Help required with service record of CPO George William King R.N. Service Number: 136258

[JohnH]

I'm researching the RN service record of CPO George William King R.N. Service Number: 136258 born on 3 January 1871 in Kensington, Middlesex.

He had involvement in two fatal explosions at Lerwick, one in 1915 and other in 1918.

He died following a explosion on board HMT Tenby Castle on 7 February 1918, in Lerwick harbour in the Shetland Islands.

I'm looking for some assistance on his service record in the lead up to the Great War and the during 1914.  I'm trying to figure out how long he trained to be a Torpedo Instructor (T.I.) prior to his posting to Shetland. He was posted to HMS VERNON, the Royal Navy's Torpedo Branch, for the period 2 Aug and 19 Oct. 1914. I'm assuming this is for training? 

I have information about his service when he is posted to Lerwick on I January 1915 (MFA ZARIA). Upon his posting to Lerwick in January 1915, CPO George W King R.N. Service Number: 136258 was appointed to the post of Torpedo Gunners Mate (rank T.I. ) with responsibility for fitting Modified Sweeps and T.N.T charges to armed Trawlers from the Northern Trawler Flotilla. He was in charge of a rented naval store containing explosives which blew up following a fire on 12 April 1915.

Source Reference:  ADM 1/8437/320 -  Report of Enquiry held on 26 April 1915 into Fire in Explosive Store at Lerwick on 12 April 1915.

Photo of aftermath: 

Shetland Museum and Archives::Aftermath of explosion

I have attached an extract from his service record for the period I'm interested in. 

[horatio2]

1 hour ago, JohnH said:

He was posted to HMS VERNON, the Royal Navy's Torpedo Branch, for the period 2 Aug and 19 Oct. 1914. I'm assuming this is for training? 

The Sub Ratings column of his record shows that he qualified TI during his earlier service. As an experienced torpedo senior rate and RFR pensioner he was borne supernumerary on the books of VERNON. This period could well have been used to update his skills and to acquaint him with developments since his discharge to pension in early 1911.

It is interesting to note that he was then discharged SHORE for five weeks during which he may have been in Portsmouth Dockyard - the record is very hard to read.

[JohnH]

1 hour ago, horatio2 said:

It is interesting to note that he was then discharged SHORE for five weeks during which he may have been in Portsmouth Dockyard - the record is very hard to read.

@horatio2, thanks for the explanation of the Sub Ratings column of his record. I have found a George William King aged 40 in the 1911 Census as a Navy Pensioner and Boarder at 131 Martins Road, Mile End, Portsmouth. It states he was single. He was married at the time of his death in 1918 to a Rosalie King. I wonder if the Shore leave was to get married prior to Shetland posting? I've not found his marriage yet. 

Edited 20 August , 2023 by JohnH

[RNCVR]

CPO King was promoted to Warrant Officer - see note "Officers Sect(ion) List 14/4 at bottom. Date likely 7 Aug 1916. I expect as a Gunner(T).

Thus he should have a file in ADM 196 series.

Also he might have an RN LS medal - entry right side appears to be Traced(Medal) but rest of entry is obscured. It could also read Traced Pension with a date.

[horatio2]

Just now, JohnH said:

I wonder if the Shore leave was to get married prior to Shetland posting?

"Shore" means thathe was actually discharged from the Service. It has nothing to do with shore leave, which is never noted in ADM 188 ledger records.

[KizmeRD]

14 hours ago, RNCVR said:

CPO King was promoted to Warrant Officer - see note "Officers Sect(ion) List 14/4 at bottom. Date likely 7 Aug 1916. I expect as a Gunner(T).

Thus he should have a file in ADM 196 series.

He was promoted to Temporary Gunner T on 7th August,1916. (reference ADM 196/157/427).

Details of his death (as recorded in Tenby Castle logbook) as follows…

Naval-History.net
7th February 1918.
Kirkwall to Lerwick
Lat 60.1, Long -1.1
8.00am: Passed Bard Head, handed log and proceeded towards wharf
9.00am: Made fast alongside Alexandra Wharf
10.40am: Proceeded to cast off moorings to pass through N boom for gun practice and test towing charges; 1st Lieutenant of Base, torpedo gunner and assistant on board
11.15am: Put out starboard towing charge off Rova Lighthouse
11.20am: Starboard towing charge missed fire; disconnected and taken on board
11.30am: Port towing charge put out
11.35am: Port towing charge missed fire; proceeded to take on board, electric wires to battery disconnected
11.50am: Commenced gun practice with 12-pounder gun
12.15pm: Finished practice with 12-pounder; 11 rounds fired
12.20pm: Commenced practice with 3-pounder
12.35pm: Finished practice with 3-pounder,16 rounds fired, and proceeded to drifter; 1st Lieutenant of Base went on board drifter
12.45pm: Proceeded into harbour
1.15pm: Made fast alongside HM Whaler Belinda
5.00 p.m.: Torpedo gunner and assistants testing wires to towing charges; wires disconnected from starboard towing charge
4.30pm: Starboard towing charge exploded
Torpedo Gunner W King, two assistants and Leading Seaman Brown killed
Vessel's stern badly damaged, depth charges, boat, sail on mainmast blown away
Compasses, barometer and searchlight broken
Skipper Curtis, two engineers, cook and 1 deck hand being treated on shore for shock.

