Ord Smn George BEACH RN died 12/01/1918

[christine liava'a]

Remembering Today:

Ord Smn George BEACH, J/40953 Royal Navy, HMS Opal who died aged 21 on 12.01.18. Portsmouth Naval Memorial, Hants, UK

A good name for a sailor!

Name: BEACH, GEORGE

Initials: G

Nationality: United Kingdom

Rank: Ordinary Seaman

Regiment: Royal Navy

Unit Text: H.M.S. "Opal."

Age: 21

Date of Death: 12/01/1918

Service No: J/40953

Additional information: Son of Thomas and Annie Beach, of Shepton Montague, Castle Cary, Somerset.

Casualty Type: Commonwealth War Dead

Grave/Memorial Reference: 29.

Cemetery: PORTSMOUTH NAVAL MEMORIAL

PORTSMOUTH NAVAL MEMORIAL

Country: United Kingdom

Locality: Hampshire

Visiting Information: A copy of the Memorial Register is kept at the Civic Offices in Guildhall Square and may be consulted there.

Location Information: The Memorial is situated on Southsea Common overlooking the promenade, and is accessible at all times.

Historical Information: After the First World War, an appropriate way had to be found of commemorating those members of the Royal Navy who had no known grave, the majority of deaths having occurred at sea where no permanent memorial could be provided. An Admiralty committee recommended that the three manning ports in Great Britain - Chatham, Plymouth and Portsmouth - should each have an identical memorial of unmistakable naval form, an obelisk, which would serve as a leading mark for shipping. The memorials were designed by Sir Robert Lorimer, who had already carried out a considerable amount of work for the Commission, with sculpture by Henry Poole.

After the Second World War it was decided that the naval memorials should be extended to provide space for commemorating the naval dead without graves of that war, but since the three sites were dissimilar, a different architectural treatment was required for each. The architect for the Second World War extension at Portsmouth was Sir Edward Maufe (who also designed the Air Forces memorial at Runnymede) and the additional sculpture was by Charles Wheeler, William McMillan, and Esmond Burton. Portsmouth Naval Memorial commemorates almost 10,000 sailors of the First World War and almost 15,000 from the Second World War

[christine liava'a]

HMS Opal, and HMS Narborough, British destroyers, ran ashore during a snowstorm, on South Ronaldsay, Orkney. There was only one survivor from the two ships.

Loss of HMS Opal and HMS Narborough

HMS Opal casualties

[Guest Pete Wood]

I urge readers to read a small website on the sinking of HMS Opal, to see what can be uncovered when carrying out research.....

http://www.kbrady.com/opal.html#Top

[Jonathan Saunders]

Christine you beaten me to it ... I think I get a credit on the translation of the casualty lists somewhere. I visited the rock face where the OPAL and NARBOROUGH ran ashore when visiting Brian Budge in the Orkeys (he collated/produced most of the info on those two links and is also related to Kieran Brady - RT's link) and it is pretty inhospitable looking and must have been terrible to try and get a foot hold in the snow blizzard of 12 Jan 1918.

I have also been in contact with William Sissons grandson - as I recall William made a full recovery and went onto serve until the late 20's ... I will have to dig out my correspondence on the loss of these two ships.

It was great to see an OPAL man being remembered today.

[HERITAGE PLUS]

The HMS OPAL men commemorated on the Portsmouth Naval Memorial are listed on this site:

Open Searching facility and enter OPAL in ships search.:

http://www.memorials.inportsmouth.co.uk/searching.htm#2