — and watched again from the sidelines by the RCN. In May 1941, the British asked them to fill that gap in transatlantic anti-submarine escort of convoys. Talking of artificers leads us quite nicely to the role of stoker, a trade which underwent a great deal of change when the switch from coal to oil fired boilers took place in the Royal Navy’s surface fleet. "A" … Flying Officer Royal Canadian Air Force Hespeler [R] Ball Robert G. Sergeant Bombardier Royal Canadian Air Force Preston [H] Ballantyne Archie M. Private 1st Battalion, Highland Stoker 1st Class. As with all of the Armed Services, potential recruits signed up to the Royal Navy with a good idea of what they wanted to do (their trade), sometimes based on their civilian work. Royal Navy H.M.S. The U-boat was subsequently abandoned and the RCN was awarded credit. Prior to oil fired boilers, stokers were primarily responsible for transporting and shovelling coal to the furnaces. This allowed contact to be maintained until the last possible moment, and eliminated the sudden burst of speed in the final attack run that would alert the U-boat. 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