大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War Site by Ann Wedgwood of 大象传媒 Radio Cornwall Action CSV on behalf of John Libby the author,and has been added to the site with his permission.The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

This is the true story of a ship named the 'Gloucester City' which was loading ammunition in Fowey to take to France during the second world war.
One summer afternoon a group of children from Fowey Grammar School were at Whitehouse taking part in what the timetable,somewhat optimistically termed 'Swimming Lesson'.On that particular afternoon the 'instruction' was somewhat rudely interrupted when a Geman aircraft let loose a string of bombs at the Gloucester City which was moored under the hills roughly opposite the Fowey Gallants Sailing Club.She had almost finished loading and,had she been hit,the port of Fowey would have a very different look, as the town would have been virtually destroyed.As it was,the blast from the bombs was deflected from the hills, travelled across the water and broke almost every shop window in Fore Street.My after- school activity on that day was to help my father board up the damaged windows to effect some security until the glass was replaced.I will never forget Fore Street covered in a carpet of glass from Trafalgar Square to Custom House Hill.

Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch(not pronounced like a sofa he used to say!)was in his garden working,as was the gardener Joe Welsh who was deaf.Miraculously no one was killed, but Joe was heard to say afterwards that he had heard a noise for the first time in years.

We jump ahead some months now to the winter.One day my aunt,who lived at 1 Cobbs Well,told my father that there was a damp patch on the bedroom wall.She asked if,when he was travelling in her direction with his ladder,he would look at the gable end wall to see if anything were amiss.On investigation he found a scar on the exterior wall and on closer investigation found and dug out a piece of iron which turned out to be a piece of shrapnel,the size of the palm of my hand(and I have got quite large hands!).This find was examined by all the local experts,and it was decided that it was a piece of one of the bombs that was dropped in the attack on the Gloucester City.To those who lived at that time it weighed about one and a half pounds but to those who are younger and wish to be European politically correct,it would be nearly seven hundred grams.
Consider the power of the explosion to propel it across the harbour past the church tower and still have enough force to penetrate the wall and cause damp to enter.Small wonder so many windows were broken and how fortunate the ship itself was not hit.At the time of the event the local pundits were convinced that the Gloucester City was carrying bullion as it would have been unwise to have advertised the true nature of the cargo.Was it a random attack by the Germans or did they know more than we did about what was happening?
Within the last couple of years the concluding part of the story emerged.

During the war years I lived at 17 Lostwithiel Street and directly opposite was a Bed and Breakfast establishment,run by Mrs Flo Hawke and her daughter.One day when the daughter,Felicia,was cleaning the bedrooms,she noticed a case under the bed in one of the rooms.Out of idle curiosity she opened the case and immediately became suspicious of the contents.Her father Bill,who was too old for the regular forces but was a military policeman in Fowey,was informed.He quickly realised that the contents of the case was none other that a radio transmitter.The'guest'was arrested and it transpired that she was indeed a German spy and that she had an accomplice who was working as a crew member on the Gloucester City.He too was arrested on the road to Mevagissey,I believe.That is just about it,the pundits were wrong and the Gemans did know more about it than we did.It was not a chance strike but a deliberate attack on what was a legitimate war time target.
To me the tail piece is rather depressing and extremely disappointing.After years of keeping pieces of shrapnel I finally decided that this piece had such a fascinating story attached to it that it should be put in the town museum.I gave it to someone who was acquainted with the story, to put with other artifacts connected with the history of Fowey.Sadly it never arrived.

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