@JohnH - Going back to the first incident in Lerwick on 12th April 1915, what was the source of the mysterious fire per the enquiry report (ADM 1/8437/320)?

 

The men killed were:

Brown, Charles S, Deck Hand, RNR, DA 12321

Green, Robert H, Wireman 2c, M 26431

Johnston, John, Seaman, RNR (Shetland Section) L367

King, George W, Act/Gunner

MB

Edited 21 August , 2023 by KizmeRD

[horatio2]

Having no wartime sea service, he was entitled to the British War Medal only. This (in the rank of Gunner RN) was claimed by and issued to his widow.

[horatio2]

4 hours ago, KizmeRD said:

1.15pm: Made fast alongside HM Whaler Belinda

A mistake in the log, I think. There was no BELINDA in the WW1 Naval Service. Admiralty whalers were all named after whales (surprise!). I believe the whaler in this incident was HMS BELUGA or HMS BALAENA, both boats based on HMS AMBITIOUS.

Edited 21 August , 2023 by horatio2
Spelling BALAENA

[KizmeRD]

I concur, most definitely BELUGA. Probably just a transcription error. 
MB

Edit. I stand corrected - See JohnH’s post below.

Edited 21 August , 2023 by KizmeRD

[JohnH]

31 minutes ago, horatio2 said:

I believe the whaler in this incident was HMS BELUGA or HMS BALENA, both boats based on HMS AMBITIOUS.

The Weekly Report of Proceeding of Auxiliary Vessels for w/e 9 Feb. 1918 at Lerwick lists the whaler HMS BALAENA among list of infective ships along with the TENBY CASTLE. I assumed that minor repairs to BALAENA related to the explosion. 

You will note that there was a Court of Enquiry held on 8 Feb. 1918 into the explosion on board the TENBY CASTLE. I have been unable to locate it at TNA. My grandfather served on her at this time. 

Source: ADM 137 944  Auxiliary Patrol, Weekly Reports, Shetlands, February 1918

 

[horatio2]

59 minutes ago, JohnH said:

My grandfather served on her at this time.

Slight confusion - does this refer to Gunner KING? If so,KING did not serve in TENBY CASTLE. It is clear from his ADM 196 record and the TENBY CASTLE log that he was embarked in that trawler as a 'day runner' passenger for a couple of hours only, for the puspose of testing towing charges. He was not a member of the ship's company. Perhaps your GF was another rating who was drafted to TENBY CASTLE?

Edited 21 August , 2023 by horatio2

[JohnH]

1 minute ago, horatio2 said:

Slight confusion - does this refer to Gunner KING? I

No, my grandfather (John Henderson) served a served as Deckhand from 7 June 1916 to 28 August 1918 on HMT Tenby Castle.

 

[JohnH]

4 hours ago, KizmeRD said:

1.15pm: Made fast alongside HM Whaler Belinda
5.00pm: Torpedo gunner and assistants testing wires to towing charges; wires disconnected from starboard towing charge
4.30pm: Starboard towing charge exploded
Torpedo Gunner W King, two assistants and Leading Seaman Brown killed
Vessel's stern badly damaged, depth charges, boat, sail on mainmast blown away
Compasses, barometer and searchlight broken
Skipper Curtis, two engineers, cook and 1 deck hand being treated on shore for shock.

There was a Court of Enquiry held on 8 Feb. 1918 into the explosion on board the TENBY CASTLE. I have been unable to locate it at TNA. 

The only other written account of this explosion appears in legal correspondence regarding damage claims from the Lerwick Harbour Trust (LHT) who owned Alexandra Wharf, the location of 1918 explosion.  The letter is from the LHT Clerk to their solicitors in 1922. I have attached a copy.

source:   TS 32 19A Explosion at naval store at Lerwick, 1915-24

[horatio2]

Most interesting. Thanks for posting.

The casualty list is remarkably small given the scale of the explosion.

[JohnH]

1 hour ago, horatio2 said:

The casualty list is remarkably small given the scale of the explosion.

@horatio2 Yes, its remarkable. The only other account of this explosion was from a Shetland gentleman aged 85 in a recorded BBC Radio Shetland interview in 1989. He had been a 14 year old boy at the time of the 1918 explosion. Here is a transcript of his conversation   

There was a naval base at Lerwick, of course, and there was a big explosion there, two big explosions at Lerwick. Ammunition blew up. One on the pier in a shed and the next time it was on a trawler. My brother and I were coming out on bikes fae Lerwick on the afternoon that this happened. We’d been down at the side of the trawler and seen her, it was a trawler called the Tenby Castle. And dey wir workin wi depth charges, very lucky we wirna dere. An we wir  coming up,  you know the brae that comes up the Sound Brae (about 1 mile away), when the earth shook beneath our feet with a tremor. We looked around, there was a billow of black smoke goin up above Lerwick. When we got the Scalloway we heard what had happened, of course. A depth charge had burst upon a trawler and blown the stern off it and killed a lot o men. That thing happened, of course.

