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Merchant Navy Recollections from a Chelsea Pensioner

Chelsea Pensioner Mr Jim Wilson
visited
Thetford Grammar School

Wednesday 25 April 2007

Chelsea Pensioner Mr Jim Wilson, resplendent in his scarlet uniform coat, with the Atlantic Star, the Italy Star and the Norwegian War Medal amongst his medals, visited Thetford Grammar School to talk to GCSE and A Level Historians about his experience during the Second World War in the Merchant Navy. He also told the pupils something about his current life as an In Pensioner at the Royal Hospital Chelsea.

Mr Wilson was at sea from 1942 to 1945 in a variety of merchant vessels. His first ship, the RFA Dinsdale, was specially designed as a fuel replenishment vessel for Royal Navy submarines. However, the first submarine she met was Italian. It took five torpedoes to sink the Dinsdale, despite her deadly cargo of fuel oil. Mr Wilson then spent seventeen days in the Atlantic in an open boat living on meagre rations until he and his shipmates were rescued by a Spanish ship. Eventually Mr Wilson managed to get home to Belfast where he soon signed on for another ship to continue his career at sea. After more voyages in the Atlantic he joined a Norwegian ship in the Mediterranean where he saw out his war service.

After the war Mr Wilson joined the British Army and saw service with the 7th Parachute Regiment Royal Horse Artillery.

We are most grateful to Mr Wilson, who spoke to both groups for about an hour each, for making the journey from Chelsea to visit the school and for sharing with us his experiences as a veteran of the Merchant Navy in the Second World War.

David Seymour
Education Consultant to the Federation of Merchant Mariner

Second Radio Officer EDWARD RUSSELL CAMPBELL, aged 17.
Commemorated on Tower Hill Memorial, London, Panel 46, and on the Second World War Memorial and in the Memorial Book at Thetford Grammar School, Norfolk. Son of Mrs S Taylor (deceased)

First Radio Officer MAX REGINALD GERARD, aged 18.
Commemorated on Tower Hill Memorial, London, Panel 46. Son of Reginald and Maud Helen Gerard, of Dollis Hill, Middlesex.

Greaser FRANK ROBERTS, aged 56
Commemorated on Tower Hill Memorial, London, Panel 46.

If anyone knows of other places of commemoration, such as their home town or village, for Max and Frank we would be pleased to hear from them.

Visit of Merchant Navy Veteran Peter Swinscoe

to GCSE History Class

Friday 4 May 2007

Merchant Navy Veteran Peter Swinscoe visited Thetford Grammar School on 4 May 2007 to share some of his memories of life at sea during the Second World War with Year 10 History students whose GCSE course includes a module on World War Two.

Peter’s talk, which lasted for about an hour, began with some remarks about his life in south-east London when he was the same age as his audience, about fifteen years old. Everyone knew that war was coming, he said, because of the preparations being made with regard to gas masks and air raid shelters. On returning home with his family from a summer holiday on the Kent coast he found that his school had been evacuated and going out to work seemed like a better option than trying to find and return to school. As the war progressed Peter sought to make his contribution and, opting for the Merchant Navy, soon found himself one of the trainees aboard the Training Ship Vindicatrix moored at Sharpness on the Gloucester and Sharpness Canal. Following a thorough training there he returned to London to seek employment on for his first ship. He was given a travel warrant for Swansea and sent in search of the 6,574 gross tons Elder Dempster Line ship New Columbia. He arrived as she had finished taking on board her cargo of coal for West Africa. She sailed the next day to join a convoy collecting in the Clyde with Peter as a Deck Boy. In West Africa her cargo of coal was exchanged for mahogany logs and the New Columbia sailed, only to meet, at 2124 hours on 31 October 1943, U-68 which put two torpedoes into her. There was plenty of time for all of the crew to take to the lifeboats. U-68 surfaced and approached the lifeboats. Her captain, Lt. Lauzemis, asked if there was sufficient water and food and wished the survivors good luck. The survivors were spotted by an RAF aircraft and were picked up the next day by a Belgian ship and taken into Lagos.

Peter then spoke of his time on the Empire Halberd, a merchant ship which had been converted into a Landing Ship Infantry for use in the D-Day landings on the shores of Normandy in June 1944. The ship carried a dozen landing craft which were lowered to take troops ashore. Peter made several trips to the beaches on the Empire Halberd.

Peter had sent notes and a deck plan of the New Columbia to school prior to his visit so that the pupils could be briefed before the talk, and this was found to be very helpful.

We are very grateful to Peter for travelling to Thetford, from his home in Suffolk, to share his memories with us. To meet veterans adds significantly to the understanding which pupils develop of the Second World War.

At just over 4,000 gross tons the Empire Toucan had a speed of 11 knots. She was originally named Freeport Sulphur No. 5., being built in Britain in 1920 for the Freeport Sulphur Company of New York. This company used her for the transport of sulphur on the east coast of the United States of America. She was laid up in 1939 but was then chartered on12 June 1940 by the Ministry of War Transport and renamed Empire Toucan.

The Reardon Smith Line was given the job of managing the new acquisition whose career under her new name was to be so brief. On 29 June 1940 she was shelled by U-47 and then torpedoed south-west of Ireland. Thirty-one of the ship’s company survived, including the Captain, Hywell Tudor Thomas. All of these men were rescued by HMS Hurricane.

Three of the crew did not survive: Greaser Frank Roberts, First Radio Officer Max Gerard, and Second Radio Officer Edward Campbell.