My Grandfather's Story

[Pappa]

My grandad wrote a short account of an experience he had as a gunner in the Merchant Navy, ferrying kids to the US during WWII. On one occasion his ship was bombed, the kids were all out on deck playing in the sun, and the bomb landed right in the middle of them, killing almost everyone. I'll see if I can get a copy of what he wrote.

Was that the incident mention in "The World at War" or a different one?

I have no idea. I've not seen "The World at War".

The voice over says "Children were shipped off to the supposed safety of Canada. This stopped when one of the ships was torpedoed with great loss of life." Give that this was the TV I can imagine they confused bombed with torpedoed.

I imagine it happened more than once. There were loads of ships taking kids over and other than their gunners, they were sitting ducks. Was it refugee ships that Churchill let get bombed to avoid giving away that Enigma was cracked?

[klr]

My grandad wrote a short account of an experience he had as a gunner in the Merchant Navy, ferrying kids to the US during WWII. On one occasion his ship was bombed, the kids were all out on deck playing in the sun, and the bomb landed right in the middle of them, killing almost everyone. I'll see if I can get a copy of what he wrote.

Was that the incident mention in "The World at War" or a different one?

I have no idea. I've not seen "The World at War".

The voice over says "Children were shipped off to the supposed safety of Canada. This stopped when one of the ships was torpedoed with great loss of life." Give that this was the TV I can imagine they confused bombed with torpedoed.

I imagine it happened more than once. There were loads of ships taking kids over and other than their gunners, they were sitting ducks. Was it refugee ships that Churchill let get bombed to avoid giving away that Enigma was cracked?

No, at that time of the war (1940) the British certainly hadn't made those sort of inroads into Enigma.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Was it refugee ships that Churchill let get bombed to avoid giving away that Enigma was cracked?

The legend that Coventry was sacrificed to protect Enigma is just that, a legend.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

No, at that time of the war (1940) the British certainly hadn't made those sort of inroads into Enigma.

[Pappa]

He was also present at the sinking of the Bismark. He didn't see it happen, but he was given charge of two German POWs with terrible cordite burns. He told me he was bollocked by a superior for playing poker with them when he should have been keeping them under armed guard. He said they were hardly capable of standing, let alone escaping.

[Ian]

Great story, Bella!

I like immigration stories like that. It makes me curious about my dad's family (Scotland/Jamaica/Norway-to-America). I'm inspired to go find out more about it.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Too Long: Read Every Word! Bella, that was incredible. It was a different world back then. I can't imagine myself going through all that. It made me blub. And then I rubbed my eyes with fingers that peeled garlic a couple of hours earlier and I really blubbed!

[Gawdzilla Sama]

My mother's paternal grandfather came over to escape The Troubles. He carried his carpenter tools and his wife carried a bag with all their clothes in it. Every time I want to bitch about not having some luxury I think to those two standing in line at Ellis Island, wondering if they were going to be sent back to "the old country", where he, at least, would have probably been killed on sight.

[Bella Fortuna]

Thanks, XC.

Funny thing is today I realised I have another, slightly longer version of this story with more detail that he added later - now, after I'd transcribed all that. I wish I'd found that first as it contains more anecdotes.

[LaMont Cranston]

I enjoyed that story very much. It really was a very different time, and it says a lot about the people who made the journey and did what it took to carve out a new life. It also reminded me a great deal of my family. My father's side came from Russia in 1905. My mother's side came from Lithuania. They ended up in Illinois.

Stories like that are also a reminder that even though the United States is a country beset with huge problems, it really has been the land of opportunities for many millions of people.

[Horwood Beer-Master]

I wish I knew more about my Nan. She grew-up in Saxony (Germany) but I know there's some Swiss and maybe Austrian involved in her background somewhere. We suspect she may have come from a family that wasn't poorly off, but her immediate family never saw any of this money if there was any (suggesting some kind of 'disgrace' for her branch of the family perhaps? Leaving them disinherited?). I know she came over to Britain aged 18 with her brother looking for work, but I don't know if that was the only reason (this was sometime between Hitler coming to power and the start of the war). During the war, like a lot of Germans in the UK, she was sent to live on the Isle of Man. Also, at some point during the war (I don't know whether this was while she was on Man, or not) she fell pregnant. All she ever told about the father was that he was a British soldier who was killed in the D-day landings, they never married, meaning that at the end of the war she was living in Britain as possibly two of the most unpopular things you could be at the time, an unmarried single mother, and a German.

The baby was my half-uncle Ian who now lives in Canada, later on she met and married my Grandfather (who I never knew), and who already had at least four (I forget exactly how many, I've never known them that well) kids from a previous marriage, and they then had three daughters, of whom my Mum was the middle one.