大象传媒

This story is mainly concerning my brother, Arthur, who was enlisted into the Navy in 1940. He opted to serve on minesweepers of Coastal Command and served at various places around Europe and as far as Sierra Leone. He continued to serve on minesweepers until the end of the war in May 1945. In the following July, his ship was called to an exptremely dangerous situation off the coast of Cornwall, when mines were reported to have broken loose in a storm. His ship, the HMT Kurd, hit a mine and he was killed on 12 July, 1945, 2 months after the end of the war. It was believed to be the last minesweeper sunk in the war. I myself had been serving in the Army and was involved in the invasion of Normandy in June 1944.
This must have been a devastating shock to my parents, who, having believed that both sons had returned safely at the end of the war after 5 years of conflict, were to lose one.
The news of his death was such a shock to my wife, that our first son was born 2 weeks early, 4 days after the loss of my brother. At this time my brother was 28 years old and I was 23.

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