大象传媒

Our ship, the SS Cree (2,750 tonnes) sailed from Middlesbrough on 6th January,1940 to Narvic, Norway for an iron ore cargo. This was just three weeks before my 18th birthday and it was already my fourth ship since becoming a ships cook after leaving school aged 14.

Going in and out of Narvic we sited a German merchant ship lying at anchor.

Nearing Peterhead on 9th February we were straffed by a German Heinkel aeroplane and luckily didn't get a direct hit but we suffered quite a lot of damage from near misses. Our radio operator had just got an SOS message away, and left his office when it, part of the bridge, and the number 2 hatch were blown to pieces.

We were sailing alone, not in a convoy and being unarmed could do nothing to protect ourselves. A Spitfire aeroplane and a naval destroyer were soon at our service and a German plane was shot down.

We were towed into Peterhead for repair afterwards proceeding south to Methil in Fife to join a convoy going south again to our homeport Middlesbrough.

When we arrived we were questioned about another ship which sailed from Narvick a few days before us and had not been seen, or heard of since sailing. It seemed as if German bombers had sunk it with all hands. The belief was the German ship moored in Narvic was a look-out passing intelligence on sailings to the Luftwaffe pilots.

I left the SS Cree on 16th February, 1940.

See also other stories being filed of my time at sea - I was finally captured off Trinidad when the SS Gracefield was sunk by a German raider, the MV Vir - and taken as a prisoner to Milag Nord, a prisoner of war camp for merchant seamen near Bremen in northern Germany. I stayed there for the rest of the war.

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