When the Phoney War turned horribly real
IT was still the period of the so-called Phoney War, those last few months of 1939 when Britain held its breath.
Air raids had still to begin in earnest; only the war at sea was tangibly under way, German U-boats having already claimed thousands of tons of British merchant shipping.
Suddenly, the conflict erupted literally on Tyneside's doorstep when, over the night of December 12-13, five German destroyers laid mines in and around the river mouth. The consequences were devastating.
Their first casualty was the trawler William Hallet, which went down with the loss of eight lives, nearly all of them men from North and South Shields.
Four trawlers in all were lost in just three days.
Says Norman Holland: "It seems to me that after the William Hallett went down, it must have been hell for those men sailing out of the Tyne piers, knowing that there were mines out there and never knowing if or when they, too, were going to go up with a bang."
Norman has been researching the story of that night, for among the casualties of the William Hallett was his father, also called Norman, who, at the time, lived in Northumberland Square at North Shields. He was fireman aboard the vessel.
The William Hallett was a 202-ton Strath-class steam trawler, built in 1919 by Forest, Rennie.
She was sold in 1921 and, prior to the Second World War, was registered at the Port of London and listed as belonging to Messrs TB Bilton and Son of North Shields.
In November 1939, she was requisitioned by the Admiralty and converted to an armed patrol vessel/minesweeper.
When she went down, she was approximately three nautical miles east of Whitley Bay, in 38 metres of water.
Says Norman: "She was dived on by a small team in 2003. They found that forward of the boiler was reasonably intact but listing to starboard, while aft of the boiler is smashed to pieces and mostly buried."
Missing deck lights indicate that the wreck had probably been dived by others.
The mines had been laid by the destroyers Hermann Knne, Friedrich Ihn, Erich Steinbrinck, Richard Beitzen and Bruno Heinemann.
A record of what happened was left by one survivor, first engineman Charles Hobson, 42, from Sunderland.
He recalled that there were two explosions, with about half an hour between them.
The first explosion seemed to lift the ship slightly out of the water.
No one was hurt and no damage seemed to have been done to the boat.
Thirty minutes later, however, there was a tremendous bang which blew the ship to smithereens.
The trawler was then going down rapidly when two of the crew, Andrew Theodovakis and Charles Hobson, were washed off the deck.
The last time Andrew Theodovakis was seen, he was clinging to an old oil drum in the sea.
In subsequent days, the William Hallett was followed by the loss of the James Ludford, sunk by a mine off the Tyne on December 14; the Evelina, also sunk off the Tyne, probably by a mine, on December 16, and the Sedgefly, again sunk in Tyne waters, also on December 16.
Lost from the Willam Hallet were:
Skipper Charles Hannant, 37 Reay Street, South Shields.
Fireman Norman R Holland, 32 Northumberland Street, North Shields.
Second Engineman Andrew Theodovakis, 32 Dockwray Square, North Shields.
Second Hand Albert 'Bertie' Cole, Hylton Terrace, North Shields.
Third Hand Robert Lindores, 30 Park Terrace, North Shields.
Deck Hand Gavin Lindores, 133 Linskill Street, North Shields.
Deck Hand C Addison, South Shields.
Cook J Young, South Shields.
Today they are commemorated on the Second World War memorial situated on the River Mersey at Liverpool.
This lists all those merchant seamen, and their ships, who were lost at sea while serving with the Royal Navy between 1939 and 1945.
The memorial consists of a circular column, faced in Portland stone, on a raised semi-circular platform. On its summit is a device of reflecting lenses, suggestive of a beacon.
Set in recesses in the wall are bronze panels that bear the names of more than 1,300 casualties.
At the base of the column is the inscription: "These officers and men of the Merchant Navy died while serving with the Royal Navy and have no grave but the sea. 1939-1945."
Norman, who used to live in North Shields before moving to Jarrow in the mid-1950s, spent many years trying to find a photograph of the William Hallett and has only recently managed to turn one up.
Seen here, it was taken at Milford Haven during the seamen's strike in 1932, prior to the vessel being owned by TB Bilton.
It's reproduced here from a photo supplied by Keith Morgan on the marvellous Milford trawlers website, which you can visit by clicking on this link.
"I am sure a number of people will get pleasure from knowing that a picture is available," says Norman.
"And if any reader has other photographs of the William Hallett, I would be delighted to have access to copies."
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Thursday 24 May 2012
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