TENBY CASTLE usually had a crew of 14. (source: The Best Small-Boat seamen in the Navy. By David and Ean Parsons). 

2 Crew were killed during the explosion: 

Brown, Charles S, Deck Hand, RNR, DA 12321

Johnston, John, Seaman, RNR (Shetland Section) L367

Skipper Curtis, two engineers, cook and 1 deck hand being treated on shore for shock. 

That leaves 7 other crew members that were uninjured. 

[KizmeRD]

I located a copy of the the original logbook which interesting to compare against the narrative published on naval-histoty-net (in view of transcription errors).

http://oldweather.s3.amazonaws.com/ADM 53-62582/ADM 53-62582-015_0.jpg

MB

[JohnH]

Thanks @KizmeRD. I should have it put it up before. 

The use of towing charges are only mentioned on 1st Feb 1918 and on 8th Feb 1918 per the transcripts of the original logbook for the TENBY CASTLE during the period from 23 Dec 1917 to 8 Feb 1918.  What I don't know if the operation of towing charges on TENBY CASTLE was some type of trial. 

[KizmeRD]

I think that (at this stage in the war) what is being referred to here is ‘The submarine sweep as fitted on trawlers’ which was never very popular, owing to considerable safety concerns. It developed from the earlier minesweeping paravane invented by Dennis Burney at HMS Vernon, and was basically a normal paravane adapted to become an ASW weapon by packing the nose with TNT and towing it behind either a destroyer (high-speed sweep), or behind an auxiliary patrol trawler (slow-speed adaptation) in the hope that the sweep wire would snag against a U-boat, drag the paravane into contact, and then detonate. The biggest danger was always recovering the submarine sweep after use (if it hadn’t already exploded), as it automatically armed itself once in the water (by use of an impeller fuse), and remained armed thereafter - making it rather ‘interesting’ to bring back onboard, especially in rough weather.

https://archive.org/details/finddestroyantis0000mess/page/75/mode/1up?q=Paravane

MB

 

 

Edited 21 August , 2023 by KizmeRD

[JohnH]

On 21/08/2023 at 06:40, KizmeRD said:

10.40am: Proceeded to cast off moorings to pass through N boom for gun practice and test towing charges; 1st Lieutenant of Base, torpedo gunner and assistant on board

 

Thanks @KizmeRD for the manual.

Do you think its possible to identity 1st Lieutenant of Base (Lerwick) H.M.S. Ambitious on the 7th Feb. 1918. from the Navy List.

[KizmeRD]

It’s most likely that the First Lieutenant of the AP base at Lerwick at the time of the ‘Tenby Castle’ explosion was Ty. Lt. Colin Campbell MacPhail RNR.

MB

[horatio2]

Certainly a possibility. The TENBY CASTLE log names him embarking on 21 February 1918 for a compass check. Not surprising as Lt MacPhail was a navigation (N) specialist. For the earlier sweep trial I would have expected a gunnery (G) specialist to embark rather than an (N) but that is surmise.

Navy Lists do not normally identify First Lieutenants and their identity  has to be assumed, in most cases.

I do not have online access to a a February 1918 monthly Navy List, the closest being for December 1918. This does, however, list several RNVR and RNR officers who were serving in AMBITIOUS (the Lerwick base) in January/February 1918. The date against each name is their date of joining at Lerwick. [N.B. AMBITIOUS was the nominal ship for the Lerwick base from 26 January 1918, so some officers would have joined the previous Lerwick base ship HMS BRILLIANT.] Take your pick from the December 1918 AMBITIOUS list.:-

https://digital.nls.uk/british-military-lists/archive/92326550

[KizmeRD]

The logbook entry in relation to the earlier gunnery practice and sweep trial certainly makes it clear that ‘1st Lt. of base’ was embarked on Tenby Castle (in order to observe the exercise). And since the only fully qualified gunnery officer on the staff was Lt. Cdr. Edward Foster RNVR, I’m now inclined towards him being the more likely candidate to have been the designated First Lieutenant at Lerwick AP base (as h2 surmises).

MB

[JohnH]

8 minutes ago, KizmeRD said:

And since the only fully qualified gunnery officer on the staff was Lt. Cdr. Edward Foster RNVR, I’m now inclined towards him being the more likely candidate to have been the designated First Lieutenant at Lerwick AP base (as h2 surmises).

Thanks @KizmeRD I think you are spot on here.

Here his service record per ADM 337/117/238, which mention role with Aux. Patrol vessels gunnery.