大象传媒

My dad left HMS Snapper on the 30th February 1941 to go on a well earned shore leave he had arranged for himself and his pal L/Stoker Bell, to spend a weekend in Portsmouth with their wives, as Stoker Bell had to go back out on patrol with HMS Snapper afater the weekend was over. My mother and father were going home to Sheffield as he was due extra leave.

My father said that his pal's wife and baby arrived for their weekend together and my mother and father stayed in the hotel room the first night to give his pal chance to go out for the night, whilst they looked after his baby.

Dad said there was a religious painting on the wall of this room and the eyes on it seemed to follow them all around the room. My mother was so upset by it that they turned it around on the wall. The next day, the Bells stayed in and told dad on his return that they had an awful feeling that they were being watched and he had cut himself of the hpicture trying to turn it round. They opened up a small locked room behind the wall with the picture on, and found it contained dozens of religious paintings and paintings of ship wrecks.

When the weekend was over, they went their separate ways and dad said he would see his pal when his leave was over. When mum and dad went back to Sheffield, the Sheffield War Relief Fund presented dad with a wireless set to take back to the men on HMS Snapper.

The submarine went back out on patrol whilst dad was on leave. It never came back. It was lost with all hands on the 10th or 12th of February 1941 in the Bay of Biscay only ten days after dad had left her. He was the only member of the crew who survived. He never forgot his pal, or that leave or the submarine HMS Snapper.

漏 Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.