Cecil Douglas Brickell

[themonsstar]

Hi

I'am trying to get any info for Cecil D. Brickell, he was the senior wireless operator on the HMS Polesly. She was sunk on 20th Sept 1918 of the coast of Cornwall. The Master & 42 of the crew were drowned.

He join the Marconi Company in May 1917 where he was trained as a wireless operator and after gaining his P.M.G. certficate was alloted to serve on HMS Polesly. He was 17 years & 7 mouths old when he was killed.

He is not mentioned on any of the Dead Rolls to the Navy or Mercantile Marine but is in de Ruvigny's.

Do's any one have any more info on this Boy Cheers Roy

[kin47]

Hello

Cecil Douglas Brickell is the CWG in Merchant Navy. S.S. POLESLY was a merchant ship not one of HMSs. Shown as drowned on 21 Sep 18.

All best

don

[joseph]

Hi,

SS Polesley was sunk by U88

After almost a month of preparations, the U-boat returned to sea on 7 September for her final cruise as a unit of I U-Flotille Flandern. Following a long voyage through the North Sea, around the Orkney Islands, and down the west coast of Ire land, she reached her operations area off the northern part of France's west coast on 14 September. Two days later, she claimed her first victim of the patrol when she fired the torpedo which sank SS Philomel, a 3,050-ton British steamer traveling south in convoy with about 19 other ships. Three days later, she fired two torpedoes at a 30-ship convoy. Apparently both missiles hit the same ship, SS Fanny, a 1,484-ton Swedish steamer bound from England to Bordeaux with a cargo of 1,930 tons of coal. The following day, she began her long return voyage to Zeebrugge via the same route-around the British Isles and through the North Sea. En route home, shortly after midnight on 22 September, she encountered her last target, SS Polesley. In a surfaced attack, UB-88 scored a torpedo hit which sent the 4,221-ton British steamer to the bottom just off the coast of Cornwall. The submarine then resumed her course and entered Zeebrugge on 29 September. She remained there only overnight. The next day, she got underway to return to Germany. On 3 October, she arrived in Heligoland and joined her new unit II U-Flotille, Hochseeflotte (2d Submarine Flotilla, High Seas Fleet). She remained inactive-first at Heligoland and, then, at W ilhelmshaven-through the end of World War I.

Regards Charles

[joseph]

Roy,

IIRC the training records for the Marconi Company are held by Liverpool maritime museum, the last one I looked for that young turned out to be a boy scout, and was entitled to wear a wound badge.

Regards Charles

[Michael Lowrey]

There a typo in the beginning of Charles' answer. The submarine that sank Polesley was UB 88, not U 88.

Best wishes,

Michael

[themonsstar]

Thank you all for the Info cheers Roy